Instead of New Year’s resolutions for 2020 I am sincerely inviting you to plan your funeral service. I know that sounds morbid, but in all seriousness if you want to prioritize what’s really important in 2020 then the best thing to do is consider what you want said, and who you want to be involved, at your funeral. For example, if you list someone as a Scripture reader, or a pallbearer, but you haven’t talked to them in 3 years, then you probably need to be more deliberate about scheduling a monthly lunch, or a weekly phone call, with them in 2020. If there are particular songs or portions of Scripture that you want people to hear at your funeral, then you need to make these passages, lyrics, and melodies more integral and ingrained in your strategies for running the race marked out for you in this life (Hebrews 12:1-2).

Bottom line, planning your funeral service will help put things in perspective as you venture into the year 2020. While we must lament and protest death (John 11:33-35), we are not to be anxious or afraid of it; in fact we are wholeheartedly invited to stare death in the face, feasting in the presence of our enemy (Psalm 23:5, 1 Corinthians 15:26); we are instructed to taunt death, boasting over it in the incomparably powerful victory of our King and Savior (1 Corinthians 15:50-58).

So, for gaining perspective, and prioritizing your life in 2020; and for the practical purposes of leaving a record of what you want people to hear when your ordained number of days on this earth come to an end (Psalm 139:16) …plan your funeral and give your pastor and loved ones a copy.

THE FUNERAL PLAN FOR ______________________________________________________________________________ (Name, D.O.B., leave space for D.O.D.)

OLD TESTAMENT SCRIPTURE READING __________________________________

NEW TESTAMENT SCRIPTURE READING _________________________________

HOMILY SCRIPTURE PASSAGE ___________________________________________

PERSON YOU WANT TO PREACH _________________________________________

THE PEOPLE YOU ESPECIALLY WANT TO HEAR THE HOMILY
________________________, ________________________, ________________________,
________________________, ________________________, ________________________

WHERE YOU WANT THE SERVICE TO TAKE PLACE ________________________

WHERE YOU WANT TO BE BURIED ________________________

PALLBEARERS ____________________, ____________________, ____________________,
________________________, ________________________, ________________________

SONGS ______________________, _______________________, _______________________