Continues from part 1
Death As “Sleep”
Don Juravin finds that the Bible compares death to sleep more than fifty times. After death we are asleep, we are unconscious; we are not aware of the passing of time or of what is going on around us. That is what death is like as well. The Bible says, “for the living know that they will die; but the dead know nothing… their love, their hatred, and their envy have now perished” (Ecclesiastes 9:5, NKJV, see also Psalm 146:4; 115:17).
It makes sense that after Lazarus was raised from the dead, he doesn’t share what he saw or experienced. He didn’t have anything to tell, except that once he was dead, and now he is alive! He didn’t experience hell or heaven. He was simply “sleeping” in his tomb. Peter on the Day of Pentecost said the same of King David. “Men and brethren, let me speak freely to you of the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried, and his tomb is with us to this day…For David did not ascend into the heavens…”(Acts 2:29, 34).
What Christians Believe About The “SOUL”?
Don Juravin REVIEW found that many Christians think of the soul as an immortal entity within us that goes on living after death. What does the Bible say? Describing the creation of human beings in the beginning, the Bible says, “And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul” (Genesis 2:7, KJV). Other Bible translations say, “. . . and man became a living being” (NKJV; NIV). God did not put a soul into man.
He formed the body from the dust of the ground, and then He breathed His life-giving spirit into the lifeless body—and the result was a soul or a living being. When a person dies, the reverse takes place. The breath of life departs from the body, and the soul no longer exists. That’s what the Bible says. “The dust returns to the ground it came from, and the spirit returns to God who gave it” (Ecclesiastes 12:7, NIV). At the resurrection, God reunites the body and His life-giving spirit—and the person lives again.
If souls existed as separate entities that lived on after we died, that would mean we have immortality. However, the Bible says human beings do not have immortality. Only God is immortal (see 1 Timothy 6:15, 16). Paul says that the righteous “seek for glory, honor, and immortality” (Romans 2:7). If we had immortal souls, why would the righteous seek after something they already have?
Scriptures
May be simply defined as the termination of life. It is represented under a variety of aspects in Scripture:
- “The dust shall return to the earth as it was” (Eccl 12:7).
- “Thou takest away their breath, they die” (Psalms 104:29).
- It is the dissolution of “our earthly house of this tabernacle” (2 Corinthians 5:1); the “putting off this tabernacle” (2 Peter 1:132 Peter 1:14).
- Being “unclothed” (2 Corinthians 5:3 2 Corinthians 5:4).
- “Falling on sleep” (Psalms 76:5 ; Jeremiah 51:39 ; Acts 13:36 ; 2 Pet 3:9)
- “I go whence I shall not return” (Job 10:21); “Make me to know mine end” (Psalms 39:4); “to depart” (Phil 1:23).The grave is represented as “the gates of death” (Job 38:17 ; Psalms 9:13 ; 107:18). The gloomy silence of the grave is spoken of under the figure of the “shadow of death” (Jeremiah 2:6 ).
Death is the effect of sin (Hebrews 2:14), and not a “debt of nature.” It is but once (9:27), universal (Genesis 3:19), necessary (Luke 2:28-30). Jesus has by his own death taken away its sting for all his followers (1 Corinthians 15:55-57).
There is a spiritual death in trespasses and sins, i.e., the death of the soul under the power of sin ( Romans 8:6 ; Ephesians 2:1Ephesians 2:3 ; Colossians 2:13 ).
The “second death” (Revelation 2:11) is the everlasting perdition of the wicked (Revelation 21:8), and “second” in respect to natural or temporal death.
Research by:
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