Religious

[PaceAdvantage]

I have a tale to pass along that involves neither somebody making it up nor the brain compensating for it's eminent death...

My mother passed away in January of 2013. She was hospitalized for days before her body ultimately decided to quit on her.

She died at around 4:30 in the morning. My dad was the only one at her bedside when she passed away.

My brother was miles away, asleep in his bed with his wife. About 5 minutes before my brother received the news from dad that mom had died, he was awoken by a very bright light shining into his eyes in his very dark bedroom. He said this light lasted about 30 seconds. His bedroom is on the second floor and his house does not face an oncoming street. Thus it is incredibly unlikely that this light could be attributed to a car outside. That plus his shades were down.

Was he dreaming? I have not a clue. He says he wasn't dreaming and I believe him. And remember, this happened immediately before he received the news that mom was dead.

Not everything in this world is known...not even close. Not everything can be explained by science...not even close...and many times theories turn out to be just plain wrong.

I am quite confident nobody in this little story of mine is making any part of it up. Perhaps it could have been aliens looking to abduct my brother...who knows.

[PaceAdvantage]

OK, I made a mistake in the above story. My brother's bedroom is on the FIRST FLOOR, not the second. But his bedroom faces the back of the house. Facing his backyard. And his backyard is adjacent to a bunch of trees and borders a golf course, with no streets of any kind or any chance of any car being outside shining its headlights into the room.

Sorry for my error there...

[thaskalos]

Originally Posted by PaceAdvantage

I have a tale to pass along that involves neither somebody making it up nor the brain compensating for it's eminent death...

My mother passed away in January of 2013. She was hospitalized for days before her body ultimately decided to quit on her.

She died at around 4:30 in the morning. My dad was the only one at her bedside when she passed away.

My brother was miles away, asleep in his bed with his wife. About 5 minutes before my brother received the news from dad that mom had died, he was awoken by a very bright light shining into his eyes in his very dark bedroom. He said this light lasted about 30 seconds. His bedroom is on the second floor and his house does not face an oncoming street. Thus it is incredibly unlikely that this light could be attributed to a car outside. That plus his shades were down.

Was he dreaming? I have not a clue. He says he wasn't dreaming and I believe him. And remember, this happened immediately before he received the news that mom was dead.

Not everything in this world is known...not even close. Not everything can be explained by science...not even close...and many times theories turn out to be just plain wrong.

I am quite confident nobody in this little story of mine is making any part of it up. Perhaps it could have been aliens looking to abduct my brother...who knows.

Life is indeed a big mystery. And, unfortunately for us, there is a compulsion within us to give these "mysteries" some sort of "logical" explanation. Science has her story...and religion has a story of its own. These stories can't both be right...but they could easily both be wrong.

[PaceAdvantage]

My brother's experience certainly put the brakes on my own little "there's nothing out there after we die" theories that had been taking a pretty firm hold lately...

[thaskalos]

Originally Posted by PaceAdvantage

My brother's experience certainly put the brakes on my own little "there's nothing out there after we die" theories that had been taking a pretty irm hold lately...

My dad was my best friend...and he remains my "hero" to this day. Although a simple, "uneducated" man, he didn't hesitate to grab a family consisting of 4 young kids, and come to this country at the age of 53...to give us a better life than the one he himself had lived in Greece. Unable to speak the English language, he had to make due with the most menial of jobs...and he worked unceasingly to raise us, without ever uttering a single complaint.

My dad died in 1986, at the age of 66...after having just retired. At the moment of his death, I was at the movies...watching Paul Newman's The Color of Money. The pain of his death became unbearable for me...mainly because I wasn't afforded the opportunity to say good bye to him. Father-son relationships like the one we had shouldn't end without saying something...I felt.

It was a Saturday afternoon a few months hence...and I was laying in bed thinking about by dad...while the rest of my family was out shopping. As I lay on my side on the bed...the bed sagged behind me, as it does when someone else also gets on the bed behind you. I felt another body brush up against mine...and my dad's arm came up and hugged me from behind. I was terror-stricken and unable to turn around...because I was fully aware that he had recently died.

"How are you doing, friend?"...he asked me, in Greek. (friend was what he called me ever since I became 18 years old)

"How am I?", I asked incredulously. "How are YOU? What happened to you?"

"What do you THINK happened to me"...he answered in his typical, deadpan style. "My heart stopped and I died".

