“One of the angels . . . carried me away in the Spirit . . . and showed me the Holy City.”                                          --Revelation 21:9-10

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For months, and maybe years to come, my mother’s life and death will be at the forefront of my thoughts.  She was exceedingly precious to me.  Someone asked me at her funeral when was the last time I had a meaningful conversation with her.  The question took me by surprise, because every time I spoke with her it was meaningful . . . and I had just spoken with her early on the morning that she made her final move to Heaven, Our Father’s House.

I remember one conversation I had with her a few weeks before her faith became sight.  We were talking about Heaven, and I related to her a visit I had made to Westminster Abbey in London, England.  The Abbey is the cathedral where British kings and queens are crowned, where members of the royal family are married and where outstanding dignitaries are buried.  The door to the cathedral that was open to tourists was rather small and insignificant.  Once I walked through it, I entered a dark, cramped narthex where I bought my ticket and guidebook.  On the opposite side of the narthex was another door that led to the magnificent, glorious, cavernous sanctuary.  I can’t imagine anyone being satisfied to stay in the narthex of Westminster Abbey, clutching his ticket or leafing through the guidebook!  The whole purpose of the narthex is to provide a place to get the ticket and the guidebook, then make the transition into the cathedral itself.

I told Mother that our lives are like the narthex to the cathedral.  During this life, she had picked up her “ticket” to Heaven when she was born again into God’s family through faith in Jesus, and she had familiarized herself with the “guidebook”. . . her Bible.  But how foolish anyone would be who wanted to stay in the narthex!  And I wondered out loud, “Why would I grieve and mourn at the thought of her leaving it?”  Her whole purpose . . . and ours . . . for being there is to transition into the “sanctuary” of Our Father’s House.  

My mother left the narthex and moved into the sanctuary of Our Father’s House at 5:05 pm on June 14, 2007, four days after her 87th birthday.  At the moment I don’t feel I’ll recover from her move . . . it’s unimaginable for me to think she is no longer here . . . that I can no longer see the sparkle in her eyes, or hear the wisdom of her words, or laugh at her zinging quips, or watch her hands reach out for my granddaughters, or just bask in the blessed joy of her presence.  But I KNOW that “goodness and mercy follow me all the days of my life . . . ” and that one day I, too, will move out of the narthex to live forever in the sanctuary of Our Father’s House.   In the meantime, this AnGeL wants to show others a glimpse of the Holy City so that they will look forward with hope to moving there, too.

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