Category Archives: Death

What’s heaven?

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Maria Shriver is an award-winning American journalist and author and she is the wife of California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.  A practising Roman Catholic, in 2007 she published a book for children called What’s Heaven?

In this book, children are informed that

Heaven is somewhere you believe in…it’s a beautiful place where you can sit on soft clouds and talk to other people who are there.  At night you can sit next to the stars, which are the brightest of anywhere in the universe…If you’re good throughout your life, then you get to go to heaven…when your life is finished here on earth, God sends angels down to take you up to Heaven to be with him…[and Grandma is] alive in me…Most important, she taught me to believe in myself…She’s in a safe place, with the stars, with God and the angels…she is watching over us from up there…

“I want you to know” [says the heroine to her great-Grandma] “that even though you are no longer here, your spirit will always be alive in me.”

…

Last words

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2 Timothy 4:7-8 contain some of the last recorded words of Paul:-

I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day–and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing.

What do people think about on their death beds, and what do they say?…

Life after death

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Do you believe they asked me
In a life after death
And I answered: Yes
But I could not explain
What it might look like
There

One thing only I knew
Not a hierarchy
Of saints sitting on golden throne
Not a fall
Of damned souls
Only

Only love made free
Never exhausted
Flowing over me…

Do you not then, ask the questioners
Expect more after death?
And I answer
Not less

David Lawrence, who quotes these lines by Marie Luise Kaschnitz, comments, ‘An expectation that the future holds “more not less” is wonderful but is this really all God permits us to know?’ …

Lk 7:11-17 – From death to life – sermon notes

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The miracle which is about to be recounted was one of just three occasions that we know of when Jesus raised the dead.  It is therefore one of the greatest of his miracles.  It demonstrates to a remarkable degree his pity mixed with power.  He had, on the previous day, healed one who was on the point of death.  But now he shows himself to be conqueror of death itself.

1.  The widow’s affliction

Picture the scene presented by that funeral procession, with the bereaved mother leading the way. …

Quotes on Death

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1.  A single death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic. (Stalin)

2.  Ah! Is this dying?  How have I dreaded as an enemy this smiling friend? (Thomas Goodwin)

3.  When Christ calls me home I shall go with the gladness of a boy bounding away from school.  (Adoniram Judson)

4.  If a man that is desperately sick today, did believe he should arise sound the next morning; or a man today, in despicable poverty, had assurance that he should tomorrow arise a prince; would they be afraid to go to bed…?…