There's a string of days that glimmer like pearls for me. They closed out the year when my friend Marian shared the last stage of her earthly life.

Although they occurred more than 20 years ago, they don't appear to be affected by time in any way at all. In fact, in the intervening years I've found that it's not possible to count all of their gifts to me, as I'm still discovering them.

It was faith that brought us together, and that motivated every single aspect of our friendship. When we met, I was 20 and she was 80, details that quickly seemed no more significant than the color of our eyes or the clothes we each wore. From the first encounter, though the eyes of my own experience were very young, I could see that her ageless spirit had long ago found its way past the world's pain and confusion and wasn't limited by them any longer, in any way. How, I wondered, do you find a life like that?

She had become a willing, enthusiastic and incredibly creative servant for the One who had made her, and she was gifted at helping others feel the pure, uncomplicated, limitless effect of love. Her eyes — her whole face — shone with their transforming power.

More consistently than anyone I have met before or since, she demonstrated how much we barely recognize the potential that's been treasured in each of us, the reality that life grows better and better as we "unpack" this potential, and also encourage and welcome it out of others.

Marian taught me to trust that where souls truly meet and connect, an inseverable bond develops. Time and distance pose absolutely no barriers in that relationship. "And, Honey," she would say, "God loves us too much to want anything but the best for us, and the best that we can possibly be. He knows the jewels He's treasured inside us, just waiting to be invited out."

Marian treated everyone like precious little mines of gems, and maintained a happy, positive tone in this treasure hunt that simply left no room for negativity to make a nest. I'm so thankful that I had this reality reflected for me while I was so young, because it's given me more time to try to share it in my own aspiring efforts, whether as spouse, parent, friend or companion.

For the first two years that I knew her, I spent most every Tuesday evening in Marian's cozy living room. Then our paths diverged for a while, and we saw each other less. During those times, I'd often receive a call or letter in which she expressed ideas or addressed matters that were precisely what I had been struggling with — and usually hadn't told anyone else about. That mysterious power of love that she valued and encouraged others to value just seemed to keep leading to miraculous things.

I hadn't seen her for almost a year the day I first drove over to the small apartment she'd rented after her husband passed away. Her face was a vivid gold when she met me at the door. I noticed that she talked animatedly about finishing all of the projects she was working on.

Two weeks later, surgery revealed an inoperable tumor on her pancreas. For a few weeks, I made the 50-mile trip to her house daily. The little things I did certainly weren't noteworthy at all; the radiance of her gratitude just made them seem that way.

She determinedly set about the projects she had yet to complete, wanting to be sure that others could carry on the work that was her heart's desire, which encouraged seeing spirituality and science as allies. Just as religion and science were created to embrace and inform each other, so, she believed, are our rational and spiritual selves meant to be collaborators for our own benefit, and our world's. The educational programs she had helped to develop usually reached toward those whom society tends to overlook or forget.

During those days after her diagnosis, she seemed to thank God constantly for the mental clarity that enabled her to pursue her work in what were the last weeks of her life. "Prayer, and the Word of God, can be mighty powerful food," she'd often say with a twinkle. Her soul, positively exhilarated about this next stage of the journey, was very patient with her physical self, nonetheless. I felt transported as I watched her, and as we'd talk matter-of-factly about life and death.

One day, seeming very small where she sat in an overstuffed chair, she leveled those brilliant eyes on me and said, "Honey, I don't think it will be long now. I can feel how much more tired I'm getting every day. But God has let me complete everything I hoped to do!"

Her joy enveloped me like arms. Yet my drive home was tinged with sadness, because this, I knew, meant it was time to say goodbye.

Then I experienced something that made me willing to entrust even my sadness to God, young and unpracticed as I was in doing so. I was bringing Marian home from what would likely be her final doctor's appointment. Eating had become exceptionally difficult for her, and she was belittling what was surely considerable pain.

Then, to my surprise, she spotted a sign for homemade soup in a restaurant window and asked me to stop. When we did, we learned that the soup was long gone, and the choices on the sticky menu were pretty meager. A handful of grim-looking people hunched silently over their plates as flies hurled themselves at the windows. Could a place be more depressing? I wondered.

Marian's radiant face shone in the midst of all of it like a beacon. She didn't really eat much of what the harried-looking server put in front of her, but I swear that she fed her, instead. Marian softly said a few things that suddenly made the waitress laugh and smile and appear quite beautiful. Then others began to talk a little, and soon there was laughter and happiness all around in what, just a few moments before, had been a dreary, dingy place.

Marian's eyes sparkled like jewels, and I remembered something she'd often assert with a similar look in her eyes: "We continually overlook the power of love."

Neighbors and friends still tell the story of what they experienced in those hours in her home before Marian left this world a few hours later. The room seemed to fill up with love and happiness, they say. They didn't want to leave.

She used to tell me that, at an earlier time in her life, being ungrateful and impatient had been two of her most difficult spiritual battles, something I often found impossible to imagine.

"Then, when I was ready to give up on this life, something suggested to me that it was time to stop my fighting, and I heard those words, what Jesus promised: 'The Spirit of God is working in your midst.'"

From the day she accepted this reality, and the teachings of the Baha'i Faith that drew her closer to it, she seems to have become an unfailing channel for its truth. I can still feel her love at work in my life today, and feel my undying connection with her most strongly when I strive to do the same.

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Phyllis Edgerly Ring, mother of two, is a writer and editor. Her current book project addresses how adults can recognize and nurture children's spiritual nature. She is a former program director at Green Acre Baha'i School in Eliot, Maine, and has been a member of the Baha'i Faith for more than 30 years. Email her at {email columns@bahai.us}columns@bahai.us{/email}. See the website of the Baha'is of the United States for more information. © Copyright 2007 by Phyllis Edgerly Ring.