A Circuit Overseer in the Woodburn congregation said that the reason so many of our brothers are disfellowshipped isn’t because of wrong doing, it’s because the New System isn’t a reality. Read this all the way thru, it is truly a dose of what is yet to come. I know all of us have been affected from losing someone we love in death, or physically spent from this tiresome system. It will make as all look at the new system in a different light, at least it did for me.
We are asked to visualize ourselves in the New World this sister did a great job. Her meditation is very encouraging, our hope is the anchor that keeps us strong.
‘One day of the Real Life’
Nowadays I like getting up with the sun and starting my day while it’s fresh and new. No more hitting that snooze button until the very last minute and dreading the workday ahead of me! I feel better and better every day, and I can’t help but notice I look better too. I have several jobs, and today I am privileged to be doing my very favorite task! Besides studying with newly resurrected ones, I have been granted the privilege of using my home as a sort of New System Bed and Breakfast. While the Resurrection Center was being constructed, I had a house full, 2 couples and two single sisters who lived here with me temporarily. Now that that work is over, families who live too far away from the Resurrection Center come and stay with me, sometimes just a few nights, often a week while their newly resurrected loved ones acclimate to this wonderful new world. This house has seen so much joy!
I have company arriving today – two fleshly brothers whose parents died in a car accident and are going to be resurrected in the same week. I want to make something special for tonight, so I head out to the raspberry patch to gather some to add to the apple pie I’m planning for dessert. The fox family that lives among the raspberry bushes come out to greet me, the mother elegantly gliding toward me to have her chin scratched, and three cubs tumbling over each other in their play. My chickens aren’t a bit alarmed at all these foxes nearby, they go on searching for worms and scratching around the yard, clucking contentedly to one another.
I’m nearly finished gathering berries when I notice two people coming along the path at the top of the hill. My Mother and her sister JoAnne often come over for a cup of tea early in the morning; their home is only a 15 minute walk away through a beautiful wildflower garden, around the little pond, then through the forest and down the grassy hill to my house. The two of them are halfway here when a tall blond boy emerges from the woods, running as fast as his long legs will carry him to catch up to them. Their conversation stops as they turn at the sound, the youth skids to a stop to talk to them. Whatever Mom tells him, I can see it’s what he was hoping for, because he hugs her so hard he picks her up, and then leaving the path he runs to wards the barn my favorite Icelandic mare has a two week old foal, so I know where my brother is heading!
He notices me as he runs, he waves but doesn’t slow down – I’m glad, even after all these years I still get tears in my eyes sometimes at the sight of him. Dougie had died in the old world when he was only a baby, and the day he was resurrected was one of the happiest of all of our lives. My dear Mom had kept so much of the pain of losing him to herself, but when they placed her baby boy in her arms, she cried tears of joy for days afterwards. She and JoeAnn have really enjoyed raising him, from a chubby blond baby to an enthusiastic teenager now as tall as me, and sure to grow taller.
I’m glad Dougie – no, he wants to be called Doug now, he thinks it sounds so much more grown up – went to the barn, I know he’ll put out fresh food and water for the animals, so I’ll have plenty of time to give him another lesson driving the curricle. What a joy it’s been to watch him grow up in this new world, with no more worries of sickness or any other harm coming to him. I go into the house to put the tea kettle on to boil, and soon Mom and JoAnne come in, full of happiness and good health. They both look radiant from their walk, and so beautiful. No more gray hair – in fact, Mom’s hair is thicker and more beautiful than in her youth. Their wrinkles have faded away from their faces; they seem to look younger every time I see them.
Mom has a package with her, as she unwraps it she tells me it came yesterday from the message service with a long letter from my daughter Bethany. She and her husband are in the reconstruction work, but somehow she managed to find the time to paint a portrait of her newest granddaughter, Elizabeth. The picture is beautifully done, a sleeping chubby infant perhaps a few weeks old. Bethany always had artistic talent, but in the new world now, growing towards perfection, she has really surpassed herself. Busy with construction projects, Bethany isn’t spending a lot of time working on art – she knows she has forever to develop her talent! This painting she did especially for her grandmother, and it warms my heart to see how happy Mom is.
While I make the pie crust and cut up the apples, we exchange news of friends an d family, many of them far away in different assignments. Doug runs in to ask if I mind if he rides Henrietta, the Llama, and dashes out again to get her saddled up. Then I hear him calling out a greeting, and I see in the shade of the big elm trees at the end of the garden two men sitting on the wooden bench – they must be my guests! We all go out to meet them, they look vaguely familiar but I can’t think of who they might be. One walks up to me with a twinkle in his eye and says, ‘Ann, don’t you recognize me? I’m Arly, and this is my brother Vern!’ For a second we were speechless, and then everyone was hugging each other and talking all at once. It’s not surprising that we didn’t recognize them, with their wavy brown hair and bright blue eyes. Vern had died in his 92nd year, the last time I had seen him he was barely able to talk and confined to a wheelchair Arly had nearly lost his sight due to cataracts, and had to walk with a cane. Yet here they were, looking like they had never seen forty! Vern was one of the original special pioneers who opened up the preaching work in our area long before I was born, and Arly had been a most beloved elder in our congregation. What an unspeakable joy to have them as guests in my house!
We show them all around, and after lunch Vern volunteers to give Doug his driving lesson. Mom and JoAnne have studies to conduct in the afternoon, but we arrange to have a get-together soon and invite many of the neighbors who know Vern and Arly.
After many hours spent talking, reminiscing and catching up on news of dear friends near and far, Vern and Arly go up to their rooms to unpack, and I go into the garden to pick some vegetables for supper.
What a good day this has been! I’m so full of joy, I can barely hold it all in, so I don’t even try. I fall down on my knees in the rich garden soil and thank my heavenly father Jehovah once more for all his bounteous blessings. Today was just one memorable, joyful day, one of an infinite number of days filled with joy ahead of us all – an eternity!
