Of Earth and Eternity

Humans are amphibians - half spirit and half animal. 

As spirits they belong to the eternal world, but as animals they inhabit time. 

C. S. Lewis 

It may be a very bad thing to let one's mind wander during one's father's funeral, but tears have an annoying habit of falling unbidden from my eyes at unexpected times and often for less than obvious reasons.  It has always been so, and I'm coming to accept that there are little faucets somewhere in my eye sockets over which I have no control.  When emotion - any emotion and it doesn't necessarily even have to by my emotion- overwhelms me, down stream the tears.  After four days of receiving hugs and condolences, I was, quite frankly, tired of sympathy by Saturday morning.  At the risk of sounding ungrateful or insensitive or just plain awful, I was weary of words of comfort that didn't quite speak to what I was feeling on the inside.  I was also a little jealous of drier eyes that seemed to attract fewer hugs.

Sitting yards away from my father's coffin, listening to a longtime family friend sing a song I can't even remember now, tears threatened to fall.  I forced my mind from the present and found C.S. Lewis's quote about amphibians.  To dwell on it would have induced its own shower of tears, so I admitted its relevance and tucked it away for future contemplation.

It's future now, and while I'm not sure I like being compared to a salamander, I wholeheartedly agree with Lewis that we "belong to the eternal world, but...  inhabit time."  We belong to eternity, as our very souls cry out against Death; yet we inhabit Time, confined to Earth till Death releases us to eternity.  And our two homes, Earth and Eternity, exist simultaneously and painfully at odds.

As creatures of Eternity and believers in Christ, we know that Death is a laughing matter.  Death is the moment we see Christ face to face; suffering, sorrow, and struggles flee; we are made like Him, and glorious, joyful, amazing Eternity enfolds us.  I can't even begin to imagine the wonder of that moment.  So we can and should laugh at Death, partly in ridicule of the one who thinks he brings destruction, but more so in triumphant gratitude for the joy into which he ushers us.  To the believer for whom Christ has prepared a heavenly room, Death is but the friend who opens the door to Christ's eternal mansion.


But we know, too, as creatures of Eternity, that Death should not be.  It was not part of the original plan, way back in the Garden of Eden.  Death is a result of sin, our refusal to follow God perfectly.  We brought this disaster into His perfection, and so we, wounded creatures of Eternity, grieve Death's very existence.  We grieve the chasm Death carves upon our souls and upon all of Creation.  We grieve for our departed, for ourselves, and for creation.  With unspeakable anguish, we grieve the loss of Eden.  And we grieve the time we must endure before God makes all things new, till Creation sings aloud of her Redeemer's ultimate triumph.


We groan in the longing of Creatures of Eternity awaiting promises fulfilled on the day that will be, and we groan in the agony of Earthbound souls holding the shattered pieces of what was.  For we are still bound to Earth and to its joys and sorrows.  We feel keenly the absence of those we've loved and whose love has surrounded us from birth, or from first encounter, or in our later years.  We love on Earth and feel the sting of Death in the absence of those he ushers into Eternity.  We are not beyond the horrors of Death, nor the agony of loneliness, even in our hope.  We are touched by tragedy and filled with grief.

I have, as many know, been through tragedy before.  I know the loss of my father is different from that of my sister, and as such, will run its own course.  I do not expect this grief to feel or look the same as that of the last twelve years, nor do I claim to understand the ways of Life and Death.  I will claim, however, a familiarity with Death and Grief - a familiarity that explains the tears, both of agonizing sorrow and of waiting hope, that have fallen during the past week and will fall for years to come, a familiarity that enables me to think of the C.S. Lewis quote above not as intriguing words, but as painfully joyous truth.


I am a salamander, caught between two worlds.  Sometimes I'm not sure from which world my tears spring, but I know the King of Eternity...  and that he loves his little salamanders and is able to guide them through the trials of Earth to the glories of Eternity.  And that is enough for now.