I had a customer come in the office yesterday afternoon with her son, who was about my age, maybe a little older. As we are trying to select a memorial for her husband, of whom she was married to for 53 years, and who had recently passed away, her son reached over with his phone and said, "Have you ever seen anything like this before?" I looked at his phone and saw that it was a picture of a beautiful sunset. It was one of those sunsets that had all the vivid hues, you know, the pinks, purples, yellows, with a hint of blue still in the midst, just to kind of remind us that a beautiful day was passing away. The blue in the sunset to me is likened to the saying, "It ain't over til the fat lady sings!" As I looked at this picture, I looked at him and said, "Yes, I've seen a sunset like this before." He said in response to me, "This is what I saw when I died." He goes on to tell me that he had died for 8 minutes. I asked him what he experienced during this 8 minutes of what we label "death", and now I am going to share that with you.
He told me that he was being ushered to this beautiful sunset by two angels, one on each side of his arms. He said along with the view of the sunset there was a glowing white light. He compared the white light to the glow of a baseball field, seen from afar, with all the lights on at night. He said, along with the two angels at his side there were angels all around him. He had suffered from back problems his whole life and had recently gotten his back in pretty good shape and he said he could remember telling God to make sure the angels didn't just plop him down at the pearly gates because he had just gotten his back right. I thought that was funny! He said he saw one of his best friends and two other acquaintances. He said he knew who they were but he couldn't see their faces. I asked him, "Were you afraid?" He said, "No, it was the happiest moment in my life!" Dying was the happiest moment of his life. Now that's something to think about.
We go around this little Earth, day to day, worrying about such insignificant matters. We release all sorts of toxins into our bodies & brains, yes they are seperate, with worrying, hating, anger, and a whole host of other damaging thoughts and emotions. Then, we act so surprised when we are diagnosed with a whole host of medical problems, heart attacks, diabetes, high blood pressure, we are about to explode or should I say implode. Yes, it all starts with a thought, that attaches an emotion to it, and eventually you find the residual in the very fibers of your body. Sometimes, not always, a diagnosis of a disease, is just that, a dis~ease. Your body is saying, "I've had enough already!" As I look into the eyes of this man, I see beyond his eye color, right to his soul. He is at peace. He holds the treasure we are all seeking. He has, Peace that passes all understanding. Oh, how we all long for this. It's more precious than gold. I am looking into the eyes of a man that has no fear, how rare.
I know now, that yes, this man's mother was here out of a basic need, but he accompanied her for something else. You see I have been, let's say, struggling with the whole idea of God, religion, other religions, and other beliefs for the last two years. I really don't like to use the word struggling because it's been more of a pilgrimage, a journey, my journey, than anything. You see, I set out on this pilgrimage because I had NO peace. I was going to church everytime the doors opened, playing by the rules, and still NO peace. I quit religion, not God, but religion ~ and I went within. That is what the bible calls the Temple of the Holy Spirit. It says, "Do you not know that you are the Temple of the Holy Spirit?" So basically, I quit church and started attending the Temple. Isn't that what we are suppose to do anyway, Attend to the Temple. In other words, take care of you! Go within, clean out your own closet of skeletons, deposit good positive things in, and mind your own business. Cause I guarantee, you got some business to mind to.
So what happened to me in the presence of this enlightened one, this buddha, which by the way, means "enlightened one"? I got what I had been searching out for the last two years ~ a connection between God and what we like to label the New Age movement. You see, there has been this great chasm between the two, but I knew that there would be a connection somewhere, someday. God is the God of all things. He sends down his rain on the just and the unjust. His words ~ not mine. So, this was God's messenger. It really is whatever I choose it to be. I choose to believe that this was a messenger from God letting me know, yes Aleece, I am real, the angels are there and here, and you have nothing to be afraid of. I really needed that! I had started to get quite jaded with the people that claim they represent God. I started not liking God. I thought if he's anything like you than I pretty much don't want a relationship with this guy. But yesterday, I saw God. I saw God in the eyes of someone that had recently gotten very close to him. I felt peace and love in the presence of this messenger.
I finished helping his mother memorialize his father. He went outside to smoke a cigarette, probably thinking, what the hell I've already died once. He came back in for a brief moment to walk his mother out the door, and I watched them drive away thinking to myself, does he even know, that his dying......saved my life.