"How are things over on the other side, dad"...I asked him.

And the reply came..."They are the way the books say they are".

But I was an avid reader even then...and I read many different religious books. Before I could ask him "which books", he got up and left...and I was again alone in my bedroom.

It has been almost 30 years...and I would take an oath that I was fully awake. In fact...in my entire life I never remember ever taking an afternoon nap. Was I dreaming...did my dad really come back to say good bye to me...or was this an invention of my mind, to let me cope with my deep anguish? As I sit here all these years later, I can swear that it was no dream. Dreams fade over time...but this vision remains so clear on my mind, that a tear runs down my cheek even as I type this.

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy." -- Shakespeare

[Show Me the Wire]

Originally Posted by PaceAdvantage

My brother's experience certainly put the brakes on my own little "there's nothing out there after we die" theories that had been taking a pretty firm hold lately...

I'll add, one of my experiences, about what happened to my sibling and myself. After my mother passed on I neglected to remove her contact info from my phone. On the first anniversary of passing my phone rang identifying the caller as my mother, reluctantly I answered the phone thinking that through some coincidence that the person who had my mother's old number somehow dialed my number. When I answered I experienced a hang-up. Being curious I redialed the number and heard the message that this number was not in service.

The absurd part of this experience is my sibling received a call on the same day right after I did, identifying the caller as our deceased mother. She also neglected to delete our mother's contact info. How do I know? My sibling called me to tell me of her strange experience. Of course, she redialed the number and received the same message I did.

[mountainman]

Originally Posted by Greyfox

In modern times, no one who has been "truly dead" has ever been resuscitated back to life.
Near Death Experiences are not Death.

How convenient for believers. So in another 10 min the trumpets would have sounded and the whole show would have started? With all respect, sir, that's just ridiculous. The kid was gone.

And I refuse to reject face to face proof of the truth just because it's unsettling to me. The comforting lies we tell ourselves won't stave off the endless night.

[Show Me the Wire]

Originally Posted by mountainman

How convenient for believers.

I have a question? What did he mean by, "No, there's nothing out there," he said with an inscrutable, bittersweet smile. "Nothing at all.

He did not remember or recall anything or he experienced nothingness?

[mountainman]

Originally Posted by Show Me the Wire

I have a question? What did he mean by, "No, there's nothing out there," he said with an inscrutable, bittersweet smile. "Nothing at all.

He did not remember or recall anything or he experienced nothingness?

I will see him on the course this spring and ask him. For sure. But he did say the experience did NOT ruin his faith in God. His expression hinted otherwise.

For reasons involving the circumstances of his "accident," I really felt for the kid, and presented him with 2 dozen new golf balls.

[RichieP]

Originally Posted by Show Me the Wire

I'll add, one of my experiences, about what happened to my sibling and myself. After my mother passed on I neglected to remove her contact info from my phone. On the first anniversary of passing my phone rang identifying the caller as my mother, reluctantly I answered the phone thinking that through some coincidence that the person who had my mother's old number somehow dialed my number. When I answered I experienced a hang-up. Being curious I redialed the number and heard the message that this number was not in service.

The absurd part of this experience is my sibling received a call on the same day right after I did, identifying the caller as our deceased mother. She also neglected to delete our mother's contact info. How do I know? My sibling called me to tell me of her strange experience. Of course, she redialed the number and received the same message I did.

SMTW,
I believe and have experienced the same thing with BOTH my deceased mom and dad(dad happening exactly one year after his passing and mom about 10 months after she passed). Both came to me in dreams and what they said and subsequently what came to pass is much better left for another time man.

The 3rd most important figure in my life was a Cherokee friend and exactly one year after he passed I had a ridiculous experience in a "dream" that actually played out in "reality" being "HEARD" not by 1 but by 2 of my neighbors.

We are without question I.M.O. "connected" to both our loved ones and each other.

Regards,
Richie

[PaceAdvantage]

Originally Posted by thaskalos

My dad was my best friend...and he remains my "hero" to this day. Although a simple, "uneducated" man, he didn't hesitate to grab a family consisting of 4 young kids, and come to this country at the age of 53...to give us a better life than the one he himself had lived in Greece. Unable to speak the English language, he had to make due with the most menial of jobs...and he worked unceasingly to raise us, without ever uttering a single complaint.

