A New Heaven

At Last in Heaven

June 5, 2023

I just took a trip to heaven. I didn't even have to die.

My Near-Death Experience

December 29, 2022

A few years ago, pre-pandemic times, I was rushed to the ER due to some health issues. On my second day, I witnessed this patient, who must have been in his 20s, being admitted early dawn to the bed beside me, literally at arm’s length, separated only by a movable curtain.

He was quite a jolly and entertaining guy who made the once sleepy ER staff alive and animated. Yet, in just less than 15 minutes after he was brought in, the patient cried out with a loud moan and released the last three of his breath.

An emergency call over the public-address system instantly summoned all doctors- and nurses-in-duty to report to the ER. Suddenly, it was eerily, deathly quiet. That was one of the so many close encounters I had with a dying and dead person.

Stunned by the sudden turn of events, I was so shocked to realize how precarious life is. I could be next. I imagined that grizzly Great Ripper, who is always beside us ready to accompany us to the next life.

A few years after that ER incident, or in the early months of the year 2020, I had my own direct experience of death or near-death- experience, as they say.

Recalling all these incidents, I was forced to pause and reflect in solitude and silence. Even at my tender age, thoughts came rushing to my mind:

"Is this what life is all about? Just to drop down dead suddenly anytime of the day or night, anywhere and whoever we are with? Is this it? Or, are we just passing by here temporarily, imprisoned in our frail bodies? But what for?"

But as we grew and matured, we came to realize that we are indeed born here, yet we are not meant to be here. We are all pilgrims. Our purpose here on Earth is to prepare ourselves for the afterlife.