If today were to be my last day, how would I spend it? Would I immediately go to a priest and go to confession to put my spiritual house in order? Or, would I spend it before the Blessed Sacrament and wait until the angel of death comes for me? No, I would like to spend it like it any other ordinary day: bring Jonathan and Jane to school, take my daily walk with Anabelle, set up a doctor’s appointment for her, greet and connect with friends online and offline, and maybe grill our dinner for tonight. For life has flowed even before I was and life will go on after I am gone. I will go with that flow till my time on earth is over.
If, by some special revelation, I were told today that there was no afterlife and that life is over when it is over, would I act and do things any differently? Am I one of those who “in piety go because of a heaven to follow?” No, I would still live by the same values and principles I have chosen to live by all my life even if there were no paradise on the other side. For I have seen how love changes people and how serving others is more meaningful and rewarding by itself than just looking after one’s self.
And if I were to finally move on to the other side, what would be my greatest fear? At this stage of my life, I am not afraid of the end for it inevitably comes to everyone. I can even steel myself for any pain that might come with my final days. But I am afraid and I do not want to be a burden to those I would leave behind. And my greatest fear is that I would already be standing before my Lord and my God and I would not recognize him, that I am already in eternal bliss and do not realize it, that the Lord would still need to rebuke me like he did Philip that after all these times I still did not know him. My prayer at my final hour is to be able to say with joy and with feelings of finally coming home: “It is the Lord!”
Philip said to him, ‘Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father.
John 14:6-14