We were visiting some dear, lifetime friends on Saturday when another old friend knocked on their door.  After greetings and hugs, he got a serious look on his face and asked, “Have you heard about Jan?”  The four of us stared at him.  “No,” one of us answered.  He had our full attention as he stood gravely before us.  “She’s gone.”

He explained that our friend of forty-one years died in surgery the day before.  So many thoughts tumbled through our brains.  Each of us blurted out a comment. Then our friend excused himself and we were left to process the news.

Our friend, Jan, who passed away, began going blind as a young mother of four.  For the rest of her life, she made the best of increasing blindness.  Blessed with a high IQ and incredible drive, she managed to do things that most sighted people didn’t.  She baked, cooked, walked miles a day, raised four children and babysat untold hours for neighbors and friends and then later her grandchildren.  She studied, prayed, and counseled until the day she left her blind, ailing body behind and awoke with a clear view of the face of Jesus. . . the first time she saw a person clearly for forty-five years.  She was mercifully spared the torturous years she would have had to endure had she survived the abdominal aortic repair.  Eighteen hours into the surgery, she left her limitations and her body behind and went home to be with Jesus.

Several weeks before the dreaded, but unavoidable surgery we sat around a table and Jan explained that those who managed to survive the surgery have a high chance of being a quadriplegic.  “I just don’t want to be a blind quadriplegic,” she had said quietly.  God granted her desire.  She doesn’t have to be a blind quadriplegic.  In fact, she is freed from blindness and weakness now.  She is more alive at this moment than she ever was here on earth.  I rejoice for her.  But I grieve for her husband who will grow old without her.  I grieve for her children who will miss her support.  I grieve for her grandchildren who will have only memories of their grandmother. 

Our earthly bodies are planted in the ground when we die, but they will be raised to live forever.  Our bodies are buried in brokenness, but they will be raised in glory. They are buried in weakness, but they will be raised in strength.  They are buried as natural human bodies, but they will be raised as spiritual bodies. For just as there are natural bodies, there are also spiritual bodies…our physical bodies cannot inherit the Kingdom of God. These dying bodies cannot inherit what will last forever.   For our dying bodies must be transformed into bodies that will never die; our mortal bodies must be transformed into immortal bodies. I Corinthians 15:42-44,50,53

A wise friend told me a story of how the pastor of her congregation handled announcing the death of church members.  He would begin his Sunday sermon by saying, “Heaven is dearer because another one we love is there.”  So let’s comfort one another with the hope we have that Jesus died to give us unending life.  And that unending life is delightful!  His plan to bring all those who love him home to himself is being accomplished one believer at a time since he left this earth.  When he brings history to a close, this old broken world will be rolled up and discarded and a new earth and new heavens will take its place.  And finally, the old order will be gone forever.  All the pain, tears, and loss will be swallowed up in eternal happiness.  All that was hurtful, wrong, and hopeless will be no more and in its place will be wholeness, peace, and joy. We will be rid of our physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual limitations.  Finally free to be all that we were designed to be.  Unlimited exploration, growth, learning.  We’ll grow wise and truly good.  And be in the happy company of those who are.  Because we will constantly do right, have right motives and right desires there will be no more regret or guilt.  Think of what we’ll accomplish in our unrestricted state with unlimited time, resources, wisdom, and strength in cooperation with the multitudes of like mind!

Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away . . . And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.  He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. All these things are gone forever.”  Revelation 21:1,3-4

Gone from My Sight

I am standing upon the seashore.  A ship, at my side,

spreads her white sails to the moving breeze and starts

for the blue ocean. She is an object of beauty and strength.

I stand and watch her until, at length, she hangs like a speck

of white cloud just where the sea and sky come to mingle with each other.

Then, someone at my side says, “There, she is gone.”

Gone where?

Gone from my sight. That is all.

And, just at the moment when someone says, “There, she is gone,”

there are other eyes watching her coming, and other voices

ready to take up the glad shout, “Here she comes!”

And that is dying…

excerpt of the poem by Henry Van Dyke