Advent Lutheran Church

"Susan Moberg Memorial Service"

            Grace and peace to you from God the Creator and the Lord Jesus.  Amen.

            A few days before she passed from this life into full life with God, Susan Elizabeth Moberg said, matter-of-factly, “I’m ready to go home now.”  That extremely simple statement came from a very down-to-earth child of God, someone who was grateful for a life well lived, a life that was and continues to be a blessing to others.

            Susan started out as a Missouri farm girl.  She learned first-hand about the rhythm of the earth’s life-giving cycle as God designed it, learned that even the largest, most abundant harvest is really just a series of small, individual successes: One seed, planted into prepared soil, tended carefully, harvested at the right time.  She carried that interior knowledge with her and put it to work in her hobby of gardening at the home she shared with John and son John and daughter Karen.

            The role that she played in that process of helping things grow brought her joy; it was the same joy that she experienced in teaching, whether in the Center School District, Hyman Brand Hebrew Academy, or Sylvan Learning Center.  In that professional life Susan proudly wore a title, one that she richly deserved: educator.  And oh how she loved teaching; she had a passion for it!  And, I think she might approve of another title as well – cultivator – because she delighted in assisting in the natural process of her students’ learning; delighted when her students’ eyes lit up at an “Aha!” moment of discovery that she had helped to arrange.  One seed, carefully planted and tended, producing when it was time.  It was a natural process, and she was grateful to be a part of it.

Yes, this woman with the quick smile and the inquisitive mind was a teacher, a cultivator of human potential; and she was also a woman of deep faith.  When Jesus said, “Do not let your hearts be troubled,” Susan knew that he was speaking to her.  Even in the depths of her illness, she wasn’t worried.  True, she deeply regretted having to leave you, John, and you, Karen and John and Amy and Nathaniel and Joshua, and the rest of her beloved family and friends.  She lamented the separation that the end of human life forces upon us. 

But she wasn’t afraid, and she wasn’t desperate to hold onto this life at any cost.  Because Susan was both realistic and deeply peaceful about moving from this part of life into the next, she was able to live through her cancer with great grace and great courage.  On one of our last visits, she asked to hear Psalm 121, which begins, “I lift my eyes to the hills, from where is my help to come?”  For Susan, that question was anything but academic; she knew very well the source of her help, and that nothing in all of creation would separate her from that help, that love that she experienced in Christ.

            It’s one of the reasons that she was so positive, and why she was such a gift on the mission trip that she took to the Gulf Coast a couple of years ago.  Before she left she wondered how in the world she would be of any practical use on a disaster relief trip since she didn’t know anything about construction; when she came back she realized that broken bricks and shattered mortar are the least of the damage and the easiest to repair, that it’s the human wound that is always the deepest.  She loved being on that trip, loved meeting the people she was helping.  She did so much to change the lives of the people she encountered by once again playing the role of cultivator: easing people’s burdens by helping to restore what had been broken and, in doing that, rebuilding their hope.

            They say that people in the dying process can see things and experience things that those of us who are still firmly earth-bound cannot.  And so it was that shortly before she died, Susan experienced just a glimpse of her future.  She was lying on her makeshift bed in the den, apparently dozing, when she suddenly let out a joyous laugh, sat up with a great smile on her face, and reached out her arms as if receiving a giant hug.  Call it a premonition, a preview, a vision; Susan knew where she was going, and she was ready.

            In his book Bread for the Journey, Henri Nouwen offers some wisdom about death and life, and as you hear these words, I encourage you to think of Susan:

            “Hope and faith will both come to an end when we die.  But love will remain. Love is eternal.  Love comes from God and returns to God.  When we die, we will lose everything that life gave us except love.  The love with which we lived our lives is the life of God within us.  It is the divine, indestructible core of our being.  This love not only will remain but will also bear fruit from generation to generation.

“When we approach our deaths let us say to those we leave behind, ‘Don't let your heart be troubled.  The love of God that dwells in my heart will come to you and offer you consolation and comfort.’"

If you want to honor Susan, don’t let your heart be troubled.  Instead, celebrate.  Celebrate this life that she loved.  Patch up a bruised relationship.  Look this world right in the eye – this world with all of its brutality and selfishness and brokenness – and love it for its beauty.  Care about somebody who doesn’t deserve it.  Give someone hope.  Make yourself available as a mentor.  Cultivate.  That was Susan’s way.  That was her gift to the world, and her gift to you and me.  Celebrate the love of God that continued in her, and continues in us.

And as you do, look ahead to the future that we’ll share with her one day in that place where they do not measure time by hours or days, where the glory of God provides more than enough light; that place that calls to each of us, and is our true homeland.  May God keep each of you as you live into that promised new life.  Amen.