Final blessing

We had my father's funeral a little over a week ago now.  

Since then, we have celebrated Thanksgiving.   

 I realized that last year, both of my parents came to our home for Thanksgiving!

The funeral was at my parent's church. 

 There were lots of flowers!

These flowers were from my brother in Washington who could not come. 

Very Japanesey (is that a word?)

We began with a prelude of Japanese worship songs.  One of the songs was "We shall gather at the river",   a song we sang often at our little church in Aburatsu, Japan.  Claire could not help but dance to the music!

After we were all seated,   Adam and Jill sang "It is not death to die."   The words were written in 1832 by Malan and translated from French into English by Bethune in 1847 and sung at his funeral at his request.

It is not death to die,
To leave this weary road,
And midst the brotherhood on high
To be at home with God.

It is not death to close
The eye long dimmed by tears,
And wake, in glorious repose,
To spend eternal years.

It is not death to bear
The wrench that sets us free
From dungeon chain, to breath the air
Of boundless liberty.

It is not death to fling
Aside this sinful dust
And rise, on strong exulting wing
To live among the just.

Jesus, Thou Prince of Life,
Thy chosen cannot die:
Like Thee, they conquer in the strife
To reign with Thee on high.

After a welcome and hymn, my husband read from Ephesians 1, a passage that my father requested.   Adam gave a short message over that passage.

Our son, Josh and my daughter, Mindy, read the story of my dad while we played a slide show.  

(A blog post on that to come)

We had a video that Jill had made about a year ago.

The recessional was "The Lord Bless You and Keep You"  

I played this song for him several times while he lay in bed.

The church's reception committee had cookies and ice-cream for all.

Many dear friends came.
We had the tables decorated with Japanese things and with pictures of Mom and Dad's years.

Cousins

People shared stories.  One of my favorites was this:  One lady was talking with my Dad about the fact that he was losing his hearing and how hard that was.  "I'm not deaf!  I can still hear God!" he remarked.

Another funny - In Dad's story, he had told me that when he was young, he often tried to get out of doing dishes.  Yet, he and mom served on the reception committee here at this church and he usually did the dishes!  Dad had such a servant heart!

The car was jammed packed with plants to take home and enjoy!

So very grateful to everyone for their kind words and their sympathy!

Thank you also for meals provided!

Dad is HOME for the holidays!