>>6284379Tricky question.
My wife died in a car crash in 2012. My sister died of cancer in March this year at the age of 34. I'm 43 and a single dad with two children. I'm ex British Army - combat infantryman (Royal Regiment of Fusiliers). I've seen death close up. Life is very fragile - you can die in the blink of an eye. I've been so sick from blood poisoning - septicemia. I got it by wearing someone elses boots and it almost killed me. I remember lines going up my legs like red stripes and my left foot swelling up like a football. Then being in hospital and tripping in and out of consciousness. I think that I had glimpses of a different 'consciousness' at that time between living and dying. I remember rowing a boat on fog, and being away from my body. It wasn't an unpleasant experience nor was it like many people have reported of seeing Jesus or a white light and overwhelming love. I simply felt like I was on a boat.
Death is final as in you leave only your body behind, and that is why we have funeral services. The finality of it is in the funeral service itself: "ashes to ashes, dust to dust" and taking soil to throw on the coffin of those that you loved.
I can never see face to face with the people I love the most who have died. But I dream about them regularly. Mundane dreams about going out shopping, going for a walk.. but are thse dreams reality? They're real to me. But they stand outside of time.
Is there an afterlife? I have no idea.
The dead have an impact on the life we live. Like throwing a stone into a pond - there are ripples on the pond after the stone has rested on the bottom of the water.
I can go to my church and light a candle, say a prayer for those people that I've lost. But do we live after death? Who knows other than God?
