In Memory of Violet May Joy Parsons
Ecclesiastes 3, Romans 8 and Mark 4
There is a time for
everything, a time to be born and a time to die, a time to weep and a time to
laugh, a time to keep and a time to let go…
Letting go is one of the hardest things to do. When we’ve
lived through the Depression and its aftermath as Violet and her siblings did,
it’s hard to let go. When we face the pain of walking with people we’ve loved
through all the ups and downs, to the very end of their lives, it’s hard to let
go. When we are facing the task of dealing with a lifetime of our own or someone
else’s treasures and memories, and all the stories we carry with us, the task
of figuring out, “Is this the time to hold on or the time to let go?” can be
very difficult… It was difficult for Vi, and I imagine, it has been and may
continue be difficult for you, her beloved ones… and yet, somehow in these
scriptures that Vi chose for the day when she knew we would remember her especially,
she acknowledged the need for times of letting go. We gather to honor Vi today,
to remember all that was delightful and amazing about her, and we also gather
to forgive.
Violet May Joy Parsons was no “wilting violet.” Don’t you
imagine that in the way that children receive labels and have to prove them
wrong their whole lives that someone at some point must have used this phrase
with her… and in response, this capable woman had to prove her strength?
In addition to the jobs she had throughout her life, she
also served in the Navy Reserve and they wanted to give her award for her incredible
organizational skills, so they gave her the only award that they had to give—“Man
of the Year.”
Vi was an active student of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a German
pastor who because of his deep faith resisted the Nazi regime and was martyred
in a concentration camp in the last days of WWII. She was such a devotee that
she was known at the Luther Seminary bookstore for purchasing every available
book about him.
Like Bonhoeffer, she also clung to the words of Romans 8, a
chapter that acknowledges how very many things in our life could cause us to
start questioning God’s love. We could start questioning God’s love when there
are world or political events that don’t seem to being going well at all; we might
question God’s love when we are facing challenges that seem impossible to make
it through; many people question God’s love at a time of death, grief, and
loss… but here again, Vi held on to the hope in Romans 8—There is nothing that we can do, nothing others can do to us, nothing
at all in life or in death that can separate us from the love of God in Christ.
She wanted you to hear that promise and word of hope today.
When she was able, she was very generous. She prided herself
in teaching Bruce to read when he was “3 months old” (you all knew it was 3 years old… and that’s amazing enough, and who
wanted to argue it with her?). She gave each of her nephews and nieces a
Bible, wanting each person who she loved to have a daily experience of reading
these stories of God’s word of life for all people, for all creation. And in
fact, it was one of her last requests of Dennis—to make sure that anyone she
might have missed would be given a Bible.
She was also politically active, and enjoyed bowling and
golf, but she was more interested in working than socializing.
There is nothing
in all creation that can separate us from the love of Christ.
Pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer says: “We should find and love God in what God
directly gives us; if it pleases God to allow us to enjoy an overwhelming
earthly happiness, then [we] shouldn’t be more pious than God and allow our
happiness to be gnawed away through thoughts and challenges and wild religious
fantasy that is never satisfied with what God gives” (Letters and Papers from Prison). Whether this earthly
happiness is found in an evening of beautiful music, or the success of an adult
literacy program, or the bounty of a church [flower] garden, Christians should
receive it as God’s gift.[1]
At her best, Vi modeled
this appreciation—for art, for those she tutored and taught, for the gardens
full of red flowers that she planted (with the help of some of you), here in
Christ’s Peace Garden.
But she also wanted the
story of Jesus calming a stormy sea shared at her funeral. By the time I met
Vi, she was very mild… but I imagine from what you’ve shared with me that there
have been times in her life when she has felt like a stormy sea, where she has
cried out to God with the disciples, “Don’t you care that we are about to
die?!” And she has watched Jesus get up, raise his hands to the wind and waves,
and said, “Peace, be still.” It’s a moment of wonder. Who is this Jesus? It’s a
moment of fear. How is he doing this? And it’s a moment, if we can be open to
it, when fears can subside… as we place trust in the one who can bring peace
not only the sea, but our storms.
A difficult chapter in Vi’s life was when she needed to move from her
home, and what her family experienced as they tried to help her—her very sharp
edges, her strong will. A true blessing of this last part of Vi’s life at
Walker was her renewed ability to have friendships with beloved friends and
caregivers and the reconciliations with family, and especially her dear sister,
Gladys, that took place.
I read this week that “Precisely when the world feels least like home, church is to
embrace it and remain in solidarity with it. We live gratefully on borrowed
time—within the limits, compromises, and failures of human life” but this helps
“nurture an earthly life marked by both hope and longing, rejoicing and
grieving.” [2]
God promises resurrection on the other side of death… in the meantime, there is
a gratitude for earthly life, alongside an honest recognition of its limits.
Amidst the expectation that death will come, both for us individually and for
all of us, we rest in the hope that not even death can separate us from the
love of God in Christ Jesus (Rom. 8:38-39). We receive Jesus’ own invitation to
peace and the assurance that Jesus does indeed care about our circumstances,
and we can trust that God’s Holy Spirit who inspired Vi to pick these words of
life and hope for us today meant for us to receive every one as a gift.
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