Is Life Short… Or Long?

SAT., NOV. 20, 1993, 7:16 AM
FARM, STUDY

The theme of the sermon tomorrow will be an “end of the year” one. The church year ends, and a new one begins the next Sunday with Advent, the season of remembering Me, as Jesus, coming into human form in the earth. This church form does not bring forth the celebration that your secular culture’s New Year’s Eve does, but it is worth acknowledging in a similar way.

Is life short, or is it long? I’ll answer this titular question as you would expect: yes to both. Earth life is short, in comparison to the whole of existence… even to the whole of your soul’s total journey, for there have been “years” already and many “years” to come. Your parents have lived long earth lives in this era. Yours shall probably not be as long, but should at least be average for your culture.

Your time to teach has been relatively long, and, in comparison, the time remaining is short, but it should be rich and fulfilling, if you follow My advice. You do not have a certain number of assigned days or years and a foreordained time to die. Though I can affect this, by causing your death, preventing some event that would cause death, or actually prolonging your life, I seldom exercise this “privilege” of Mine. Earth life is relational, by design, so that it is rarely possible to change just one aspect without this affecting others, sometimes in ways detrimental to Me. So, though I continue to influence and still have ultimate power to determine what shall be, I prefer to let “nature take its course,” the nature that is My total Creation.

So I want you to enjoy these final years of teaching, cutting back in ways that allow your transition into retirement to be an easy, gentle one. These can be good years, even some of your best. Your perspective on your field is so much more complete than in your earlier years. Your capacity and willingness to include the spiritual dimension and to emphasize the important interactions with the environment are valuable to Me, and thus I want you to continue.

At the same time I want you to give more attention to these Teachings, for when your earth life ends (or even shortly before) these tangible evidences of Our relationship will cease. But fear not… I shall direct you in ways to utilize them, as I desire.

Yet life, in the full, real sense, is long, and this life, as Bob Russell, is but a short episode in the life of your soul. Only a few humans are “advanced” enough to even glimpse life in this fuller context. What is life like, outside of a physical body and outside of time and space? This life still seems so real and important that it is naturally difficult to envision what a continuing long life is and will be. For many good people, physical death brings them closer to Me. For you this won’t be much of a change, for these Teachings have brought us quite close. You just will no longer have some “distractions” that occasionally distance us, one from the other.