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Mitch Albom, he of Tuesdays
with Morrie, in his latest book writes about the five people you meet in
heaven. Fascinating reading. Albom is no theologian. He writes mostly about
sports. But sports are about people, people playing games. Albom writes about
those games people play, how they were played and why they turned out the way
they did. Life is not a game, but it is about people. Albom knows people and
knows people have questions about all the whys and wherefores of life and,
perhaps more importantly, the whys and wherefores of life after life: heaven. So he tells the tale of
Eddie the Maintenance Man who dies and meets five people in heaven. The first
person Eddie meets says to him: "Each of us was in your life for a reason.
You may not have known the reason at that time, and that is what heaven is for.
For understanding your life on earth…. This is the greatest gift God can give
you: to understand what happened in your life. To have it explained, It is the
peace you have been searching for." "Heaven," as another one of
those five people Eddie meets, says, "is [where} you get to make sense of
your yesterdays." Well, I don’t know what
heaven is like; but I surely do believe that when I get there, the life I have
just lived will finally make sense. All the pieces will fit together. There will
be no loose ends, no unanswered questions. I will know why everything happened
the way it happened and thus know why it happened in the first place. I will
meet all those people who crossed my path in this life and see the influence
they had on my thoughts and words and actions even if I did not know it at the
time. All my yesterdays will finally make sense. What a gift! It is also a great
consolation in the here and now. After all, one of the greatest questions we ask
is "Why?" One of our greatest frustrations is that all too often that
question goes unanswered. We know we cannot see the big picture and that
frustrates us. We know that if we could see that picture, life would make so
much more sense. So we grope our way though life searching for the answers to
questions that can only be answered in the life hereafter. We struggle with
partial answers, inadequate answers, even, to some questions, no answers at all. It will certainly be a
moot point whether or not the greatest gift God gives us is in the life to come
is to understand what happened in this life. It is certainly a gift to
anticipate. At this point in my life I am in no hurry to find the answer to that
question. I can wait even as I do look forward to finally being able to make
sense of all my yesterdays. Albom reminds me of what I already knew but, perhaps
all too often, take for granted especially when caught up in those life
situations where nothing seems to make sense and all I can do is ask
"Why?" Thanks, Mitch.
W.J.P |