A Gift

I was given a gift last night....a very special gift that has touched me deeply inside my soul.

I was given the gift of being with a dear woman as she passed from this life onto the next. It has taught me so much about life. How precious life is, how extraordinary this world is and how loving God is. I had heard how beautiful death was. I couldn’t imagine how it possibly could be, until last night.

I think the beauty starts in the comfort and prayers that others give to those dying. Gone are the restrictions that would normally hold a person back. Feelings are shown and shared. Tears freely flow down your cheeks.  A shared caring for another person is put before anything else. The dying are cared for with dignity and grace. They are wrapped in love with prayers and blessings from so many, near and far. There seems to be a knowing within them.

Our bodies are wondrously made. I have often been amazed by their complexity. Last night I was shown how our bodies are truly vessels that God has given to us, for our use here in this world. They are not who we are but simply the containers that hold our spirit and our souls. When our bodies tire and wear out, with age or illness, they simply stop working. The vessel remains but deep inside, our souls are released and fly free from this place into whatever lies ahead in a beautiful indescribable way.

Today I sat on a mountain top looking over this beautiful world that we are so blessed to have. The wind softy blew across my face and I remembered. I remembered the fun I had shared with this wonderful woman, the laughs, the trials as her body and mind slowly wore out, and the care we had given each other in so many different ways. I am not sure she knew what a gift she has been to me or how honoured I feel to have shared the last minutes of her life with her, such a gift from her family to me. Her soul peacefully left the beautiful vessel that had carried her for over 93 years. And so today, as I watched the wind blow through the clouds and trees, I could feel her spirit so free from pain and suffering, blowing with the wind.

A courageous, loving and giving woman, who has given me and so many others such wonderful gifts of care and love is now with God. I shall miss her, yet it so many ways we are still together. We are not alone, we live in God’s world, here on earth and life beyond death. She flies on.