What Happens When We Die?

What happens when we die?

This is a question that has been on the minds of men and women from around the world for centuries. It’s the one life experience that every person is certain will come to them, yet it can evoke the most unsure thoughts and emotions. The Bible gives a clear answer to this uncertain event called death.

Let’s begin with David, the one chosen by God to be king of Israel. When his own child had died, he said ‘But now he is dead, wherefore should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me’ (2 Samuel 12:23). Here we find David expressing one of the most poignant truths about those who pass-away. It is simply, that those who die cannot come back in this lifetime. The book of Job supports this point quite vividly when he speaks concerning his death, saying ‘The eye of him that hath seen me shall see me no more: thine eyes are upon me, and I am not. As the cloud is consumed and vanisheth away: so he that goeth down to the grave shall come up no more. He shall return no more to his house, neither shall his place know him any more’ (Job 7:8, 9, 10).

A logical question now – in light of the many different opinions – would be, what is the state of someone after they have died? Do they inhabit some kind of underworld? Are they in purgatory? Or have they taken on another type of existence? The Bible is very clear on this point. It says ‘For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten. Also their love, and their hatred, and their envy, is now perished; neither have they any more a portion for ever in any thing that is done under the sun … Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest’ (Ecclesiastes 9:5, 6, 10). An explicit distinction is made here between the living and the dead, which is this: the abilities that are possessed by those that are alive, are not possessed by those that are dead. So this means that the dead are not aware of anything; they cannot love, hate, or work - they have ceased from existing and all that they had has ‘perished’; the dead know nothing.

“For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing”

So in other words, we can confidently say that the dead have no consciousness. The Bible explains this to us in familiar language in the book of Psalms where it says ‘Consider and hear me, O Lord my God: lighten mine eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death’ (Psalms 13:3). We can understand from this verse that the Bible refers to death as a type of sleep, and we all know that when we sleep, we are not conscious, but unconscious. The books of Acts and 1st Kings echoes this idea when speaking of the death of king David: ‘For David after he had served his own generation by the will of God, fell on sleep, and was laid unto his fathers…’; ‘So David slept with his fathers, and was buried in the city of David’ (Acts 13:36; 1st Kings 2:10).

Jesus Christ understood this truth and taught it Himself. When His friend Lazarus had died, He plainly likened death to a sleep. The Bible says ‘These things said He: and after that He saith unto them, Our friend Lazarus sleepeth; but I go, that I may awake him out of sleep. Then said His disciples, Lord, if he sleep, he shall do well. Howbeit Jesus spake of his death: but they thought that He had spoken of taking of rest in sleep. Then said Jesus plainly, Lazarus is dead’ (John 11:11-14). Another account where Jesus likens death to a sleep is found when He raised a twelve year-old girl from the dead. The book of Luke says ‘And when He came into the house, He suffered no man to go in, save Peter, and James, and John, and the father and the mother of the maiden. And all wept, and bewailed her: but he said, weep not; she is not dead, but sleepeth. And they laughed Him to scorn, knowing that she was dead. And He put them all out, and took her by the hand, and called, saying, Maid, arise. And her spirit came again, and she arose, straightway: and He commanded to give her meat’ (Luke 8:51-55).

The Bible describes death as a type of sleep

Just before we continue with the thought of death being a sleep, there is a crucial point here that requires our attention. We find it being alluded to in the last sentence of the passage of scripture just quoted: ‘And her spirit came again, and she arose, straightway’. This sentence implies that when this young girl had died, her spirit was separated from her body. This is widely accepted by many different beliefs with various conclusions, but what does the Bible say concerning it? Well, in the book of Genesis, it gives us an important account of how God made man. It 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). So God formed man’s body from the dust of the ground, and then breathed into him the breath of life, resulting in man becoming a living soul. This ‘breath’ is the element of life that God gives; it is the life principle that God imparts to us, and it has no consciousness in and of itself. The word ‘breath’ used here means ‘spirit’. This point is clarified in the book of Job where it says ‘All the while my breath is in me, and the spirit of God is in my nostrils’ (Job 27:3). With this in mind, the equation of man’s creation and existence would be: body + spirit (‘breath of life’) = a living soul.

What happens to this equation when someone dies? We can find the answer to this in the book of Ecclesiastes, where it informs us that when someone dies ‘Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it’ (Ecclesiastes 12:7). So according to this verse, the body which is formed from the ‘dust of the ground’ returns to the earth, and the spirit (which is the ‘breath of life’) goes back to God, which means that the dead no longer exist as living souls, or living beings. This goes directly against the idea that when someone dies, their spirit (or soul, as some interchange the terms) live on or exist separately from the body. This view is challenged by the Bible on two accounts: the first being that the living soul is actually the result, or product, of the body and spirit being united; the second is that the spirit (which is the God-given life element – not a conscious entity) goes back to God - it does not say that it roams the earth or goes to a spirit world.

