A Time For Life And A Time For Death

TUES., SEPT. 23, 1986, 6:29 AM
FARM, STUDY

I haven’t given you a Teaching on the relationship in this title or on the theme of “a time for” in awhile. What would be more appropriate on the day the autumn officially replaces summer as the resident season? You have been to a visitation, for death of a friend has occurred. Yes, it is time for…

This week you shall tell the story of three funerals in which you have participated somewhat fully. These were rather sudden deaths, with little time for preparation. Milton had lived his average, expected years, but the others would have looked forward to more earth life. Still, I have created this earth, and I found… and still find… it good. Therefore I rarely intervene when the natural forces and circumstances of earth life are working to prolong or to shorten an individual life. It often is quite interesting to experience that attitude of one who is not prepared for the transition that death is.

J. Murray’s life was full and long. He had fun in this life, and his spirit of fun shall accompany him as he now has moved. His spirit was ready for more earth years, but not in that malfunctioning body. And strong spirits are aware of and appreciate the balance that must be achieved with one’s earth body and all of its interacting parts… and with the conditions of the earth environment. A weakness in one part of a body can mean the end of earth life. Or a circumstance such as a car crash, an earthquake, or the escape of radiation can cause death. Earth life is meant to have balance between life and death. And, as I said, I do little actually, to modify this.

You made a brief pass, last week, through a nursing home, and this gave you a picture of humans worse off than J. Murray, but still alive. Do I approve of maintaining earth life when the natural balance is one of “pass on”? I have allowed and created the basis for technological progress. I watch its total effects, and I conclude that there still are many opportunities for spiritual growth, and so I accept its myriad consequences, including life prolonged excessively and life shortened prematurely.

Is this a time to mourn? Not really. It is a time to consider the reality of a time for life and a time for death. In the total earth it is always time for both, but in your personal experience the reality of death comes only “from time to time.” You must ponder and then conclude that while it is time for J. Murray to die, it still is time for you to live life, even more fully. There are many tasks you can tackle and complete this day that can evidence this new infusion of life. Be as aware as possible of these opportunities.

The ax, the knife, and the pot has been instrumental in the transformation of small lives that you ended yesterday into sustaining food for those who shall hear of the balance of life and death this evening. If you expressed this there would be some distress, but it is too bad that many in your culture have so little appreciation of this constant link between that which gives up life in order that other life might be sustained. It is beautiful rather than morbid. A false, one-sided reverence for life almost prevents this perception.