Obituary of Rosetta N. Ziegler

BELOW YOU WILL FIND A VIDEO OF ROSIE'S FUNERAL SERVICE. UNFORTUNATELY, DUE TO A PROBLEM WITH THE SOUND SYSTEM AT THE CHURCH, THERE IS NO AUDIO. HERE IS THE MESSAGE FROM PASTOR JONATHAN: Rosetta Ziegler, born May 13, 1930, baptized as a child of God, and confirmed into the Christian faith. Dearly beloved, grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Rosie will be remembered as a wonderful wife and mom, a super grandma, and—I quote—a “favorite” aunt. It was said that you couldn’t have picked a better mom to raise three boys without a dad—especially because there was a fearsome red stick involved! But maybe it was also because she was an avid outdoorswoman. She liked to hunt and fish for the camaraderie and for the opportunity to teach kids those skills. And while she and Earl had a happy marriage, I’m told a source of tension was when she was busy crocheting instead of copiloting as they traveled. She and Earl spent 16 years traveling and wintering in Texas and Arizona. Rosie and her family enjoyed going to Camp Luther and went every August for over 30 years, made possible because she faithfully spent the rest of the year setting aside $20 or $30 every paycheck to rent the cottage. Rosie was a woman who was not only faithfully dedicated to her family, but also dedicated to her Lord. Not only was she a faithful member of Immanuel, but she also passed that faith on to her family. Rosie and Earl would share a kiss and say the Lord’s Prayer each night before going to bed. Rosie was dedicated because she knew who our Father in Heaven is. He’s the God all-powerful and living in the heavens who lets you call Him “Daddy.” Rosie was a dedicated mother to her kids, providing what they needed, teaching them how to fish and hunt, and providing for trips to Camp Luther. The good news is that if Rosie provided such good care to her family, how much more will the Heavenly Father provide for His children! Rosie knew how marvelous the love of God was, and that’s why she passed on the faith to her family, to remember the holiness of God’s name that we received in our baptism making us God’s children. She passed on that faith because she believed Jesus when He promised that His Kingdom would come, where all sin would be forgiven, wrongs made right, death reversed, families reunited, and our world made new. Rosie was a wife and mother who knew what her family needed most was the Kingdom of Jesus that comes to us in God’s Word, in Baptism, and in the Lord’s Supper. She passed on the assurance that God’s will would be done on earth as it is in heaven, that Jesus died and rose again so that His Father’s loving will for us would be done in our world. The God who wills to give us all good things wills to give us those things forever. Things like a day on the lake in the northwoods, or the camaraderie shared on a hunt in the quiet of creation, things like kids running from house to house feasting on the delights shared during a family reunion. Things like that are God’s will for us, the heavenly Father who gives us each our daily bread, who knows every need we have, who wills for us to thrive in the creation and the life that He has given to us. Our Father in heaven wills this kind of eternal life for us so much that He sent Jesus to forgive us our trespasses. Rosie knew the relief and joy of what it meant to have all of her sins paid for by the cross of Jesus, and that’s why she passed on to her family forgiving those who trespass against us, praying against temptation, and trusting God to deliver us from evil. See, that’s why Rosie prayed the Lord’s prayer each night with Earl. She knew that the Kingdom, and the power, and the glory belonged to God, our Heavenly Father, forever and ever. Nothing—not death, not sin, not sickness, not distance, not even the year 2020—nothing could ever take God’s Kingdom for us. For even if this tent of an earthly home is destroyed, Rosie knew that we have a building from God, our heavenly Father, not made with mere human hands, but built to be eternal, waiting for us in the heavens. And that building is the Kingdom of Jesus, the Kingdom that He has been preparing to bring to this world. He will bring that heavenly building of His kingdom to this tent of a world when He returns, and when that happens our bodies will be raised, families will be reunited, and our Father in heaven will indeed provide daily bread in abundance. Rosie was baptized into that hope. And what she would want to remind you of right now is that that is your hope, too. Rosie would remind you of those same things she passed on to you: on account of the death and resurrection of Jesus, your sins are forgiven, death has lost its sting, and you are going to see her again. And there won’t even be any red sticks to fear! That promise belongs to you, and that promise still belongs to Rosie. And Rosie will rise again, just as Jesus did on Easter. Today, even as we grieve, today we also have a resolute hope, because the One who rose from the dead also taught us to pray “thy Kingdom come.” And it will, friends, because His is still the Kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever and ever. In Jesus’ name, Amen.