Fireflies and Jars

      I was driving into work today and was thinking about how to minister to one of my cousins, it's something I am very much feeling led to do, and I've been spending a lot of time thinking about how to approach it and what to say. While I was going over all that in my head I started to think of his mother that died of cancer a couple years ago, my aunt was saved and before her passing the Lord gave me a vision of her being brought up to Heaven, I keep feeling like this is where I should start with him, explaining that she's not really dead, that only her body is.
       When I was trying to figure out how to explain that her body is dead, but her spirit is alive I was reminded of when we were kids and used to put lightening bugs in jars, for all those people who live outside Pa, a lightening bug is a firefly.  It was a lot of fun, and something I know he will recall doing. What was placed on my heart about the fireflies and jars is this, our bodies are simply vessels to carry our souls, like the jars that held our lightening bugs as kids.
      We were made from dust, and shall return to dust, but our spirits, our souls will one day return to the Creator, or burn in the fiery pit... but I'm focusing on the return to the Father because that is what applies to his mom.  In this example, the jars are our bodies, and the lightening bugs our souls. From inside the jar you can see the light they provide, I remember using them as lanterns and nightlight as a little girl, that light is Jesus shining through us, the kind of light all Christians should be shining. The lights of these bugs flicker, as often our light does because there are times when we all stumble and our light doesn't shine the way it should. And just like our bodies, the jar is strong and yet fragile at the same time. The glass that the jar is made of can only withstand certain temperatures in each extreme before it breaks, just like our bodies, and can also withstand some drops or falls without necessarily breaking although maybe some cracking occurred. 
       Now that it I've explained my comparison by breaking down the elements let's continue with the image of a jar filled with fireflies. When the cap is taken off the jar, or it breaks, the fireflies escape and fly away. Similarly, when a follower is called home their spirit is released from the vessel that carries it, our bodies. The release of the spirit can happen suddenly in a break, our gently like the opening of the lid, but when it does happen the fireflies fly away, or the soul returns to the Father. Once the vessel is empty, the jar or the body, there's typically sadness for the lose of that light it provided, but just like the lightening bugs, the spirit is happier outside the vessel.
       My final point with this imagery is that even though the jar is empty or body, the bugs or spirit, are not any less alive, in fact it could actually be argued that they are more alive because of the freedom of being separated from a confining, imperfect vessel, they are free to do what they were designed to do. This is makes sense to me as a away of explaining the 'death' of a follower of Christ, and I know to some it may not. I know some Christians believe that you go into a slumber after the body dies to wait judgment, where others believe you go directly to your reward or punishment, and I have seen scripture based arguments for both. I cannot say for certain who is right, but I know in the vision I had the Lord had two angels lift my aunts soul from her body, blessed it, anointed it, clothed her white and gave her a shining crown of glory before taking her home. To me, this could mean this is what He did immediately upon her bodies' death, or will do on judgment day, I am not sure really but I know that either way she will live in eternity with the Father and that's good enough for me.
      I really hope this served to comfort someone, and I pray that it will help my cousin as well. My intentions in sharing these thoughts were for comfort to any mourning and hopefully helping them to understand that if your loved who is a follower of Christ passes on to glory that it was only the vessel that died because the spirit lives on! Christ defeated death, and because of that we are able to be free of it!  

 1 Peter 3:18         
For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit,

Matthew 10:28        
And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

John 11:25        
Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live,