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Christ is in our Midst, my dear reader!
From the point of view of a secular, unbelieving person, this day is madness for us. If you love someone, could his death be a feast day for you? Yes, it can! And not just a feast day, but the greatest victory—the victory over death. If the Lord Jesus Christ is the God-Man, then His Resurrection was natural. After all, God cannot die. Christ’s divine nature is immortal, and it would follow that human nature in Him acquired immortality. But the Mother of God is like us in every way. She is flesh from flesh, bone from bone a true human being, having only our human nature. And so we see that for the first time in the history of the world, an ordinary human being has attained immortality. And moreover, she was taken up to eternal life in both body and soul, where even the highest divine spirits cannot penetrate. The Life and Dormition of the Mother of God is an ideal example of what mankind is called to in God’s plan for it.
The end of each one of our lives leads to one of two results—either death or dormition. A person will become either a corpse or a reposed one. It all depends upon how and for what he lived. Those who go to death cling to this life, to their health, their families, their houses, work, and so on. That is because their hearts cling to the earth, and they don’t know anything better than it. But those who were able in their earthly lives to get a taste of Heaven, its sweetness and grandeur, burn with the desire to leave this life as soon as possible in order to be with their beloved God. For I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; which is far better (Phil. 1:23).
When the soul in the spirit comes to know God and His love, there is nothing dearer to him. But in order that the soul be united with the spirit it must conquer its attachment to the flesh. If this does not happen, then after the death of the body, the soul remains alone and filled with passions and lusts. After the general resurrection our bodies will return to us with a different nature, because flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God (1 Cor. 15:50). Our body will be renewed, but the soul will remain the same as it was when it left its earthly body. Death is when all around there is light, joy, and peace, but inside is darkness, stench, and godlessness. From this we can conclude that whether we go to dormition or to death depends on how we live this brief, temporary earthly life.
