Today was life-changing.  I was with a friend today,  who happens to be my age, as she died and went on to be with Jesus.  What an immense honor it is to be there with a person who is shedding their mortal body to ascend into heaven with Jesus.   Emotions run the gamut.  There’s joy.  There’s sadness.  There’s a sense of understanding of eternity and that we are all taking one step forward to that place with every single breath.

Today the Lord was gracious beyond measure.  As I held her hand, I spoke with her of heaven, of our Lord, of our imperfections and His acceptance. She knows Him. She wanted to let go.  She was trying.  I felt it.  I saw it in her. She tried to speak but cancer prevented it.  I sang Jesus Loves Me to her.  I commended her on what a good mother she was.   I told her it was ok to let go, it was ok.  I asked the Lord to send angels to be with her.  And I asked Him, in His grace and mercy, if He would allow her to go while I was there so that she would not be alone.

Then I called her daughter, such a good friend of mine, who is states away and unable to fly because her baby girl is due shortly.  She was here until she could no longer travel.   I put the phone up to my dying friend’s ear, her daughter spoke words of love and gratitude.  I then took the phone and walked just outside the room to tell her girl that I believed the time was short. The nurse had said up to a week.  I didn’t believe him.   This kind, gentle, precious daughter and I  spoke for just a few minutes and then I walked back in to find her precious mom’s cocoon void of her spirit.  She had indeed let go and was with Jesus, having heard the voice of her child one last time.  Selah.

It was an amazing moment, a profound one.  It has taken its time in embedding itself into my understanding.   It’s now 3am and I am still in awe of our Lord.  My heart is heavy with reverence- of His grace and His mercy that she did not leave us while alone, that she heard her daughter’s voice as the last one.

Life is short.  We are dust.  Here, all our days are numbered.  There, we live forever.  Here we are a vapor in the wind, there is endless.   Please be deep in thought on this truth.  It means everything.  Tell others.  He wishes that no one would remain lost.

There are those I love with heart and soul who are not headed to heaven but instead to eternal separation from love, from God.  We are given one chance.  We are presented with the most important decision we can make.  And eternity looms.   Yet, blindness abounds as the enemy pursues as well, being the perfect counterfeit.   It looks just like the truth.  It is not.   God,  save.  Please, Lord.

There is so much joy is knowing we will see those we love again.  There is so much grief knowing that there are those we love fiercely who will suffer eternally because they denied Jesus was God incarnate, God Himself, the only One whose blood could possibly pay our debt, make us pure, so that we could be in His presence as we received His blood as payment.   We know what happened to Moses when he simply came close to God.  To be in His presence, we must have His purity within us and the only way that is possible is to have the indwelling Holy Spirit and the only way to have the indwelling Holy Spirit is to have believed Jesus when He said He was God and then receive His blood as payment for all of our sins.  There is no other way.

Lord, forgive us.  Open the eyes and hearts and minds of those who deny you are God.  Save all that You can possibly save as we ask that You interfere in their lives to reveal Yourself.  We pray Your grace.  We pray Your mercy.  Amen.

Eternity. There is nothing, NOTHING, as important in this life than to choose rightly where you will be forever and ever.   As we grieve the lost, let us speak and not be silent.

Acts 4:12

“And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”