The Communion of the Saints

The Apostles Creed says we believe in "the communion of saints." Do you? Here's how Ron Rolheiser defines it. 

As Christians, this is our belief: We believe that the dead are still alive, still themselves and, very importantly, still in a living, conscious, and loving relationship with us and with each other. That’s our common concept of heaven and, however simplistic its popular expression at times, it is wonderfully correct. That’s exactly what Christian faith and Christian dogma, not to mention deep intuitive experience, invite us to. After death we live on, conscious, self-conscious, in communication with others who have died before us, in communion with those we left behind on earth, and in communion with the divine itself. That’s the Christian doctrine of the Communion of Saints.

So, do you believe this? What difference dose it make in your life?

Hi, Mom. Miss you!

HT: Internet Monk

Doorways

I once scorned ev’ry fearful thought of death,
When it was but the end of pulse and breath,
But now my eyes have seen that past the pain
There is a world that’s waiting to be claimed.

Earthmaker, Holy, let me now depart,
For living’s such a temporary art.

And dying is but getting dressed for God,
Our graves are merely doorways cut in sod.

– Calvin Miller, The Divine Symphony (Minneapolis: Bethany, 2000), 139.

HT: Trevin Wax

Stories of Mystery

"Once upon a time, a king came to earth to tell stories, and the stories contained the mystery of eternal life."

From The Story-Telling God: Seeing the Glory of Jesus in His Parables, by Jared Wilson (Kindle version, location 435)

Why I Am Sure About Heaven

I lost my mother this week. She passed after a full life, a beautiful 64 year long marriage, and leaving behind a great legacy. Therefore, this carton was especially meaningful to me today. I know where Mama is.

Click on cartoon to see it bigger

From Radio Free Babylon

Everything Else Thrown In

Some of the best lines C.S. Lewis ever wrote:

Give up yourself, and you will find your real self. Lose your life and you will save it. Submit to death, death of your ambitions and and favourite wishes every day and death of your whole body in the end: submit with every fibre of your being, and you will find eternal life. Keep back nothing. Nothing that you have not given away will be really yours. Nothing in you that has not died will ever be raised from the dead. Look for yourself, and you will find in the long run only hatred, loneliness, despair, rage, ruin, and decay. but look for Christ and you will find Him, and with Him everything else thrown in.

                   - C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, page 190

The Promise of Our Future

The promise of our future is found in an empty tomb.  He is not there. He is Risen....He is Risen Indeed!

Therefore, we will rise also. Death is defeated,; it no longer has its sting.

Wishing you a blessed and joyous Easter Sunday.

Hat Tip for Picture: Cross-Eyed