April 24, 2009

Death is our inevitable future, yet we see this event as an unbearable, most tragic marking in our lives. Not only do we view our own lives as ending, once this futuristic time bomb blows, but also the lives of dearly beloved ones that have already “left” us. Many of us believe we have “lessons” to learn while we are here. We don’t necessarily understand the particulars, but we have faith that God is our maker and He is providing these lessons for us. My mother was diagnosed with colon cancer at 49 years old. She lived 6 more years undergoing chemotherapy, five operations to remove tumours and radiation treatments over that time. In her eyes, she felt she was losing her life long before she was ready to depart. Her body was slowly succumbing to the disease, yet after each bout of treatment, she was back on her feet and living her life to the fullest. She prayed to God daily in hopes of overcoming the disease, yet she didn’t recognize that this was her path. This was a lesson from God. It’s true that life as we know it ceases for the embodied soul once we die, yet it is most important to understand that our spiritual journey continues on and on, just as it has for many years leading up to the present life we live today.

During our lives, we hear from many sources that we are spiritual beings created by God, and we take this idea to heart. The enigma we face is that our minds and egos elude grasping the depth of this concept. We allow fear to enter our conscious thoughts, from the time that mortality takes hold of us. We feel that at any time we could “lose” our lives, whether by accident, disease or old age. Whatever the case may be, we never know when our precious lives will “end”. Fear is very well described as False Evidence Appearing Real. Although we feel it is real, we do not have a sound basis for our conclusions. More than we realize, it is fear of the unknown that we are actually giving power to. Fear of death has become a negative force that we must not allow to enter our minds. When we have doubt, we let Satan’s suggestions become real to us. “He’s only here as a temptation to the human mind or ego to lure man away from God” as stated in another article at Owe Spirit - God's Power, Not Satan's by Sherry Iles. If we have faith in God, we need not empower Satan’s influence; we need not embrace a fear of death. While we understand that God has given us lessons to learn while we are here, we must also understand that God has a plan for each of us. Do we truly believe that He has only given us a single “chapter” to experience? God’s plan for each of us begins long before we are born to this life, and long after we depart.

From the book Interview with an Angel by Stevan J. Thayer and Linda Sue Nathanson: “Human life is absolutely the most precious gift that you have. Death is imminent when you hear, you feel, you sense the will of God and you are called from your experience of being human, beckoned into an ever increasing level of love.” Even through the pain of cancer, as my Mom experienced, “Spiritual growth within the heart and soul of the being who is afflicted can be immeasurable. And so long as that soul knows - knows in its heart that it is not its time - then working and struggling and fighting to stay alive can produce the most powerful evolution.“

As spiritual beings, another idea we ponder throughout life is that our souls live on after we have died. Although we take this idea to heart as well, once again our minds and egos have a difficult time grasping the fluidity of this concept. We see that our bodies may be physical vessels, similar to machines that may be afflicted, broken and unable to continue on, but what about our souls? What about our spirits? Have we not also believed at some point that our spirits are energy? Every living entity we are capable of imagining is energy. God is energy; God is love energy. We cannot see or touch Him, but we can have faith and love for Him as we feel Him in our hearts. Through prayer we show Him our love; we are trusting of His plan for us, for our beings, for our spirits. In prayer, we show Him that we are opening our hearts and exchanging our love energy with His. We don’t need to understand the process of how this love is exchanged, we simply feel it and trust it, just as we do every day, with our loved ones. After death, life has to end, but love never does; this is the basis of faith in God.

As we pray to God, we feel the comfort of His embrace. Fear of death need not have a bearing in our lives, when we understand that God is guiding us through all of our soul‘s chapters. My mother heard God’s call just hours before she died in her sleep. She placed her hand on my cheek and with a smile she spoke her last words to me, “Goodbye my Love, this is God’s plan, isn’t it?”

The article above was written exclusively for owespirit.com by Darcy Downes, and may not be copied or used in another arena or medium without the sole permission of the author.  Please contact us if you would like to use this or any content from this website.