It's Better Than "In the Garden"

An article from AP caught my eye the other day. A cemetery and crematorium in Adelaide, Australia has said that the traditional Christian hymns are losing their place at funerals. The most requested song these days is actually Sinatra's My Way. Second is Louis Armstrong's It's a Wonderful World.

Not in the top ten but climbing is Led Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven or AC/DC's Highway to Hell. (I guess there are all kinds with all kinds of expectations.) Also being requesed from time to time are such funeral classics as Ding Dong the Witch is Dead, Hit the Road Jack, and Another One Bites the Dust.

I'm struck most by Sinatra's song being there for some reason. If there is any moment when we can't say we are doing it our way is at that point. All the ways we have done it have ended and here we are, at the mercy of God.

The only traditional hymns in the Top Ten, by the way, were Amazing Grace and Abide With Me.

Funerals can be such a difficult time and they often fall prey to far too much emotionalism. I don't mean by that the emotions that you would expect to get expressed but the overly sentimental types of emoting that might be called "eating up the scenery" if you were talking about acting. As a result we go for the sentimental. Why or how a song like In the Garden became a funeral favorite is beyond me- other than it expresses that overly emotional attitude that allow us in some way or another to feel even worse than we already did.

In case you haven't guessed, I don't like that song. There was an old bishop at one of our churches who once stopped a hymn sing for a sermon against the poor theology expressed in the song. I agreed with hymn. Of course my friends in the churches I served would always request it just to get my goat. I think I have only heard one version of the song I can say I like- and that was Johnny Cash, although I do have a couple jazz arrangements on my iTunes list.

So what would I want? Well, I have always been struck by the traditional New Orleans Dixieland funeral. There's always a dirge-like song on the way to the cemetery and then a rousing second line on the way back. I want When the Saints Come Marching In played in best jazz/New Orleans style. Our Moravian national anthem, Sing Hallelujah Praise the Lord is a rousing finish that reminds us that there's a lot more to all this than meets the eye. Beyond that, I won't be there.

Just don't play In the Garden. God will get you for that.