74. Death Is an Eternal Milestone

Concluding remarks by Elder Dallin H. Oaks of the Council of the Twelve Apostles at the funeral services for Barbara Jean Fraughton Lange on Monday, February 28, 1994, in the Mueller Park Ninth Ward in Bountiful, Utah. This talk was transcribed from a recording of the funeral and published in the March 7, 1994, issue of the Family Journal. Elder Oaks’s wife, June Dixon Oaks, was Barbara Lange’s first cousin.

Marvin and David and Claudia and other members of the family and my brothers and sisters: I feel privileged to be invited to take a few moments to speak at the conclusion of this beautiful service. I complement Bishop Clegg and Brother Cleverly for the wonderful spiritual banquet that they have given us.

As I listened to what they had to say, I couldn't help contrasting that with the last funeral service I attended in another place and under a different presiding authority. It was a suitable tribute to a life well lived, but I went away spiritually undernourished because there was no testimony, there was no doctrinal comfort, there was no tribute to the Lord Jesus Christ, who makes it all possible. There was no note taken of the fact that love is immortal and marriage properly entered and covenants properly observed can be eternal, and that life has a purpose and that death is only a transition from one phase of eternal life to another.

We've had all those assurances in this service, and they're true. And I thank Bishop Clegg and Brother Cleverly for the beautiful assurances that they've given, which I affirm.

Like many of you, I've felt the warmth of Barbara's hospitality and I've taken strength from the brilliance of her example. Hers was a life well lived, hers an example appropriately followed, hers was a faith strong and bright, hers an influence that will perpetuate itself through the generations to come—as is evident from the expressions that I've observed on the faces of those who are her descendants, her companion, her friends.

Death is an eternal milestone. And a funeral, which commemorates a death, is not a time for trivial things. That's a truth forgotten in many Latter-day Saint funerals. But it wasn't forgotten here. The things spoken of here have been things important, not things trivial. And so this service has been a comforting one and an appropriate one, and all of us in tune with the Spirit that has activated what has been said and done here have recognized the benediction of approval from our Heavenly Father whose daughter Barbara is and who takes joy, as has been noted, in the death of His saints, a life well lived, a new horizon opening, for additional joy.

And when there is a sad parting here, there is a joyous reunion there. And I'm sure that joy is warmly felt by many for whom we have ties of love and affection, because our families, in every case, are on both sides of the veil. And when we have that vision, a funeral has a different meaning and death has a different significance.

I testify of Jesus Christ, who made it all possible, of the truth of His gospel, and of the authority of the holy priesthood, which makes possible the fulfillment of the promises given, contingent upon the covenants made.

I testify to you of these things and invoke His blessings upon the family to comfort and strengthen them, and especially upon our brother Marvin, who has a difficult season of adjustment despite the sweet assurances that have been given.

And I say these things and invoke these blessings, in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.