Does the light of our spirit come from within, or does it shine through us?
We recently attended the memorial service of a dear friend. Many came, but everyone was so quiet. So unlike our friend whose voice rang out in joyful conversation or argument wherever he was. We who had joined him in volume and cadence suddenly sat subdued by his loss.
My husband and I, along with the rest of the attendees, were deeply grieved by this wonderful man’s passing. Yet I could feel his presence all around us, his joy at us being together: all his dearest, most favorite people. He was not sad about going, and he was not upset he could not speak to us. He was overjoyed we were there, and I could feel him greeting every person gathered.
His ashes were collected in a beautiful urn, held by his wife. It was a large urn, for he had been tall, well built, and strong, even though his battle with cancer left him light for his big frame. It could be said that those ashes were all that was left of his incredible impact in the world. It will be hard to imagine this existence without him in it, intense, laughing, joyous, sparring with pointed quips and razor sharp wit. Always with that twinkle in his eye.
He had his foibles, for sure. Stubborn, opinionated, overbearing. These words could be used to describe such a man. Yet no one has been more generous with their time and capacious intellect, his zest for life, and his intense passion for every one he called friend.
He was a fighter. Undergoing a double chemotherapy regimen that if he survived it, could cripple him permanently, yet he was organizing back-to-back visits from friends, and entertaining them all in his warm, active style.
His body gave out long before his spirit was finished spending time with us.
As I sat in the synagogue feeling the grief, celebrating his life, mourning with his friends and family and at the same time experiencing his unbounded joy that we were gathered together in support of his beloved wife and child, I found myself in those quiet moments contemplating the stained glass windows on either side of the sanctuary. Their beauty was undeniable as the Florida sunlight streamed through them, illuminating their jewel hues and casting colored light across the carpet.
Fragile, yet exquisite, and hinting of an entire world beyond, with the shadows cast from palm trees swaying outside adding life and movement to the designs in the glass. Glimpses of water and grass and flowers were visible in the rare clear panes, yet even with these enticing visions, all I could look at was the loveliness of the window itself.
What are we but that? Delicate, beautiful, offering tantalizing glances into the world beyond, and yet so captivating ourselves that these hints of a greater reality fade against the glory and miracle of our physical presence.
Now imagine the window without light. Truthfully, it would be nothing but a wall: a barrier. Boring, ultimately physical, without charm, magic or beauty. All the work done in creating the art, choosing the colors and piecing the glass together would be completely lost.
But while the light shines through the window, we are enticed, so charmed by its splendor that we forget…
The light necessary to create the all the magic the glass contains comes from that world beyond the window.
Everything that truly makes the stained glass window beautiful, is not of it. It is not even of this world — the world the window resides in. It is from so far beyond the window, the distance is almost unimaginable to our human consciousness.
It is the same with us. If our body is the fragile window with such potential for beauty, then what illuminates it has no relation, except it is That which shines through us, enlivens us, gives us movement. It offers radiance to the physical presence and tantalizing glimpses of what lies beyond — a spiritual reality so powerful, so compelling, that it animates a purely physical construct and makes it magnificent.
In that moment I understood my friend’s joy. He had returned to this world of ultimate truth. The energy that shone through the body that we came to know as him, is now home, and without losing his coherence, he could experience in this world with perfect purity the incredible love he has for us, and we have for him. But he was also in that other place, a place that while it overlaps us, like the sunlight, it is so far removed from us that we cannot consciously understand it.
So does the light that illuminates us come from within, or does it shine through us? Well…the answer is yes.
Yes, the light shines through us from that place. But we are not only of that place, we are that place. And all the infinite beauty and power that is in us when we live there is also within us now, so yes, the light comes from within. We are of it. We are it. It shines through us. It shines from us.
I think the trick is to see it now, to experience it now, and to act in a manner that enhances its radiance within this existence and the next.
So good bye my friend. Thank you for all the love, the support, the soaring arguments and for all you have taught me in thirty years of precious friendship. And thank you most of all for this final precious knowledge that represents the most profound wisdom one soul can share with another.
Momi 
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