Easter, 1921 - March 13, 2003
CROSSINGS is for
Christ's Resurrection Overcoming Serous Sickness IN a Great Shift
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| Robert W. Bertram Easter, 1921 - March 13, 2003 |
Richard Lyon, dentist and ordained theologian, was a long-time friend of Crossings and of Bob Bertram, its founder. On January 6, 2002, only weeks before Richard died, mutual friend David Heyen brought him and his wife Dottie to the home of Bob and Thelda Bertram for a private worship service. The group sang Canticle 13 in the Lutheran Book of Worship: "Keep in Mind that Jesus Christ has Died for Us."
Refrain:
Keep in mind that Jesus Christ has died for us and is risen from the dead.
He is our saving Lord; he is joy for all ages.
Following the singing, and preceding the Holy Communion, they talked. Richard Lyon spoke, and Bob responded with the following.
John Calvin, Martin Luther, the apostle Paul, the evangelist Luke, one after the other, but one big difference between those dead white males on the one hand and Jesus Christ on the other, is that any one of them is not living now. I do not talk to them, I do not pray to them. But to Jesus Christ I pray. And you do too. In fact I pray to Him about you all. And I wouldn't be doing that if there weren't some huge difference between Him and all the other dead white males, and that is--how does it go?--"Keep in mind that Jesus Christ has died for us and is risen from the dead"? For never, never, never, has that ever meant so much to me as it does now. I do not say about any of these other important, dead, white males - and I love them, I have learned so much from them - I do not say about any one of them that they are my "living Lord," that they are "joy for all ages."
But that raises a question, and I would like to use some of the things that Richard said here in the last few minutes to try to explain that. What does that mean, that He has died for us? Does that mean, because He has died for us we don't have to die? I don't think that's it. I think the Scriptures are very clear. And Jesus Christ Himself is very clear. We do have to die. We will die our death too. It's not that He says, "move on over, I've done that already and you won't have to die." I think it comes more in the department of what Dick called "transferring" before.
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| John Bertram and his siblings remembering their father at the Memorial Service on March 22 |
Right now Dick and I both know, and you all do when you are really sick and down, if you could not transfer the things that you've got to do, and cannot do, to somebody else who can step in and take over and do them for you, boy! We would just be lost. For me, that's Thelda. I cannot get through two hours of the day if I cannot transfer, and Thelda would not let me transfer to her, what ordinarily only I could do. She is the chief chauffeur in this house. I don't dare lay a finger on the steering wheel of my car anymore. Plus all sorts of other things she does. And Dick said just moments ago, it all comes down to this. And he used the word "perfecting."
It's a matter of quality, folks. It's how Jesus Christ says, No, I will not take over your death so that you don't have to die. But I know you well enough, I know your condition well enough to know that if you tried dying now, you would botch it. You'd botch it. You would not make a very good job of it. You could not perfect it. So why don't you transfer it to me? I know how to do this. I'm among the best of the world's diers. And you know what He means. He can die in such a way that when He gets to death, it's not the end. "But He's risen from the dead." Now that, folks, is really good dying. Richard, hand over your dying to me, and you can be sure that it's in very good hands. Here, watch, this is a really good case of dying. When I get to death, I also rise from the dead. What does it mean that I died for you? It means when you transfer it to me, it'll get done well. And that's the death that's gonna count for you. The one that goes right on sailing, and it gets to the end, goes right through the gates of death, through the gates, into the time of resurrection.
"If we die with the Lord, we shall live with the Lord." The whole Christian claim comes down to that. If He had not been raised from the dead, there'd be no point in our turning over our dying to Him. Put it under the Lyon department of transferring. You transfer it to Him: it gets perfected. You said, that's the one that counts for you. It may wind up that the best thing you ever did in your life is the way you died. Because how you died when it gets to the end, since you're doing it with Jesus Christ, goes right into resurrection. Now that's some kind of dying. That's why I think they put me, in 4th grade, way out on that far intersection, so I could read what the Methodist minister said. "Christ died. That's history. But He died for you. That's faith." But what does that mean, He died for us? It doesn't mean that we don't have to die. It means that He'll do it with class. And that's the kind of dying that God will count as yours. One that goes right into resurrection.
Martin Luther is not my living Lord. John Calvin is not my "joy for all ages," not even the apostle Paul. When I first found what the diagnosis was with my brain cancer, I sort of broke my recovery period into two stages. One was listening very carefully to what the medical profession had to say, and trying to follow orders, as a good boy. But stage two has been very deliberately, in a way that I never did as a theologian, coming to terms with who Jesus Christ is as my healer. And I've given that so much thought. And this little service today gave me one more opportunity to think about that and talk it over with dear friends. He is so crucial. And it's not easy to believe in Him. But He is "joy for all ages."
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| Thelda Bertram and her children receiving friends before the St. Louis Memorial |
As you said, we are all in this business of dying. I like Richard's word. We are not going to do it very well on our own. And so our Lord has invited us to transfer the whole thing to Him. And so the prayer I'm going to pray applies to all of us.
"Into your hands, O merciful Savior, we commend your servant, our brother, Richard. Acknowledge, we humbly beseech you, a sheep of your own fold, a lamb of your flock, a sinner of your own redeeming. Receive him into the arms of your mercy, into the blessed rest of everlasting peace, and into the glorious com pany of the saints in light. Amen."
Cathy Lessmann tells me that the Thursday before Bob died she visited him. She was supposed to be helping him eat but he was too sleepy for that. Instead, while he slept she sang hymns and read psalms and prayers. She was startled when, as she was singing Canticle 13, he joined her in singing the last phrase, "He is joy for all ages."