FAREWELL, GOOD NEIGHBOR

"We thank you for your servant [name], whose baptism is now complete in death."
—Reverend Sue Watkins

I don't even know what that means! I would reverse the terms: "whose death is now complete in baptism." (And, I would have said it at her baptism, not her funeral.) I believe baptism to be an act that brings about new life. Baptism kills the sinfulness within us, drowns our old self, even though the sin still exists, because Christ has not returned. We still have to die. The event just doesn't have the sting that it once did, because we have the promise of new life.

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"The cross , therefore, is not a punishment but an exercise and preparation for renewal. For when present sin is put to death and when in the midst of temptations we learn to seek the aid of God and experience God's presence, we acknowledge more and more the lack of trust in our own hearts and we encourage ourselves by faith. In this way, newness of spirit grows, as Paul says, "Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day" (2 Cor. 4:16)."
—page 214:151, Apology of the Augsburg Confession, "Article XII: Repentance," The Book of Concord: The Confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church

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I am tired of death. I am tired of being so close to it. Its immediacy. Its rawness. It is fraying my nerves. I am tense and on edge. I am not alone. I can sense the same in the wife and the child.

In October 2007, it was mourning the loss of a second pregnancy, and the death of the maternal grandmother. In February 2008, it was the death of the paternal grandfather. Today, it was the memorial service of a neighbor, a ninety-three-year-old woman, whom we have lived next to for the past six years.

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The wife discovered the neighbor lying in her driveway a week prior to her death. She was fiercely independent and had been raking leaves out of her driveway. Now, she couldn't walk. The wife carried her to her house and they pushed the button on her "emergency necklace." The wife waited with her until paramedics arrived and they transported the neighbor to the hospital.

A call from the neighbor's children, later in the day, informed us that the neighbor had suffered a stroke and broken her hip in the fall. Another call a few days later let us know that she was probably not going to recover. A visit from the neighbor's grandson on the day that she died gave us the news that the bleeding in her brain had continued for three days. The hemorrhage was deep in the brain, so the flow could not be staunched. Her death was eerily reminiscent of the maternal grandmother. The neighbor's death exposed old wounds that I thought were healed.

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The wife, the child, and I attended the neighbor's memorial service this morning. It didn't feel very hopeful, even though it was held in a church and presided over by a pastor. The wife described the service as "shallow, lacking any true depth." I would have to agree.

It just adds to and aggravates the rawness, the tension, the anger.

Death, where is thy sting? Right here. Right now.

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Our neighbor was a wonderful woman. She was also a wonderful neighbor. She lived in the same home for sixty-four years. She was the neighborhood's memory. She would tell the wife and I stories about the various families that had lived in our house and the other homes on the street.

She would keep an eye on our house when we were on vacation. She would call us or question us if she saw strange vehicles in our driveway, to make sure that everything was okay. We did the same for her. A couple of times, I went and knocked on her door just to ensure that she was fine.

She never pronounced either the wife's or the child's names correctly.

On occasion, I would walk her empty garbage can from the road to her back yard after the waste had been collected. She would inevitably call me to ask if I had brought it in. I would inform her that I had. She would thank me for being such a good neighbor.

She and I accidentally pushed her "emergency necklace" once when I was visiting her. I had to assure the dispatcher who called that she was in no imminent danger.

She would wander out to get her mail and wave at me as I mowed the lawn or worked in the garden. We would wave at her as she weeded her flower beds or took laundry out to her washing machine in her garage.

She told us about the lives of her children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and them about ours.

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We could see her in her dining room window at night as she ate dinner, and she could see us eating in our dining room. Tonight, her window is dark and the blinds are shut. Her house is still and quiet and without activity.

There is no life there.