(In loving memory of Sharon Cassady)

My wife was terminally ill with cancer. We had just traveled the previous weekend to visit relatives and took a granddaughter with us. The trip was a success. Tuesday evening I received a phone call from the doctor.

“According to the lab reports, Sharon’s liver and kidney have failed. She cannot live but a few more days,” the doctor said.

I have been unable to describe how I felt when I heard this death warrant. I felt as if a huge weight landed on my heart. Tears came to my eyes, and I slowly turned to my wife. How does one tell their love, they have but hours or days to live? How does one cope?

I told her. She cried for but a minute, then said, “I guess I need to go to the hospital.”

I responded, “Wouldn’t you rather be here, at home, than in a cold hospital?”

“Yes!” She said. This was her last major decision in her life.

We had two phone lines in our house, and we each started calling family: her four children, her sisters, my parents, pastors, friends. After we were done we went to bed and held each other very close. How many more nights would we have?

The next few days were fuzzy in my mind. Her parents, my parents, family numbering about thirty or so, stayed with us. Sharon started to fade, her sleeping time increasing with the increased amount of morphine given.

Friday night I gave her communion, I prayed over the bread and the water, and I received a new vision of the holiness of communion. Yes, she would have eternal life.

Later her minister came over, and I wrote a check from her last social security disability income. Sharon was a full tithe payer.

Saturday morning, with her mother and me at her side, Sharon awoke and said, “I see Jesus.”

“Go to Him, your sins have been forgiven,” I responded.

She looked at my face and smiled, and said with her last breath in this world, “Good-bye.” She smiled and closed her eyes. She passed on at 11:20am Saturday morning.

The neighbor’s dogs started howling when she died. A great spirit that lived on this world exited to live with her Maker.

Does God exist? Yes. I do not say she died, but she passed through a door, a door that leads to a more beautiful place than here, with no pain, no cancer. There she awaits me, of that I am certain.

B. J. Cassady BJ.CASSADY@af-group.com