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ALIVE on Arrival!
Last night – a full 18 years since Grandad "died" – I realized for the first time that while he was on earth, he was much wiser than anyone had given him credit for
Date: 1/22/2006 8:54:09 AM ( 18 y ) ... viewed 3120 times "Grandad" (my father-in-law) was born on 17th October 1911, two months premature. He was so small that they said he would have fitted into a pint jug. They summoned the Priest to baptize him straight away, as he was not expected to live.
They laid him in a drawer packed with cotton wool to conserve his body heat. Eventually he grew into a normal little boy and, when he left school, his father took him into the family business – originally a bicycle repair workshop, but also servicing cars as the first of these began to appear on the roads.
Grandad was 75 years old and still in good health on the night when my elder daughter Lucy was born.
I had opted for a 6-hour discharge from hospital, and so it was that at 10 o'clock in the morning, Grandad drove Nanna over to my house to see their newborn granddaughter.
Nanna and Grandad took it in turns to sit on the sofa holding Lucy and have their photo taken, face wreathed in smiles.
Ten minutes later, I was standing in the kitchen when my husband came in with the look on his face that he wears when someone has just died.
My thoughts immediately went to my newborn daughter, who was in the dining room; but I said nothing and waited for George to speak. He blurted out: "Grandad's dead in the garage".
He hastened back through the connecting door to the garage with me behind him, and we knelt down and held Grandad's lifeless body that lay stretched out on the floor.
I looked straight up, scanning the air for Grandad's astral form, but could see nothing. I remarked out loud how grateful I was that he had gone in this way, rather than dying slowly of a disease like cancer, knowing that Grandad could hear me even though I couldn't see him.
My husband explained that Grandad had driven his car into the garage to have a look under the bonnet; and the effort of turning the engine with the starting handle must have triggered a heart attack, even though he was apparently healthy.
It seemed as if the train that had brought Lucy from Heaven had waited on Earth overnight; Grandad had noticed it was preparing to depart again, and decided to step aboard just as it was leaving.
In the intervening years, I have pondered on Grandad's courage at leaving this world swiftly, without lengthy good-byes. But last night I got an additional insight into Grandad's passing which unveiled a wisdom so deep it leaves me breathless with awe.
I was reading Suzanne Ward's book "Matthew, Tell Me About Heaven".
On page 160 Matthew is describing his work assisting souls such as Grandad's in their transition to Heaven. He says the transition "… happens so quickly that the arrival's memories of circumstances immediately prior to transition are as real upon entry here as they were when the person was experiencing those circumstances on Earth".
I cast my mind back to what Grandad was doing ten minutes before he died: holding a newborn baby. So, when he arrived in Heaven, he must have felt as if he had just been holding a newborn baby in his arms, with all the joy that that brings.
The depth of Grandad's wisdom as he prepared for his own transition leaves me in awe. He was a simple man who worked 12 hours a day all his working life; and yet he proved himself wise beyond my understanding.
P.S. After checking this for factual accuracy, my husband has corrected me on two points.
- Grandad drove over to our house by himself, because Nanna was already there. He went for a haircut on the way.
- Grandad’s car didn’t have a starting handle, as it was a relatively modern model. Therefore, it appears that his heart failure had no known physical cause.
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