Episode 346 - Dumb Head

I'm not talking about dying these days in order to be a downer. (For years one has tuned out all sorts of devotional books that major on death and dying. Especially R.C. ones, which felt morbid. They seemed both remote from one's actual life and almost intentionally depressing.) What I am talking about now, though, is the question of where one goes immediately after death. Not Too Long Ago (Nick Lowe/Los Straitjackets, 2015) I was preaching at a funeral and ended the sermon by asking the question: Now where is our friend? Where is he right now? People almost jumped out of their pews. But not in a bad way. It proved an arresting question. "Everybody's Talkin'" (Nilsson, 1970). That is the purpose of this cast. Who wants to be a Dumb Head at the end of your life? Believe me, at that moment, all your attention will be on the question, Where am I going? "To San Francisco, with a Flower in your Hair" (Scott McKenzie, 1967)? Maybe something like that. One is required to deal with this. You become less interested in the vagaries of the "dying process", terrible as they are, than in the question of Final Destination. Into the arms of Whom or What am I falling when I am pushed off the cliff of physical life? Nothing else matters. At least in my opinion. We conclude with a swift journey into the Unknown, Joe Meek's production of "Message from Venus" by The Tornados. It's German-language, tho' produced in a third-floor flat in North Islington, London; and has to be... from God. Right? LUV, PZ