by Steve Lowry 19 Replies latest jw friends
In a meditation a couple of yrs ago, i saw my brother, whom i had been close to. He died about 30 yrs ago. He emenated acceptance, reassurance, comfort, happiness, and love at a very high level. He had on a big smile and was lit up and beaming a golden yellow light. I will remember it until i meet him again, on the other side.
S
I am very open to these sorts of things, but I am afraid to let them in. When I read these stories I get goosebumps though.
When I was in my 20's I knew a sister , same age, whose mother had died. She was very depressed and not doing well at all. I was at her apt . one day and the phone rang .She answered and she talked to the person on the line .I thought nothing of it unitl she told me it was her mom. I was freaked out, being a jws at the time and thinking all such things had to do with the demons. She felt very comforted. (as you can imagine). I am so glad I had the sense to restrain myself and and not take her joy away, even though I strongly felt it was the demons.
Read the book "Hello from Heaven!" It's written by a husband and wife that are grief counselors. It is full of many such experiences. You can find it on Amazon.com . I got a copy at my local library.
Biblical scholar Dale Allison in his book Resurrecting Jesus has a very interesting discussion of this phenomenon and he surveys the anthropological and psychological literature on the subject. He also reveals that he himself has experienced this. Here is part of his summary:
"In case after case, and from different regions of the globe, we have learned that up to half of all widows and widowers believe that they have run into their dead spouses, that is, have seen them and/or heard them and/or felt their presence. This is clearly a normal part of the mourning process: the bereaved frequently report contact with the dead. We have also now learned that such contact is not confused to surviving partners or those in mourning. Indeed, when asked, all parts of the general public report a high incidence -- surveys from Western Europe and North America vary anywhere from about 10-40 percent -- of apparent contact with the dead through dreams, voices, felt presences, as well as visions while wide awake. These experiences are, moreover, often experienced as quite vivid and real" (pp. 274-275).
Then after relating his own experience, he says: "I relate all this not so that others may believe that Barbara survived death and spoke to me, nor that readers might regard me as fantasy prone or a victim of mental dysfunction. The point is only that these things really happen, and in my case I know this from firsthand experience. I also know how overwhelmingly real such events can seem -- so real that I took them at the time to originate in something other than my own subjectivity and have difficulty thinking otherwise even now, years later" (p. 276). He goes on to withhold any judgment on an ontological external reality causing these experiences, but he very interestingly notes that these experiences resemble NT resurrection christophany stories in the NT. In particular, the dead person is not perceived as a ghost or transparent spirit but as a real three-dimensional solid person, but there are other parallels.
In my case, there was no grief involved. Perhaps because of jw numbness, i never felt much loss or any grief from my brother's death. Further, this happened decades after he died.
S
And Casper says "HI !" too ! Good grief.......
"When I was in my 20's I knew a sister , same age, whose mother had died. She was very depressed and not doing well at all. I was at her apt . one day and the phone rang .She answered and she talked to the person on the line .I thought nothing of it unitl she told me it was her mom."
This sounds a bit like the story the lady related to me in the doctors office, but there was no actual phone.
And Casper says "HI !" too ! Good grief.......
Thanks KID for proving Balsam's point:
Until a person experiences it there is no way to believe it.
2x's
The thing is, when they get a really good one, like Midwich's, they will need a change of underwear.
Warlock
