A Sacred Trust

Greg Nabity

When I was 14 years old, my grandfather died. He was a farmer, and was a stocky, strong, hard-working man. The cancer that afflicted him left his body thin and frail. I visited him in the hospital a few weeks before he died. He looked pale and sickly, totally unlike the grandfather I had always known. That day was the only time in my life that my grandpa shook my hand. I can still feel that massive hand in mine. A hand vastly out of proportion to the bony figure sitting in the chair before me, no longer able to rise or stand without help. I was unaccustomed to seeing my grandfather helpless and dying, and those moments spent with him in the nursing home wing of the old St. Francis Hospital imprinted in my mind a memory as poignant today as it was that spring day in 1972.

I stood for long moments in front of his casket at the funeral home peering at the familiar figure lying peacefully within. His face full, his complexion its usual ruddiness, his anguished expression replaced by a peacefulness that comforted me and intrigued me all at once. This was not the pathetic creature that cancer had made, the one I had encountered just days before. Though lifeless, this was the grandfather I had always known. The one I remember walking with through the apple orchard on the farm, the one who never missed All-star Wrestling on TV every Saturday evening, the one who taught me to whittle. They had done it. They had given me back my grandpa!! The funeral directors also supported my grandmother, guiding her and her family through those difficult days with quiet gentleness and respect.

So affected was I by this experience that I knew unmistakably why God had placed me in this life. Here was a boy of 14 whose destiny was clearly known to him. A boy who did not question why he had been chosen to fill this role in life but, rather, a boy who embraced it as a sacred calling. Now it is nearly four decades later, and the respect I have for this work, and the gratitude I have for God choosing me for such an important ministry is still as strong as it was the day I rode in the front seat of that hearse. The one which bore my grandfather’s body to its final resting place in the Central City Cemetery.

Being a funeral director is a sacred trust which I do not take lightly. I work hard every day to help families to create beautiful memories of the special people in their lives, like my grandpa was in mine. I do this work because I love it. The work energizes me and satisfies something deep within me which understands that a family's love is forever.