I have a friend who tells a heartwarming story about a little girl who walked home from school every day. The quickest way home for her was through the town’s cemetery. It was her favorite time of day. She loved to feel the breeze in her hair and to watch the birds. Sometimes she just threw herself on the soft, green grass and watched the clouds turn into castles and angels and great white stallions. As she skipped around gravestones, she whistled her favorite tune or sang a song. Other times, she liked to kneel down and read the names and dates on gravestones, and to glide her fingers across the engraved lettering. She particularly enjoyed those peaceful walks through the beautiful graveyard.
Still, her friends asked, “Why do you walk through the cemetery after school?”
“That’s easy,” she would always reply. “Because it’s the way home.”
In an ultimate sense, that is true, isn’t it? The way home is always through the cemetery. The Shawnee warrior and chief Tecumseh may have said it best: “When it comes your time to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with the fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way. Sing your death song and die like a hero going home.”
You are going home. You have been away a long time, and you are finally going home.
It does not have to be a fearful passage at all, this way that leads home. And don’t worry about getting lost. Your heart knows the way.
-- Steve Goodier
