Death

TUES., MAR. 12, 1985, 6:00 AM
FARM, STUDY

Death can mean (have) several meanings. Just as time is both linear and circular, so death can be both a beginning and an end… or a transition, which is neither a beginning nor an end. This is one of your areas of teaching, and though I have made numerous comments about life and death, I have offered no Teaching just this specific. So hear as I do, o son.

You just have finished a story about the end of all human life, where death comes slowly but inexorably from radiation sickness or quickly by way of the lethal tablet. Most held on to life as long as they could, but when death seems inevitable decided to end life with dignity, “decently and in order.” The story had virtually no spiritual theme, except that of people helping one another, even as death was imminent. So let Me add a more prominent spiritual dimension.

A basic spiritual premise is that “all things come from Thee, o Lord”… “the earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof.” I am ultimately responsible for what happens in the earth, even as I do not cause events, such as a nuclear war. When “bad things happen to good people” I either caused such, as a test of spiritual growth, or I did not act to prevent such, for any number of reasons. I am not ignorant, and I am not impotent. These are the ultimate alternatives, wouldn’t you agree?

If I am involved, then I obviously want to see how individuals and groups – church congregations, for example – act and react in a circumstance of death. The spiritual dimension, of course, carries the promise that ultimate life, or life in the spirit, does not end with the body’s non-functioning. Life in the spirit goes on, but it is affected by death of the physical being.

What did the “way of dying” show forth? This can be quite tricky, for it is not always simple to distinguish selfishness from selflessness. My death, as Jesus, was selfless, by definition. I laid down My life that grace might abound and that forgiveness would prevail over deserved justice. That was pretty selfless, wasn’t it? But, having said that I would lay down My life, wasn’t I then affected by ego… “I said I’d do it, so I’d better follow through, or I’ll look bad.”? “Didn’t I back down and take the easy way?” “Did I use some of My spiritual power to avoid or allay some of the physical suffering?” These are question that can be asked, but the dogmatic interpretation is that I lived and died selflessly.

And so it is with any of you. If you are in active relationship with Me whatever you do in relation to death is spiritually strong, whatever the action might be. Some who died “naturally” and in agony were strong of spirit, but so also were some who took the tablets and died in the best circumstances possible.

As I have told you, those who have a well-developed spirit and accept death as it comes are quite conscious as they move from earth life to spirit life. Such a one can finish up responsibilities in the earth and can then complete the transition to the timeless life of spirit.

You saw the sun appear to rise over the edge of the horizon, and a new day was begun. You know that the day will be lighted by this sun, and then it will “go down” in the west, and the day will die. This day shall never be again. But there will be others like it… and unlike it.