Comment by C. Morningbear Cullimore Mercer on 5th mo. 17, 2011 at 8:01pm

Death.  A door to a new awareness..  I have experienced death.  I have lived seven years longer than for which my first heart specialist slated me.  In the course of military service I lost friends, a room mate, and respected leaders, all senselessly and way too premature.  I had my first near death experience when I was  thirty due to heat stroke subsequent to burning off patches of skin on my arm and back.  That experience informed my spiritual journey for the next thirty-five years.  I have lost all my beloved relatives excepting my father and his sister who  are in their eighties. 

 

I often wonder why a well informed dead person would choose to live?  Life is painful.  From the passage through the birth canal, through a slow decline of faculties, organs, and relationships we experience pain.  Your insight that your friend was more afraid of the pain of the dying process than death itself, I believe informs the negative response toward death.  Some of us love life and the observation of it.  The pleasant surprises of life add value to what otherwise would be torture.  Finding the inner peace, the light of Christ and resting in it is another value that makes life worth living.  With this in view, death becomes a door not a destination.  

 

Recently, an old spinal injury immobilized me and the pain was unending.  I really was ready to move on and began to look at taking my life.  God's angels came to me through my spouse, ER Doctors and the National Suicide Help Line.  Reaching out and being available to others in need is central to defeating death as an enemy and as a quick escape.  I have been on both ends of those views.  I hope this is helpful.

 

Do  you go up to Quaker Heights Camp near Eldora?  It was one of my favorite places when I lived in Iowa.

Comment by David Woodward on 5th mo. 18, 2011 at 12:30pm

think for your help a that. Quaker Heights camp is going. I like going there to.

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