鈥淓ternity is not something that begins after you are dead. It is all the time. We are in it now鈥� 鈥� Charlotte Parkins Gilman.
Eternity is for a long time. Why not make it the best. This body, this soul we have, it will help define the heaven that God wants to share with us. Our awareness of this reality is crucial.
A quality test, a soul MRI, can tell us immediately if we are on the right track. Our spiritual health is not dependent on age, physical fitness or the absence of pain and suffering.
Are you a friend of God? Of Jesus? Do you have friends in high places? In heaven? Do you talk to God? To angels?
During each day we should frequently invite and recognize God鈥檚 presence. A special sign accompanies this acknowledgement: In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. That is the spirit with which we should enter our life鈥檚 activities, be they an at-bat for the Blue Jays, a surgery, any activity of life, or even our entry into physical death.
This is our time; this is our life; this is the opportunity to be the gift God has made us to be. This is our chance to know, love and serve our Creator and our world.
A Limelighters鈥� song The Time of Man addresses our opportunity with creation:
Once there were trees and a river
Once there was grass where you stand
Once there were songs
About rights instead of wrongs
Once was the time of man.
In a prophetic warning the song describes the possible abuse of nature and destruction of this Eden we are gifted with:
Grass doesn鈥檛 grow on the hillside
Trees shrink and die in the sun
No place to hide my little baby鈥檚 eyes
From the damage the dead have done.
So now is the time to right the environmental wrongs. Now is the time to rebuild and heal the physical world around us.
But most important 鈥� now is the opportunity of our life-times to touch God and our fellow man. Our Father is waiting with joy and with open arms. Our brothers and sisters ache for our love. This is our time to act.
We are in eternity now. We can improve the quality of that eternal joy and happiness God wants to share with us. A little effort daily will change our eternal reality.
Now is the time to embrace the Gifts of God we received at baptism. Christ literally lives in us as we become temples of the Holy Spirit and God鈥檚 adopted sons and daughters.
Heaven starts now. We are in eternity. Our body and soul will be with us when we share God鈥檚 heaven. This is our chance to get it right.
听
