I Appeal to You
... through Bertha Dudde  - 08.08.1956 

6616   Fear of death ....

Death is just the passageway into a life which will last forever. You humans would not have to fear death if your life on earth corresponded to My will .... if you had travelled this earthly path in divine order, for then you would not feel terror-stricken in view of death, because then your soul would just rejoice at being able to escape the body in order to return to its home where the earthly body is utterly superfluous, where ceasing to exist cannot be spoken of but where a free life in an abundance of light and strength will await the soul. Jesus Christ arose from the grave on the third day .... He demonstrated to you that there is no such thing as ceasing to exist after the body’s demise, he has provided you with the evidence that a correct way of life merely results in the change of the earthly into a spiritual body, that the human being continues to exist, that only his shell has experienced a transformation, which is absolutely necessary for staying in the spiritual kingdom .... And you all are able to accomplish this change yourselves, and death would then truly have lost its sting. But since you humans do not believe in life after death, you neglect to prepare yourselves for a stay in the spiritual kingdom, and since your soul has therefore no prospect whatsoever to clothe itself after physical death in a radiantly bright spiritual garment you fear death, and rightly so, for you cannot cease to exist but earthly heaviness can still cling to you, and your awakening after the body’s death will not be a happy one .... But you will awaken, regardless of how imperfectly your soul is shaped .... it will find out that it has not and cannot cease to exist .... And this fate is unconsciously dreaded by you humans who fear death.

Yet you ought to remember the One Who has overcome death .... Jesus Christ wants to awaken you to life, He wants to give you an eternally-indestructible life which you shall never lose again. Accept his gift of grace, remember Him during fearful hours and commend your soul to Him, and appeal to Him not to let it fall prey to death, but to have mercy on it and to help it attain life .... And, truly, you will not have sent your appeal to Him in vain .... Your fear will disappear to be replaced by blissful calm, a calm which only Jesus Christ can bestow upon the soul. The living faith in Jesus Christ dispels all dread of death, for the human being knows that he will rise again, just as Jesus Christ arose on the third day.

But anyone without this faith in Him will fear death or believe that he will cease to exist, that he will return into oblivion from where he imagines himself to have emerged .... And he, as well as all others who lived on earth without Christ, will have a rude awakening .... And it will take a long time until they are convinced that they have not perished, but that they can only escape their lifeless state if they call upon the One Whom they refused to acknowledge on earth, but Who alone can give them life again .... Death need only be the transition into a new and immortal life .... It need not worry people on any account, because Jesus Christ has prevailed over it, because He accomplished the act of Salvation in order to deliver people from a condition which had been brought into the world by His adversary .... But Jesus’ act of Salvation and resurrection are not properly valued by people .... Many know of them and yet do not believe, and therefore they are also unable to derive the benefit from the effects of the act of Salvation and resurrection .... But the living faith gives people firm confidence and therefore also removes their every fear of death .... And these will blissfully fall asleep in the Lord and joyfully awaken with Him in the kingdom of light and beatitude .... For they will eternally not taste death again, they will only ever have eternal life ....

Amen