Very helpful sermon (from Psalm 23:4) by the Archbishop of Sydney, Dr Peter Jensen at the funeral of Detective Constable Bill Crews.

The public and private grief over the death of Detective Constable Bill Crews has been extraordinary and yet understandable. The circumstances, as we now know, are doubly tragic, and we all anguish over that. Furthermore, the young man came from a family which is distinguished by years of public service. The police uniform hides individuality, but when we see the individual, as we do here, he turns out to be one of us. We grieve with and for his family. But we grieve as a community, because Bill’s life was so rich in promise and he so clearly belonged to all of us. He could have been anyone’s son, brother, husband, father.

The service of the community through police work is never easy. Police encounter more than their fair share of cynicism, and even abuse. But today the members of our Police Force can see that there is in the community a deep respect for you and an appreciation that your work is difficult and can be highly dangerous. We wish to thank you for what you do. Sometimes, indeed, it takes you in to very dark places, yes, into the valley of the shadow of death.

That is where God’s word, the Bible, takes us this morning. There is no point smiling and striking a note of false comfort and psuedo cheerfulness. The Bible is the most realistic of all books. It knows death and it speaks to us about death, its horrors, its pain and our fear. It tells us that God never intended it to be like this, but death is the product of the way we ignore God and push him out of our lives. We can’t beat death; it is too strong for any one of us; whether it comes too early as in this case, or much later, it does come for us all. And it reminds us of our weakness and our failures.

Read the rest of Dr Peter Jensen’s sermon here.