My dad died in 1986, at the age of 66...after having just retired. At the moment of his death, I was at the movies...watching Paul Newman's The Color of Money. The pain of his death became unbearable for me...mainly because I wasn't afforded the opportunity to say good bye to him. Father-son relationships like the one we had shouldn't end without saying something...I felt.

It was a Saturday afternoon a few months hence...and I was laying in bed thinking about by dad...while the rest of my family was out shopping. As I lay on my side on the bed...the bed sagged behind me, as it does when someone else also gets on the bed behind you. I felt another body brush up against mine...and my dad's arm came up and hugged me from behind. I was terror-stricken and unable to turn around...because I was fully aware that he had recently died.

"How are you doing, friend?"...he asked me, in Greek. (friend was what he called me ever since I became 18 years old)

"How am I?", I asked incredulously. "How are YOU? What happened to you?"

"What do you THINK happened to me"...he answered in his typical, deadpan style. "My heart stopped and I died".

"How are things over on the other side, dad"...I asked him.

And the reply came..."They are the way the books say they are".

But I was an avid reader even then...and I read many different religious books. Before I could ask him "which books", he got up and left...and I was again alone in my bedroom.

It has been almost 30 years...and I would take an oath that I was fully awake. In fact...in my entire life I never remember ever taking an afternoon nap. Was I dreaming...did my dad really come back to say good bye to me...or was this an invention of my mind, to let me cope with my deep anguish? As I sit here all these years later, I can swear that it was no dream. Dreams fade over time...but this vision remains so clear on my mind, that a tear runs down my cheek even as I type this.

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy." -- Shakespeare

Thanks for sharing this Gus. I think despite your words on this screen, you DO truly know whether or not what you experienced was "real."

[TJDave]

Originally Posted by thaskalos

"How are you doing, friend?"...he asked me, in Greek. (friend was what he called me ever since I became 18 years old)

My father never addressed me in this manner but I understand the sentiment. Like your dad, he was a product of the "old country". Your story awakened faded memories and touched my heart.

Thank you

[Ocala Mike]

OK, with all these serious stories about contact from the beyond, I must inject a little humor here. My wife passed away about six weeks ago and, when she was alive, she had a pet peeve (more like an obsession) about the toilet next to our bedroom running open sometimes after a flush. Now, of course, the lazy man's approach to "fixing" this is to just jiggle the handle which I would do when it happened, but she constantly would nag me about getting it repaired properly, which I of course never did.

Fast forward to now. I don't use the toilet in there any more (in fact, I've been unable to fall asleep in our bed since she died - been sleeping in a recliner). Lo and behold, I believe she is trying to communicate with me from the afterlife BY CAUSING THE WATER TO RUN OPEN EVEN WHEN NOBODY USES THE THING OR FLUSHES IT! I know it's funny, but every time it happens, I find myself thinking of what I'm doing at the moment that she might be finding fault with as I obediently jiggle the handle. LOL! Not gonna repair it now, because that would cut off our "talks."

[Actor]

Originally Posted by boxcar

Your inane ...

Argumentum ad lapidem.

Originally Posted by boxcar

... theory depended on chronology and similarities between the CH and the Law of Moses. But the fact that God's laws existed in the form of oral tradition in the time of Abraham ...

Confirms my thesis. Your statement was ...

Originally Posted by boxcar

No Moses, no Exodus, no Law!

Implying that without Moses and the exodus there would be no law. But was not "the time of Abraham" quite a few centuries before the time of Moses.

Try making an effort to understand what I am saying before twisting it into something else.

[boxcar]

Originally Posted by Actor

Argumentum ad lapidem.

Confirms my thesis. Your statement was ...

Implying that without Moses and the exodus there would be no law. But was not "the time of Abraham" quite a few centuries before the time of Moses.

Try making an effort to understand what I am saying before twisting it into something else.

No, it doesn't confirm your thesis. I never said Moses wasn't given the Law directly by God. So, my thesis is intact. (You're the one who needs to learn to pay attention!) But in addition to that, it does confirm my thesis that your thesis about the Law of Moses finding its ground in the CH is indeed very lame.. Just because God's laws, commandments and statutes were handed down to Abraham via oral tradition doesn't mean that hundreds of years later those laws, statutes and commandments weren't codified and written down and even expanded upon greatly in the Law of Moses.

Apparently, Hamm and cheese doesn't agree with you too swell...