{"product_id":"a-funny-thing-happened-on-the-way-to-a-funeral-9781949888119","title":"A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to a Funeral","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eA Funny Thing Happened on the Way to A Funeral \u003c\/em\u003emay seem inappropriate as the title of a book that talks about deaths and burials. But as a former teacher astutely observed, words have uses rather than meanings. Funny is one of those words. Something may be funny\/ha-ha--amusing, humorous or funny\/odd--unusual, out of the ordinary, even weird. And there are times when a thing is simultaneously funny\/ha ha and funny\/odd.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eMy experience across more than sixty years of ministry has included all three uses, and that fact began early. Though a Baptist, I began like a Methodist serving a circuit of two rural churches. They referred to me as their pastor, but I was more like what the Air National Guard calls a \"week-end warrior.\" I was a college student in Birmingham, the churches were 120 miles away in Chambers County, and I had no car when the first one called me. One met on first and third Sundays, the other on second and fourth Sundays. On fifth Sundays I went hungry! And to keep things interesting, though the churches were in the same Alabama county, one operated on central time and the other on eastern.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI discovered this pattern applied in ministering to those who were genuinely grieved as well as to those, to put it nicely, \"less emotionally stressed\"; of whom there are many. Moods and happenings have run the gamut from: pious to secular; heart-breaking to funny bone-tickling; sublime to ridiculous; holy to irreverent. \u003cem\u003eA Funny Thing Happened on The Way to A Funeral\u003c\/em\u003e, therefore, seemed most appropriate as a title.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Parson's Porch","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51749436096786,"sku":"9781949888119","price":12.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_7471c24b-71fc-4c90-ab97-35d44a1ab79b.jpg?v=1764085282","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/a-funny-thing-happened-on-the-way-to-a-funeral-9781949888119","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}