July Journal, Seventh Sunday after Trinity, Octave of St. Mary Magdalene

Okay, I admit it. I’m winging it.

I wrote Chapter Eight of my novel-in-progress this week, The Music of the Mountain, named (for today at least), “Fr. Adams’ Faithfulness.” I’ve come to look forward to the hours from three to five each afternoon, sometimes four to five, to find out what happens next. I put my fingers on the keys and the characters begin talking to one another. They are still in the basement, but there is hope for the next chapter that they will be set free from the damp and the dust. I for one am starting to sneeze.

In this chapter, the question of right and wrong is presented by the priest, Christian, to his co-worker, Dr. Norton, agnostic. How is it that she decides, he inquires, what is right and what is wrong? Where does she find the standards of behavior when she doesn’t believe in the authority that sets those standards? It’s just a question, a nudge from the old Vicar to stir the thoughts of the middle-aged Professor of Ethics.

Alongside the daily dose of writing, I have been reading Imagine Heaven by John Burke, a consideration of the many Near-Death Experiences over the last decades, how these witness accounts compare and contrast. The common threads, of course, are most intriguing, and above all, I have been fascinated by the industriousness of Heaven. Who knew?

For Paradise has a city in its center, the New Jerusalem. Paradise is so large, three times Earth they say (as I recall), many many many miles in circumference. And the city itself is gigantic, within the pearly gates and walls (that are the depth of a room). But what has really fascinated me, is that there is a great deal of activity. Each person is doing what they were intended to do, being inspired by the Holy Spirit, present in an intensely beautiful way. It is Earth reflected as it was meant to be. There is even a hill where you can watch the goings-on on Earth.

Also there are pets we have loved. I’ve often thought that love was the key, but evidently there are all kinds of beasts, lions lying down by lambs. Yay, my many cats will welcome me!

The colors and the light are nearly blinding, but the souls that inhabit Paradise have developed vision that can handle it.

And that brings me to the remarkable part. Our life on Earth is a rehearsal for Heaven. We develop habits of thought and action, habits of love. We live with Christ within us. We speak as Christ would have us speak. We allow his love to flow through us to others. We consciously work on being “little Christs.” And that includes suffering, if so be it.

This morning, in our little chapel, our preacher touched on this as well, and I always smile when dots are connected in my spiritual life. He described the drawing closer and closer to Christ, in stages, for as St. Paul writes in his Epistle to the Romans:

“For when ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness. What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed? for the end of those things is death. But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life. For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” (Romans 6:19+)

Ah, the famous phrase, “the wages of sin is death.” So our preacher explained that the first thing we do as Christians is to try to speak the words and do the deeds we are told to speak and do by our Lord, i.e. the commandments for a start. We draw even closer by worshiping God together in church before the altar and the Real Presence of Christ, as Our Lord commanded. And the third step is to commune with Christ by partaking of the Real Presence, a moment when we are “made one body with him, that he may dwell in us, and we in him.” (BCP p. 81)

Not sinning, I suppose, is a no-brainer, since sinning leads to death, and the slow dying is fed by sin each minute. For eternal life begins now, with a sinless life, yet as fallen creatures we can only step along the path of Christ, follow the light, repent when we stumble, and continue along the path following the light. Simple, really.

Returning to my reading: Imagine Heaven describes a reality that is intensely glorious, like Earth but fuller and more real. Some of the descriptions from the NDE’ers recalled C.S. Lewis’ description of the grass in Heaven as being too sharp and real for the shades from Hell to walk on, for these souls were too insubstantial, filmy. The saints – those of us (hopefully) who have grown more and more real in our lifetimes – are solid and can walk on the grass.

I have noticed this increasing reality in my own life of faith and life itself on Earth, bound by time. Partly, this is due to seeking and finding what I am meant to do, at least I think at this moment, that is, to write. For in the process of writing, novelists develop characters based on their observations of others. I’m not sure when I noticed it, but somewhere in the process of my novel-writing over the last twenty years, I realized I was observing far more than I ever had before. I was noting the color of the sky, the temperature, the breeze, and best of all, I noticed people. People became my greedy hobby, as if I was introduced to a new universe with each hello, and I fear I have become rather rude with all the questions I ask or want to. As one of my characters thinks in Angel Mountain, “I want to know everything about them, everything.” People are the ultimate realm of exploration, incredibly complex and beautiful.

And of course if you spend all your time thinking about people, real people, that is time spent when you are not thinking about yourself.

So with the writing I entered a new world here on Earth, one of infinite variety and wonder-ment and exquisite beauty. For I have also found that finding the word to describe something makes it more real as well. Why is that? We are words, ourselves, words spoken by the Creator at our conception. “In the beginning was the Word…” and that Word spoke others that spoke us into existence. We are the notes that make up the music of the mountains that touch Heaven.

Mystery and miracle. Just as Mary Magdalene (feast day yesterday) discovered at the feet of Jesus. There’s no going back. For we have known something so true, so beautiful, and so real we step toward the light. That’s what it is. Here on Earth and then in Heaven. And if we are on the right path, the path of Our Lord, the two overlap. Every Christian, every believer in Christ Jesus, knows Heaven already, and the experience will grow throughout their lifetime.

And so, I’m winging it, soaring high, dipping down, circling and singing before the throne of God, wondering what will happen in Chapter Nine.

Thanks be to God.