There’s a specific union, or equation that makes a living soul

The consciousness of an individual is a result of the body and spirit being united, so once the two have been separated at death, the consciousness of that person has ceased to exist. We find evidence for this point in the book of Psalms, where it tells us that when someone dies ‘His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish’ (Psalms 146:4). So this verse says that when someone dies, their ‘breath goeth forth’ (which means that their spirit goes back to God), his body goes back to the ground, and on that very day, at that very time, his thoughts – which are his consciousness – perish.

The question could be asked, so why is death described as a type of sleep? Our reply to this reasonable enquiry would be an equally understandable question: What happens after you are finished sleeping in your bed, and the set time for your alarm sounds? You wake up! So in a similar sense, those who are dead have an appointed time in which they are to be woken. In the book of Job it says ‘But man dieth and wasteth away: yea, man giveth up the ghost, and where is he? … So man lieth down, and riseth not: till the heavens be no more, they shall not awake, nor be raised out of their sleep’ (Job 14:10, 12). These verses tell us that until ‘the heavens be no more’ (which is the end of the world – 2nd Peter 3:10-13), the dead will ‘not awake’ or be ‘raised out of their sleep’. Or in other words, the dead will only be woken up out of their sleep at the end of the world. The book of Daniel elaborates upon this by providing additional information. It says, ‘And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt’ (Daniel 12:2).

This also lets us know that there will be a time when those that are dead and asleep will wake up, but he goes on to say that there will be two classes of people waking up: the first class are those with ‘everlasting life’; the second class are those with ‘shame and everlasting contempt’.  The first class are the righteous, and the second class are the unrighteous. This ‘awakening’ is also called a resurrection, and we find in the Bible that there will be two separate resurrections for the two different classes of people. Jesus Christ taught this in the book of John where He says ‘Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in which all that are in the graves shall hear His voice, And shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation’ (John 5:28, 29). The book of Acts agrees with this teaching of Jesus, saying ‘And have hope toward God, which they themselves also allow, that there shall be a resurrection of the dead, both the just and the unjust’ (Acts 24:15).`

Let us summarise what we have discovered from the Bible so far on this question of what happens when we die: 1. The dead cannot come back in this lifetime; 2. The dead know nothing, which means they have no consciousness; death is a type of sleep; 3. The body united with the spirit produces a living soul, so when they are separated at death, this living soul dies; 4. The dead will be woken up or resurrected at the end of the world; 5. There are two separate resurrections for two different classes of people – the just and unjust.

If those that have done good and those that have done evil are resurrected from the dead when this world comes to an end, where does the idea come from that when we die we go straight to heaven or hell? This question deepens and becomes even more puzzling, especially now we know the Bible teaches that the dead have no consciousness – if the dead go straight to heaven or hell, they would have to be aware of it. Is this a teaching of the Bible, or an invention from the imagination of men? The evidence points a finger to the latter.

Furthermore, if the dead sleep until the end of the world as the Bible says, and do not exist beyond the grave, who or what is appearing to people in gatherings such as the séance, and what does this suggest about the Spiritualist movement as a whole? Note that Spiritualism is a ‘system of belief or religious practice based on supposed communication with the spirits of the dead, especially through mediums’ (Oxford Dictionary). We have seen that the Bible is in stark contrast to this belief system and in no way agrees.

More importantly, what does this mean for the idea of hell itself? Does the Bible really describe a place where men and women are tormented for eternity? These are two serious questions that hold great consequences within their palms. Many people hate the God of the Bible because they believe that it teaches these two things, and they are unable to reconcile a loving God with such a barbaric and merciless place. But our question is: does it actually teach this? The study we have just been through has already shaken the foundation of this chilling legend.  We encourage the reader, firstly to review this study with an open Bible to see for yourself if these things are true, and secondly, to then take what we have learnt here and continue to test this legend of hell and come to your own conclusion in light of the evidence.

(We also have two studies called Hell: It’s Not What You Think Pt. 1 + 2)

Though this idea of hell is highly unlikely, the fact remains that those who have done evil and have died without the hope of being raised with ‘everlasting life’ still have a grave consequence awaiting them. The opposite of ‘everlasting life’ is ‘everlasting contempt’, and the Bible gives us an explanation of what it means by this in the book of Revelation. It says, ‘And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works. And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.’ (Revelation 20:12-15). There is hope in the first death we now die, if our hope is in Jesus Christ – it is a sleep that we will be woken out of to spend eternity with God. However, this is not the case for those that die ‘the second death’ – this is a total end; utter hopelessness.

Only two paths; two sides; two choices to be made

 Are you certain what resurrection you will be in? There are only two. Two different consequences – one is everlasting life with Jesus our creator and redeemer; the other is a despairing end. The life we now live, plus our power of choice are great opportunities given to us by a loving God. Jesus is knocking at the door of your heart today. He is longing to show each and every one of us how we can have our names written in the book of Life and escape the second death.  Decide today to pick up the Bible and find out how you can be sure that you have the hope that even death cannot shake.  

 by LetterBox Bible

What Happens When We Die? Pt. 2

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