No Guarantee of Time

There is nothing more painful then the death of a young person; a person who has their whole life ahead of them with all of its challenges and rewards and yet they will see none of it.

My niece is currently going through a time with a high school friend that has a rare form of bone cancer that has spread throughout his body and his time is drawing near. There is great sadness over this as well there should be for the family and friends have been vigilant and yet all of the time, prayers and good intentions have fallen on barren soil, or have they?

The immanency of death is a harsh reality to all of us and its sting is well documented yet it is what we learn from death that really is the key to any death that we are involved with. Death leaves a trail…a trail of tears and sadness for sure but also a trail of endurance and longevity for the person who has passed through death’s portal.

What we need to look at is the trail of continuance that stays with us long after the grief is gone and the mourning is over; the trail that leads us back to that person in the future years of our life and makes us pause and remember an earlier time and place when they were still with us.

Death is not finality as much as it is transference from physical to spiritual presence and no person that has ever died is truly dead until no one thinks of them again.

I think that it is interesting and very important to remember that we are all physical beings but also spiritual and that is an important part of our mastering of death in our lives. It is in the spiritual that we are allowed to still fellowship with our family and friends and that part of us transcends time and space.

The Native Americans have a saying, ‘Today would be a good day to die” and when you think about that you might be cynical about its intent. But plainly said it shows a far greater understanding of death for in it is the feeling that “I have lived a full life regardless of the time given to me” and that shows a depth of understanding far past most of us.

Time will grow short in all of our lives; some of us will be blessed with longevity and others will not but regardless of the time given; it is the quality not the quantity of time that blesses our lives and blesses those that remember us.