What is Life/ What does it all mean?

Those are two heavy questions that cross all of our minds a few times in life, or for some people I'm sure lay heavy on their heart all the time. Well, here's a new way of looking at life that I just starting thinking about:

I just read in the book Called to Question by Joan Chittister about her thoughts on life. She said, " Life on earth was simply a waiting ground for heaven." At first, I just read over at then kept going down the page, but that idea, earth being a waiting place, a preparation for heaven, kept recirculating in my head. Maybe that could be true? It makes a lot of sense.

Think of it like this: First, our time on earth is short compared to the history of humanity, and is even shorter, is only a pinch of the time we will spend in heaven after his life on earth, because we were given the gift of eternal life, being happy and content in heaven forever.

So if that's the case, then you can compare our time on earth to the foyer of a house. It's like when you are going over to a friends house or going to pick up someone for the first date, and the door is opened to you at the house, so you are welcomed in, and then you stand there, sometimes along or sometimes accompanyed by someone else who lives in the house, while you wait for your friend or significant other to come to meet you at the door. In those moments of waiting, there is an uncertainty around. You stand there awkardly or uncomfortably, looking around the hallway for something familiar, not sure what to do. You also don't know entirely what to expect, you don't know when your friend will come to the door, so there's a feeling of anticipation. That's just like what our life on earth can be compared to. It's the start of something much greater, that's for sure. And during times in our life, we all find us doubting ourselves, unsure of what we are doing, and most of the time we can never be sure of what's next and what's to come.

So then why really does this time, this breath of life, on earth even exist? Well, I've got a theory about that too. We could have st been created in heaven, or just gone straight there, or something along the uncomprehendable lines of that, but we were evidently put on this life for a reason. For all that man is, all that he is capable of doing and feeling, we had to have been created by a higher power, a divine hand that could be greater than we are. I know that God created each of us, and did so in his image. So then, God put on on earth for a reason.

When you experience something you would explain to another person as "beautiful", such as a pink and orange sunset over the water or an arching rainbow appearing over head after a downpour, those certianly are beautiful acts of nature. One of the reasons we may have been put on earth is so that we have a chance to experience things. God wanted to give us a glimpse of the beauty of what we are to experience in heaven. He wanted us to first experience the breath taking beauty of the nautre he made for us on earth before we experience the unthinkable beauty and glory we will see and witness in heaven.

Sometimes you see or hear about actions that one would describe as a miracle, whether it's big or small. For example, I would say that a few months ago or so when that pilot landed his crashing air plane in the Hudson River in out side of NYC and saved the hundreds of people who were going to die, I would say that's pretty miraculous. We hear about these king of miraculous events all the time and see others often online and on the news. Maybe it was just natural coincidence that caused them, but I really don't believe that. I think God has his hand in everything that happens. So what about you, and me? When do we get to experience our miracles? Just wait. If you keep your eyes and heart open, you'll see them all around you every day, though they may be small, they are there. I've expereienced a few already, because I understand that everything really does happen for a reason (but that's another time, another post). So all of these mini miracles, even the pilot landing his crashing plane, all of these are miniscule compared to the miracle that happens we we die, when our souls leave our bodies and pass, with angels and grace, to the heaven God created. That is the ultimate miracle, and we are just being given a tiny reminder and preview to it when we expereince so called miracles here on earth.

Finally, few people are lucky enough to ever really experience and feel love here on earth. Yes, you love your family and they love you. And yes, you love your friends and ya'll would do anything for each other. But I think the most powerful, potent love between to humans is the love and passion and yearning that two people who are truly, unabashedly in love, which is really only felt between the two people who are meant to be together, otherwise maybe known as soul mates. I kinda do think there's one person out there who I'm meant for, who from the beginning of time God said that this man would show me how to love and love me back. Unfortunately, and I can't understand why, but its disconcerting that the divorce rate in today's society is so high. And I can't explain that. Maybe those people settles before they were meant to? I don' know, I can't explain that. But what I can explain, is that I think the earthly love we have for the man/woman we love is the closest thing we can know on earth to what God's love is like for us. That yearning, heartfelt longing, and consuming love that you experience for your loved one is what God had given to us, to our hearts, so that we can have a tiny idea of what his love is like for us. But obviously, God's love really isn't even comparable to that, because he is God, and he can love like we can't even imagine.

What it comes down to is this: our time on earth is a short time of preperation before the real party starts, before we get to meet our wonderful creator, before we get to spend forever in the beautiful, miraculous, lovely heaven. (Just wanted to say, that I do think there are additional reasons we are here on earth, such as to reach out to our brothers and sisters and love them, and help them, and show them God's love; to spread the message of peace and help to bring justice to ourselves and our neighbors; etc... But that's for another time another post too) When we go to heaven we will see beauty that we thought couldn't be created, we will witness the miracle of eternal ife and real perfection, and what I'm looking forward to most of all, is that we will know what God's love is truly like, and our hearts and bodies will be filled to the brim, will be overflowing with his love for us.