Julia’s desire was that the blog would continue in some way after she passed. Although I will never be able to live up to how she chronicled her story in such a powerful way, and with such strength and peace from God, I will attempt to jot down some thoughts on here once in a while. I’ve had some time to process the events of January 7th, and wanted to share some thoughts, and some thanks.
First, I was blown away by how many people came, and the distances that people traveled to be there. When Julia wrote some notes about her wishes for the service, she requested that it be held at Compass Point Church, because it was a large church (~900 capacity) in between Hamilton and Burlington. She had thought it would be plenty big enough. But when we did rough calculations of the number that might attend, we realized that we needed a venue with a capacity over 1,000. It turned out that ~1,300-1,400 people attended.
So many of these people drove for several hours to be there. Of course, there was family who traveled from Iowa, Michigan, Ottawa and Montreal, for which we are so thankful. So many traveled hours from my parents’ church, Cobourg Alliance to help out with the service. But I even met people for the first time who had traveled from Montreal and New York to be there despite their loose connections to Julia and our family. I’m honoured that so many would spend their weekend to travel and be there.
I loved how many different circles were represented in the program. Everyone described Julia’s impact from a different perspective; every speech provided a view of a segment of Julia’s world, and when they were pieced together it formed a panoramic image of Julia’s life on Earth. Yet everything came back to the common theme of Julia’s challenge to all of us to live an abundant life of Hope in Jesus, not in our circumstances.
Worshipping with everyone was so powerful. Andrew and his team from Hughson Street Baptist did a great job of leading us. What struck me was that we were worshipping the same God that Julia is now worshipping in a much fuller way, in His presence.
The comment that I’ve heard again and again since the service is, “I haven’t been to anything like it before”. I think this is partly because it is so rare for someone to die so young. It’s not that it’s any less significant when an older person passes away, but the emotions are different when it’s someone younger. I also like to think it was very unique because God’s presence was there in a special way.
There are two quotes I will always remember from the service (I’m paraphrasing). One is from Pastor Dwayne at the beginning, “We have it backward. We are in the land of the dying and we’re going to the land of the living”. And the second is from Pastor Mike at the end, “if you want to honour Julia don’t just remember her as a great person; make the decision she did to put faith in God and receive His love and mercy into your life.” Julia did not want the service to be about how great, or strong, or brave she was. She wanted it to be about the Source of all those things in her life. And I think it was.
Thank you all for being at the service, or being there through the live stream or video. Thank you to all those who said hi after the service, or sent a Facebook message because they didn’t get a chance to say hi. I will not be able to answer all (or even most) of the messages as there are hundreds, but I read them and appreciate them greatly (and I know I speak for the whole family in saying that). Thank you to all those who helped out so greatly with the service; from Julia’s family, to my family, to the staff at The Meeting House, to the volunteers from Forestview, Cobourg Alliance, and Hughson Street Baptist. Thank you all for your support.
Here is the link to the YouTube video if you haven’t watched the service yet. And if you are interested in honouring Julia through donations (in lieu of flowers), please see the charities’ information in this post.