Chapter 1: In Between

The room was white; blindingly white. Come to think of it, it wasn't even a room. There were no walls, floors or ceiling. There wasn't even a horizon. It was just bright white.

"This is the strangest dream I've ever had" Thought David

"This isn't a dream" said a voice.

David whirled around. There was a man standing there ... a pleasant man. He was of no discernable race. It looked like he was an amalgamation of all races. He had a pleasant, reassuring smile. David immediately felt safe and at ease.

"Not a dream?" said David.

"No"

Dave heard the man speak but he didn't see his lips move. In fact, he didn't really 'hear' the man speak. It wasn't as if he detected the sound through his ears. It was more like when he was younger and was swimming in a river and would go under water and bang rocks together ... the sound didn't feel like it was coming through his ears but more at the base of his brain. He wondered why that was.

"It's because you have no ears. At least not physically" said the voice

"What do you mean, I have no ears?" said David ... now David was beginning to realize that he

wasn't really 'hearing' his own voice either

"You have no body, David. You left your body a few moments ago"

"I'm dead?" David started to panic

"Do you feel dead?"

"No"

"No. You aren't dead. The physical body that housed you is no longer functioning so that is quite dead; or soon will be. You, however are still functioning so now you're here"

"Where's 'here'? Is this Heaven?"

"No. There's really no such thing as Heaven. At least not as you picture it"

"Is this Hell?"

"There's no Hell either"

"Then what is there?"

"There is energy". The voice continued. "All things, David, are simply different manifestations of energy. The energy that is you has neither been created, nor can it be destroyed. In fact, you are a product of countless eons of energy that has come together with other energy, joined as one, rejected that energy that did not exist with you in harmony. You are, to be blunt, both ancient and ageless. As I said, you've spent countless eons and countless phases of joining with other bits of energy. At some point, the bits of energy that joined together became one to the point that they became self-aware. At that point, the bits of energy became a consciousness ... you, to be precise."

"Are you God?"

"If it pleases you to think of me as God, you may" said the voice. "What I am, in actuality, is a consciousness that has evolved to the point where I joined with others like me. It is that organization of individual, perfected, consciousness that is really God. I happen to be the consciousness that is in charge of this particular universe.

"This particular universe"

"Yes David. There are countless universes. This one began nearly fourteen billion earth years ago. To be precise, I began it. I 'thought' it into existence. It has been mine to oversee"

"To what purpose?"

"Throughout all of the universes, David, there are many laws that are as timeless as the energy that is in them. One of the major laws is that nothing is truly static. The energy is either progressing to a more organized form or it is degrading. In simple terms, the purpose is to assist energy to organize itself into a consciousness. Those individual conciousnesses are very precious. They take countless eons and evolutions to come to fruition. Once they do, they are safely guarded through their various evolutions until they reach your stage. At that point, the consciousness in charge of that particular universe introduces it into what you just left, a physical body. There are many reasons we do this but the main reason is that, with that physical body, you can experience more than you can without it. You needed that body so that you could progress to the next level."

"What level is that?" asked David

"The level where you begin to become like me ... like all of the conciousnesses that rule all of the universes. You will have a perfect physical body as you see I do. You will mate with conciousnesses housed in perfect female bodies and the offspring will be the collection of energy as it exists when it first becomes self-aware. In a very literal sense, you are the offspring of such a coupling. You are my offspring. You were then placed into a physical body at some point during its embryonic development. You became 'one' with that body. However, that body was always, as it is now, simply energy that has taken a physical form. It, in and of itself, has no self-awareness. It will eventually degrade into pure energy again and that energy will be re-used."

"I thought I would get it back again", said David. "That's what you're talking about, right" The resurrection. I learned all that in Sunday School when I was a kid"

"The people who wrote those words were inspired. In fact, they were shown the process. We do this in order to give people assurance that life does continue beyond what you term death ... but the process isn't exactly that"

"What is it then?"

"At some point, the collective energy that is your consciousness will begin to oscillate or vibrate on a different wavelength. In short, your consciousness will form itself into physical matter and that will be your perfect body. At that point, your physical evolution is complete. However, according to the immutable laws, you either progress or you degrade. The only way to progress then is to join up with others like you and engage in the process of perfecting energy to that level. Otherwise, you would begin to degrade. It would take eons for you to degrade completely into pure, unconscious energy but you would ... and actually, some of us make that choice. They have no wish to continue in the struggle"

"What about those that do continue?"

"As I said, they join with the collection of others like themselves. Individually, they become the guardians of a universe like this one. But we are, at the same time, a part of a much larger organism. If you were to compare what we are to your earthly experience, the closest comparison would be a hive."

"So what happens now?", asked David

"Now", said the man, "I'm giving you a choice"

"What kind of a choice?" asked David

"A choice, I'm afraid that I'm not going to give you very long to consider", said the man. "Where we are right now is what would be termed on earth, a wormhole. We are rapidly passing between the dimension where you used to exist physically and the dimension that would be closest to what you would term 'Heaven'."

"So it does exist"

"It isn't a place of rest and relaxation, David. It is a place of learning and preparation. If you go there, you will be happy to be sure and you will be with other conciousnesses that you knew while you were on earth. All of your relatives that made it to this point are there. There is much joy there"