Rise and Shine

Every August I feel like a stretched rubber band that snaps back from Transfiguration amazement to Mary-land of my mind. In the evenings me and my aspiring immortal friends get together and sing her to sleep, her own special night’s sleep that wakes her up near her Son again. I love to imagine Elijah hopping in his chariot yoked to magical white horses and flying up to God, only mother Mary is in there with him too.

No cancerous pain to battle, no stinky cold hospital room, no box for the cold stiff shell to be stored in or no hopeless fire to ashify! I know that a whole big lot of people think it’s a good idea to be burned after they leave their bodies, but I wonder if that isn’t like saying either, “I don’t believe the part where our bones will rise from their graves and God will dress them with new flesh.” Or, they think that God can put the ashes together just as well.

Nope, I don’t dare expect God to assemble a puzzle of ashes and I wish those I love the most wouldn’t either. What if expecting that is like when Satan suggested to Jesus that He fling himself from the mountain because God could catch Him. He said that He wouldn’t put God to the test. Well, I wish we aspiring immortals wouldn’t put God to that test either. I ask God for a whole lot of things that He doesn’t want to do, and He doesn’t do them. I sure don’t want to find out in the end that He doesn’t want to look for such tiny pieces of me during the most intense moments in all of history since the beginning of the world.

The best way to avoid the problem of burning or burial is to just disappear altogether like Elijah and Mary did. Mary and Elijah never had to leave their bodies at all. They just ascended when God said they were finished here, like it was time to go to Church...forever.

Maybe you and I will ascend too, like Mary and Elijah did. Of course I mean when the aspiring immortals, maybe millions of us, will meet Jesus in the sky on the last day. The most exciting thing to think about is that it can happen next week. While everyone is reading the newsy political blogs and getting all upset about this or that we are quietly packing the bags of our hearts to make sure that we love enough, forgive enough, and we are obedient enough to give our bodies the kind of lift that Mary had.

”Fret not, neither let your heart be troubled” is another way of saying, lighten up to make your hearts like helium balloons, it will make it easier to fly.

Happy Birthday Alayne.