Have I got some news for you!

5/2/09

I'm not the shiniest pebble on the beach but even I know that there are things in Heaven and Earth that are beyond me, that there are things I will never know and many I will never understand.

And even with my ego, I'm okay with that. So, why then, I wonder, would God give me such a good life? I'm almost completely free of illness, just the normal aches and pains that come with a human body that's never reached its full and strong potential.

I have a curious mind, one that is unencumbered with the ambition to develop it much beyond my interests - children, husband, family, politics, music, history - so I'm not handicapped with dreams outside my reach.

I'm not a bad person, as people go, but I should be a lot better considering the people who have mentored me all through my life, not to mention the examples set by people I admire.

So, why then would God have given me a gift that he hasn't given to everyone else? To make matters worse, I didn't even know what to do with the gift once I had it. A good analogy might that you picked all the right numbers and then put the winning lottery ticket in your dresser drawer and left it there for years and years.

That's what I did with the gift God gave me, and it was almost thirty years later that I even wondered about it. One day, out of the blue, I remembered it and thought maybe, just maybe, I was supposed to do something with it.

Another kind of gift is the gift of being loved. God must have loved me but have you ever noticed the responsibility that comes with being loved? Sometimes the weight can be unbearable, and other times you don't feel worthy of that love and you certainly don't feel you've earned that love. We might not be mature enough to know how to handle it, either.

So it was that when I was in my twenties, and an irregular church-goer, I discovered that I could sense the spirit of someone who had passed away. There was no sound, no voice in my head, just a kind of knowing that I had just crossed paths, passed through another plane, and was sharing space with someone who had died. I got something like a message, nice and short - like a Tweet, in a way - here and then gone. No vision, just a knowing, as it were.

There were three of these encounters and there might have been more if I had figured out what to do with them at the time. But there were only three.

Oddly enough I really wasn't frightened or curious about these encounters. I didn't feel any fear or worry. It was just something that transpired and then it was gone.

These people were not friends of mine, merely acquaintances, and even one was a stranger. I did, however, know in each case someone who was close to them. It was through the living that I was able to confirm the deaths, and extend my sympathies to their loved ones left behind.

One day, more than twenty years later, I awoke thinking about these three encounters and knew at that moment what I was supposed to do with the information I had - for the most part - kept to myself. I was to find their families and let them know what I knew. I tried to find their loved ones in the telephone book, or, in one case, in an old church directory. I found a daughter and a son and called them on the telephone. Here's how the conversation went:

Hello? This is Elvis ... and I don't know if you remember me but there's something I have to tell you. You might think this is crazy but after so-and-so passed away their spirit crossed my path and I knew who they were and that they had died. I only recently realized that I was supposed to let you that they had lingered nearby you after they died, hanging around for a time - I don't know how long, that wasn't something I was privy to. [One family's loved one was in another state but found their way to the family, anyway.]

You know how they responded? They each said they were not surprised; one said they sensed their loved one was often nearby. Fortunately for me, no one thought I was crazy and even thanked me for calling.

The fact that I no longer have the gift of sensing spirits is not the least bit disappointing for me because I had - for a time - an insight into the after-life, that place where we go once we die. That insight could have only come from one place, from God.

I had all the information I needed about God and only wished that the rest of you could have the same experience, share the same gift God loaned to me.

I never doubted His existence again, never wondered what God was up to, what His plans were, what mystical phenomena He had caused Man to witness over the millennia. I still don't know if He might be watching us in the way we might understand 'watching,' I only know that once I'm gone from this plane, I'll be 'seeing' Him later.

You'll just have to take my word for it, God is real. And just like it was mine, the choice is yours what you do with that information.