Good morning…
The night before the memorial service, I had an intense dream. It was like I was traveling through an invisible, physical barrier between earth and heaven. I felt as if I was in one of those airplane movies where people hold on for dear life and their faces contort in unimaginable ways as they fight through strong, G-force resistance. In the dream, my body tensed and tightened, holding on for dear life, pushing through a thick, supernatural barrier for an excruciatingly long time.
Once I pushed through the real-feeling, powerful barrier, I sensed myself lying in a king-sized bed with my friend Julie beside me. It felt much like sharing a bed with my best girlfriend from middle and high school, us talking late into the night, together working through our teenage angst, mindlessly eating pretzels and drinking Tab hour after hour. Julie looked at me gently through her kind, loving smile and said, “It is not time for you to come home to Jesus.” We rested in each other’s gaze for the perfect amount of time, relaxed, peaceful, wordless, before I woke from the dream. I woke relaxed, peaceful, wordless.
Upon waking into consciousness, my brain scanned my body. I picked up a lingering sensation of intense muscle tightness, especially in my calves. Like I had physically wrestled with a supernatural force, pushing through the thick, penetrable layer separating earth and heaven. Overlaying the physical pain, like the ache following a bad cramp, I experienced an integrative wholeness bonding my body, mind, and soul.
With tightness in my calves I walked into yesterday’s memorial service. Instinctively I knew more keenly that the only way through this temporary pain, physical, emotional, spiritual, is persistently pushing through it. Relaxed peace beside Julie in a heavenly king-sized bed is where we are each headed. It is the eternal resting place of every life lived with God. Being together, talking all night, working through our angst, maybe even eating pretzels and drinking Tab, union with God and loved ones is our final, forever home. For now, we must endure the painful, powerful separation between earth and heaven until it is our time to come home to Jesus.
Until we are reunited, loved ones who are already resting to God’s heavenly king-sized bed might come to us in a dream or in the movement of tingling wind chimes. In a song on the radio or a soothing sensation when we enjoy silent solitude. As a bee, bird, or butterfly flies freely by or in the shining sun warming our sensitive skin.
As the memorial service bulletin suggests, until we are reunited, our loved ones will be remembered… “In the blowing of the wind and the chill of winter. In the opening of the buds and in the rebirth of spring. In the blueness of the sky and in the warmth of summer. In the rustling of the leaves and in the beauty of autumn. In the beginning of the year and when it ends. So long as we live, they too shall live, through Jesus Christ our Lord, for they are now a part of us.”
Jesus said to his disciples, “Don’t be worried! Have faith in God and have faith in me. There are many rooms in my Father’s house. I wouldn’t tell you this, unless it was true. I am going there to prepare a place for each of you. After I have done this, I will come back and take you with me. Then we will be together (John 14:1-3, CEV).
We grieve the loss of our loved ones on earth, day after day, as we look forward to Jesus’ whisper, “It is time for you to come home.”
…Sue…
