I am often asked if dying and coming back influenced my decision to get ordained. The answer is yes and no. In some ways, I have always been on this path. I’ve had a strong interior spiritual call since I was a young boy. I’m sort of an accidental clergy member; I did not intend to remain at the pulpit, but I kept finding work that had to be done, so I did it.
Also, the intensity of my spirituality increased dramatically after my near-death experience, and I knew of no other way I could get away with spending hours each day in yoga and meditation and call it work. The work of ministry has allowed me the honor of sitting and conversing with many who are dying, and many who have died. And I feel better equipped to help because of my experience.
The best part of my ministry job has always been sitting with the dying—talking, praying, and simply being with them, being real, authentic, and truthful. I’ve found that, when I’ve shared my story, even if very briefly, expressing my assurance of eternal life, my hope, my knowing that I am known, has helped ease hundreds into death, and into Love-Hope-Joy-Beauty-Truth-Charity- Kindness-Compassion-Love-Patience-Beauty-Love.
I have been an unconventional pastor because I am an unconventional person, one who has at times run afoul of certain parishioners who had their own ideas of clerical propriety and dignity. I have never been good at either of those things. Inevitably, some of these parishioners have become gravely ill, and—whether they like it or not, whether I liked them or not—it has been and will be my duty to visit them and help their passage across. Once someone reaches the stage where he or she sees death coming, we have become the fastest of friends.
BUY PETER’S BOOK, HEAVEN IS BEAUTIFUL
I said it was an honor to sit with the dying, and it has been, every time. Part of this is because people often become more honest in their deaths; but more so, as the time nears, it is because the veil that hides heaven from the eyes of humans sometimes begins to lift. In the old days, when Auntie Mabel was dying, she might say, “I see an angel” or “I see my husband (or my mother).” The attendant might say, “No, dear. There is no angel here,” or “No, dear. Your mother (or your husband) has been dead for ten years. She (or he) is not here.”
These days, nurses, doctors, and clergy just let those who are dying express what they believe they are seeing, even if no one else can see it. Who is to say that what they see is not real, and that an angel or a deceased family member is not in the room? The veil between heaven and earth is lifted more often than we know.
For weeks after a funeral, it has been my job to visit the grieving mother, widow, husband, or child. Often, in hushed tones, they would lean across the kitchen table and say words such as these: “Peter, this is going to sound crazy. This morning when I came down for breakfast, there was Tom, standing right there by the sink with his back to me. I was shocked. He turned around, looked me in the eyes, and said, ‘Don’t worry, dear. I am okay. I’ll see you again.’ He smiled and then vanished.”
A hundred times or more, I’ve heard such stories from the grieving. Maybe you have a similar story or have heard one like it. If the afterlife is real, and I am here to tell you that it is, then why wouldn’t your loved one want to tell you that she or he is okay and all is well?
If you are dying right now, or fear dying, or love someone who is dying, then please, let me tell you this: You are not your body. You are your soul. Your soul inhabits your body. When you go across, or when the one you love departs, the soul does not die. Only the body dies. The real you does not die. When you die, you will carry with you—yourself—the you who is you, plus all the love you have given away or shared, and all the love you have gathered.
All the bits and pieces of love you have given or collected are in your soul right now, and they are yours to keep. They are your treasure. Jesus said, “Store up treasure for yourself in heaven, where moths and rust cannot destroy and thieves do not break in and steal” (Matthew 6:20). He was right. Every act of love accumulates in your soul. No one, and nothing, can take these from you or destroy them. Love is eternal, and love is inside you.
You also get to carry all the pain you have caused, and whether you choose to believe me or not, that pain is sin. We all sin. I still sin, probably every day; but I love every day, too, and I know that God is merciful and forgiving—thank God. You will carry your memories, your self, your mind, and your soul into heaven, a heaven where there is no pain, no boredom, no suffering, and where there is love and beauty beyond comprehension.
God is all-loving and knows you thoroughly already, from before you were born, even before you were knit in your mother’s womb. God created your innermost being. God knew you, and knows you (Jeremiah 1:5; Psalm 139:13). You are loved. You are beloved in particular. You have always been loved; you will always be loved. You are loved with a love beyond imagination, with a power of love beyond comprehension, a thousand times sweeter than the sweetest love you have ever felt. Love is how you were made. Love is how you exist. You will not end. When the trumpet blows for you, you will transform in the twinkling of an eye (1 Corinthians 15:52) and find yourself in the presence of God, who is Love and Mercy and Truth and Beauty.
Be prepared to be loved and to be welcomed: you are going Home. Death is only a doorway. When your time comes, as it must, walk through that doorway and love God. Trust God. Believe. That’s all you have to do—simply believe. You can believe in God, because God is Real. This life is simply one bridge in between.
