It was my Aunty Marjorie’s funeral today, and although the service was short, it was beautiful. The vicar told a story about water beetles, which I thought was a lovely way to describe death. We already know that God has promised us eternal life, and this was a great way to interpret that.

“There was once a community of water beetles living in a little pond underneath the lily pads. Every once in a while, sadness would come to the group, when one of the water beetles would climb the stem of a lily pad and disappear above the water. The group knew that when this happened, their friend was not coming back.

When this had happened a few times, they made a promise that the next beetle that went up the stem would come back down and tell the others what was above the water.

The next time that a beetle started climbing up the stem, his friends reminded him of his promise to come back. When he reached the top of the stem and climbed out of the water and on to the top of the lily pad, the sun was so warm that he fell asleep.

As he slept, his body changed into a beautiful blue dragonfly.

When he woke up, he remembered his promise to his friends to go back down to them, but his new body would not let him below the water, no matter how much he wanted to go back. At this point he realised why none of his previous friends had come back to them, and that eventually, his friends below the water would make the journey up the stem to join him.”