pearly gates

My uncle died eleven years ago tonight.

I was 15 and the moment the phone rang is emblazoned on my memory by flame. He had fallen off a ladder in a roofing accident and had been in the hospital for a week. He was going to be fine, they said. He would be going home the next day, they said.

It was a blood clot.

It wasn?t supposed to happen.

I remember a few months later, my cousin, his daughter, a year older than me, sat in the passenger seat of her car and told us to listen to a new song she heard on the radio. The singer spoke of heaven. Will I dance for you, Jesus? Or in awe of you, be still? My cousin said she couldn?t believe he was there, her daddy, that he was seeing it all with his eyes. We all wept hot, stinging tears.

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By the time I turned 25, I had lost all of my grandparents. My Grandma, my lookalike, when I was 12. She was magic and laughter and McDonald?s pancakes on Saturday mornings. My Grandpa Jack, the Rockwell engineer, died when I was 16. He took me skiing in Mammoth during the winter and we swam in his Orange County pool in the summer. My other grandpa, the distant one, died after I was married. He met my oldest boy and we visited more during those last few years, but I was sad at his funeral because I hadn?t known him better. And then last year, my Gram, the beautiful, gentle, wise one who smelled of Saratogas and Estee Lauder, took her final breath while we cradled her hands.

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I hear that song, now, and I try to imagine it myself. Streets of gold, they say. The pearly gates. I try to picture Jesus, and wonder if it?s possible to fathom diety.

Will we sing, dance, stand, bow?

And eternity. I mean, eternity?

My brain hurts.

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When my uncle died, people rushed to console his heartbroken young wife and three teenagers. They brought mountains of food and cleaned the house. They did their best to comfort with their words, ?He?s in the best place of all. He?s happy with Jesus.?

My fifteen year old self wanted to believe them, but I stood to the side and felt anger. Why wasn?t this a good enough place for now?

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The truth is I don?t always want to imagine heaven. I want to live forever here, because even though this place is broken beyond seeming repair, it?s familiar. It?s the place I know, and it doesn?t make sense, of course, but, come now ? creatures with features so unbelievable they must be described as a combination of all manner of living things? Wrap your brain around that for a moment.

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I met up with a friend last week for lunch. We talked about her grandfather who passed away last fall.

?He had been saying for a few years he was ready. He wanted to die.? She leaned her elbows on the table. ?But it wasn?t morbid. He just said he was tired and ready to see Jesus.?

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I do wonder about heaven, and I wonder if that?s it, the knowing of Jesus, the wanting more than anything to be with him, wherever he is. A world of pearl and gold and sapphire must pale beside him, his glory. I work my mind, willing it to want to be there, to be happy that my family members and friends are there, not here.

But sometimes I wish this was good enough, this place here. I wish for my uncle, much too young, and my grandmothers with their smiles and my grandfathers with their hugs and deep voices.

I wish for heaven to be on earth and earth to be heaven, just for tonight.

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Source: http://deeperstory.com/pearly-gates/

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