![\"\"](\"https:\/\/e-gen.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/04\/carljean.jpg\" "\\"carl&jean\\"")
<\/a>Jean & Carl Pearce (c.2000)<\/p><\/div>\n
There\u2019s two or three things to understand. There\u2019s some straight chairs back by the controls for the audio-visual system. And that was almost by invitation. You had Paul Bahm there, then you had that big Kahuna Carl. Then you had some kids who would almost do the pie fight thing to get there. I\u2019m not talking now about little kids; I\u2019m talking about high school and college age and even older than that. More than anything else, Carl was a friend.<\/p>\n
Sunday morning it was just heart breaking here because we had just gotten word and people were saying, \u201cThis was the first guy I met when I came into that church, and he was there year after year after year.\u201d We talked about several snafus in the bulletin. There\u2019s another one and it\u2019s totally my fault. I wanted, instead of [Psalm] 121 which I use so often at funerals, to use 122, and just this first verse always grabs me: Carl went to see the grandchildren. Carl helped on the bridges. Carl did things like that, but there were very few Sundays when Carl wasn\u2019t back there greeting people. And I think if you were to really press him on it he would say that that was the foundation of his week.<\/p>\n Sitting behind me is a lady [the organist] who probably 30 years ago gave me a little plastic sign that the sun and the ultraviolet rays have broken down so that it\u2019s almost in tatters now, but it says, \u201cTrust me; Do it MY way.\u201d Well, I\u2019m an agitator and I\u2019m a con artist and Carl was my biggest challenge, because there was metal in Carl, or steel, or character. I don\u2019t know what you might want to call it, but once Carl got something straight in his mind, [there was] no deviation whatsoever. And he loved to figure, as Ken said. I think without a doubt the greatest story of any of them, and I\u2019m not going to develop it, but Carl\u2019s truck before the last one wasn\u2019t worn out yet, according to Carl. And in Carl\u2019s mind this thing had miles and years to go, but there were absolutely no creature comforts. Now Carl figured out a way to put a sleeper on it, but the BIG challenge was Carl was trying to figure out heat from a generator on the cheap. And Carl played with this and worked with this and twisted and molded until Carl got what he wanted. Then in the last few years when he moved over into the green truck and life became a lot easier, I really believe that Carl used his trips to think and to meditate, and much that he brought home from those trips were the foundations by which he lived his life.<\/p>\n Remember the period, and it\u2019s still today, when every truck had to have a CB radio? Well, it was kind of embarrassing to Carl, because he had the CB radio, but he broke down–he blew up the truck in fact–up in New York stat one time, and he didn\u2019t have any radio to call for help. Because Carl liked to drive around and not be bothered by the chatter on the radio\u2014just to think. He\u2019d think about some of the darndest things\u2014we\u2019d talk about them. But, one of the things that Carl thought about often was, you know, how cars and trucks will come out on the interstate from the entrance lane. They never slow down, figuring you\u2019re going to pull over. And Carl\u2019s concern was always, as he was a driver, a moral man, if he\u2019s forced into a situation where he can\u2019t get out, and these vehicles come like this, what could he do? Those were the kind of problems that Carl worked with. And I use that just to say that he was just about as much of a moral straight shooter as any man I\u2019ve ever known.<\/p>\n I could tell a lot of stories, but instead I want to spend just a few brief moments on one thought: If that bulletin had been right and those birth dates were right and Carl was 82 instead of 62, this wouldn\u2019t be such a difficult service for us, would it? We\u2019re walking around thinking, \u201cCarl got cheated.\u201d We really, really wanted Carl to be here for the other 20 years, And we don\u2019t know who to be the more frustrated with: the doctors, the health care system. We just don\u2019t know, but it\u2019s very convenient to blame God. This is the thrust that I want you to get: I know Carl didn\u2019t blame God. His friend and co-worker Howard Krupp reported that Carl said earlier in the fall that he\u2019d either be very, very sick or dead by the end of the year if he didn\u2019t get that transplant. It didn\u2019t work out, but the point we need to deal with as family, as friends, as church members is to understand that what we celebrate now on this day, in this month\u2014we celebrate God coming down in Jesus Christ to bear our infirmities, to bear our sorrows, to bear our short comings. I always hear these people say, \u201cOh, it\u2019s such a shame. My loved one died at Christmas time. We\u2019ll never have Christmas again without thinking of the death of our loved one.\u201d But, I submit to you instead that you\u2019ll never have Christmas time again without thinking about the salvation of your loved one given by God through Jesus Christ. Now you can deal with it anyway you want to. I\u2019m on my third funeral director in Mars, and way back from the beginning to the present we\u2019ve always gotten into some hard funerals right at the Christmastide. But truth be told, what better time to lose someone we love than this! Because the totality of the promise comes to us.<\/p>\n You know, we Presbyterians are kind of a wildcatter outfit. We do not get quite as holy as we ought to sometimes, and sometimes I\u2019ll go to a funeral and I\u2019ll hear a clergyman stand up there and talk about the conversion experience of the deceased. All I want to tell you is that this daddy, this husband, trucker, this head usher, this friend, this family member was a dedicated man of God. And in His love, God has taken him home. We\u2019re going to miss him, but we do need to understand that there is no doubt that Carl has gone home.<\/p>\n PRAYER: O Lord God, indeed as we walk down life\u2019s path, all of us see these ones we love going ahead, and we\u2019re caught with the idea of trying everything we can to get them to stay here awhile longer, grasping. But, Lord God, help us to go ahead in full stride, to know the love of our family, of our friends, of the environment around us, to realize that as Carl has gone on ahead, young Ronnie takes his place: one to reach out in the name of Jesus Christ and to greet. And as Carl goes on ahead, his son, his daughter, continue his interest in the lives of their children. In all things, O Lord, keep the fullness of our faith before us, And unto the mercy of almighty God we commend the soul of our brother departed and we commit his body, earth to earth, ashes to ashes, and dust to dust, in the sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord, for their works do follow them. Amen.<\/p>\n Additional Eulogies for Carl:<\/p>\n Eulogy for Carl Dale Pearce<\/a><\/p>\n The Father\/Son Perspective<\/a><\/p>\n Remarks on Carl’s Life<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By The Rev. Robert Brierly McCrumb Delivered at the Funeral of CARL DALE PEARCE at the Mars United Presbyterian Church December 15, 2004 There\u2019s two or three things to understand. There\u2019s some straight chairs back by the controls for the … Continue reading
\nI was glad when they said unto me, \u201cLet us go into the house of the Lord.<\/em>
\nOur feet have been standing within your gates, O Jerusalem.\u201d <\/em><\/p>\n