I remember reading a book years ago written by Gordon T. Allred, a Professor of Literature and a fellow educator at the university I spent thirty years serving. The name of the book was “If a Man Die.” It was a very thought provoking book and it, for the first time in my life, made me think more seriously about death and dying. Since that time, I have been asked many times to speak at various funerals for friends, as well as family. It is always a hard thing to do, because I am such an emotional person, and I seldom get through such a task without shedding tears and being unable to talk for a few moments several times during those occasions. My intentions have been to try to relieve the pain of their loss, if I could. But my emotions probably enhanced their pain rather than alleviated it.
Death is actually a process that begins when we are born; it is not something we look forward to or even anticipate as something around the corner. Our brains are not programmed to anticipate death as we do a birthday or other celebrations. Rather our brains are designed to think of death as something that happens to others, to old people, and when we are old, it is something that happens to other old people. When we come to that point in our lives that we can see that our bodies and our minds have deteriorated, we may know in our hearts that our very own death is pending. At that point, we may finally resign ourselves to believing that at last it is now our turn.
The key to accepting that time is not to see death as a punctuation period, the end, but that it is rather more like a comma, meaning that there is more to come. Job, of Old Testament fame, asked the question, “If a man die, will he live again?” There is no other question to which the human soul more eagerly seeks an answer than that one. It seemed to Job that the grave could not be the end. If life were just a tangled web of injustice, such as he had suffered, why would God have given us a moral code if our only reward for following it were death? Job, wanted to be assured; he wanted to believe that there was ‘a beyond.’ All men want to be assured of that. Otherwise, why not, ‘Eat drink and be merry for tomorrow we die!’? What is it that stands in the way of a man’s belief in immortality? It is the cold, real and universal fact of death. All men die, and every day we read a brief description of their lives in the obituaries. As far as we can see, there is no more than a casket and a grave. So where is the evidence of the beyond? Science will say there is no evidence of the ‘beyond’ because the body lies there for all to see. Science, however, knows nothing, or very little, about spiritual evidence. But Job’s great faith allowed him an audience with God. And from that audience, his assurance was such that he cried with joy, “And though after my skin hath been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh shall I see God.” ( Job 19:26) Luke tells us that; “He is not a God of the dead, but of the living for all live unto Him.”(Luke 20:38) Men’s lives, apparently, have many forms, not unlike the transitional life of a butterfly that changes from a larvae to a caterpillar and then to a butterfly. The butterfly begins much as we. A caterpillar emerges from their egg much like a small child emerges from its mother’s fertilized egg. After a short life, such as ours, the caterpillar prepares itself for its next stage by wrapping itself in a cocoon or pupa much like a man is laid away in a coffin. Eventually a beautiful butterfly emerges, possibly comparable to the spirit of man leaving the cold body and ascending into the spirit world. The spirit world being his next phase of existence on his way to eternity.
It has always been reassuring to me to know that when Heavenly Father wants us to know something, he sends a messenger down to reveal the thing He wants us to know. The messenger comes, he delivers the message and leaves. He goes to report back to the Father that he has completed his assignment. Heavenly messengers have never stopped to linger nor to discuss the weather or how things are going on earth. The messenger has been given a specific assignment and that is the only information he will give us. They have never told anyone, to our knowledge about where they live and what it is like there. They don’t fill us in on what they do all day or who they do it with or if they even have days. Obviously Heavenly Father does not want us to know very much about what lies on the other side of the veil. Some early Christian leaders somehow got the idea that people who have passed on are living on beautiful white clouds, and all they do is play harps and sing Hosannas all day. They had a lot of funny ideas about the hereafter. But we know different. This much has been revealed to us: we know that there is a place that we will be going that is usually referred to as the spirit world, or paradise. We also know that we will have more important things to do than play harps. Missionary work will be one of them. We also know that we can communicate with one another and that those who were valiant will be with many of their ancestral relatives. That is a happy thought!
We have to “Remember the worth of souls is great in the sight of God.” (D&C 18:10) He will save as many of us as He can. Some will suffer punishment for their indiscretions, and the repentant, He will eventually forgive. There are, however, some sins that cannot be forgiven. The Psalmist said: “When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; What is man, that thou art mindful of him?…For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour.” (Psalms 8:3–5) We have to know that this life is not the end and that there is much, much more in our eternal quests.
What will we look like there in the spirit world where we will await the day of Resurrection? The Book of Mormon describes the time during which the people built the tower of Babel. The Jaredites were leaving the place of the Tower of Babel, and the Brother of Jared requested that Lord stretch forth His finger and touch 16 stones in order to provide light for them in the eight barges they built to cross the sea. The Brother of Jared’s faith was so strong that he saw the finger of the Lord. Because of his great faith, the Lord elected to show Himself to the brother of Jared. “And never have I showed myself unto man whom I have created, for never has man believed in me as thou hast. Seest thou that ye are created after mine own image? Yea, even all men were created in the beginning after mine own image. Behold, this body, which ye now behold, is the body of my spirit; and man have I created after the body of my spirit; and even as I appear unto thee to be in the spirit will I appear unto my people in the flesh.” (Ether 3:15, 16)
When we think of moving from this life to the spirit world, we should be comforted to know that our spirits look just as we do here, only we will not have our bodies until after the Resurrection. May God bless us to know and have faith in His great love for us and His great Plan of Salvation for all mankind.