A Picture of Heaven Chapter 1 (of 14 episodes)

(Just in case you missed it, here is a link to the Prologue,)

The day and the weeks of that time had begun like any other day in any other week of any other month of any other year.

I say that they had begun that way, not because this day was any different, but because it was the same. We existed from day to day and week to week, alongside the same people in the same places doing the same things.

Some of us went to church when the spirit moved us. Some of us went to church every week (some even more). And some of us would never be caught dead among people who tell us that ‘we have to change’ or we would ‘never get to Heaven.’  But as it turns out on this ordinary day, we all ended up at church.

I recognized some of the people as they walked in the door. They were family and friends; young and old (with some even older). Their smiles were reserved and their embraces seemed more in need of embrace than gifts of hugs. A few held back tears.

We were not the planners of this hastily arranged reunion, but all of us had broken the ordinary busyness of that day and dropped everything from our sacred schedules to meet here at this church on a day like any other: the day of the funeral…

That’s what everyone kept referring to, for weeks and even years afterward:

Do you remember the day of the funeral?

Yes. We all remembered it. I could not put it out of my mind.

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Years ago when I had traveled in Europe I became awestruck at the towering Cathedrals and intricate worn detail of these monuments of religion constructed centuries earlier.

It must have been something of this which brings Jews to speak with some reverence of the Temple. I had seen pictures of many magnificent temples with this same opulence, built like palaces of kings in many lands of other countries with other religions.

What had struck me most about these palatial places of worship was that they seemed to be built more for tourists and pilgrims, than for the poor family around the corner.

And my experiences prior to the day of the funeral seemed to confirm that churches have way too many seats for the number of people who show up.

These churches did, however, often look grand enough for the formal processions of a King or a beautiful bride.

... To be continued