Anybody else?
- Thread starter Riven
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Just like those who have decomposed in the dust of the earth, they will be bodily resurrected to life.
Hmm... what about unsaved children that die? Is it the same for them? They just stay dead?
Young, old, male, female, saved, unsaved - everyone who dies remains dead until made alive again.
The only way back to life from the realm of the dead is via bodily resurrection.
It seems like a rotten deal to me. Billions of people begore us have lived and died. They remain dead. It seems like there isn't much difference based on what one believes. Dead is dead, and this bodily resurrection seems to be... on hold.
BlessedPeace
Well-Known Member
The body returns to dust. The soul to God who gave it.
If we stay dead until bodily resurrection where is their soul in the interim?
And what of the Scripture that tells us the corruptible, the flesh,shall not inherit the incorruptible, Heaven.
Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
You have good and meaningful questions that deserve answers….Riven…welcome.
The Bible is like a big jigsaw puzzle where you have many pieces, but unless you have the picture to show you where all the pieces fit, it will be a difficult task.
So, first you need to see what the finished product looks like on the box…….”the big picture”.
We first have to understand why we are here…..on this one tiny planet, in a rather insignificant solar system, in a remote part of one of billions of galaxies in a vast universe…..stepping back we can see how truly small we really are in the big scheme of things.…but it doesn’t mean that we are unimportant. I see us as more of a prototype, where the bugs all get ironed out before the finished product goes to market.
Finding out what the purpose was in our creation, we then find out why we were given free will (as part of being created in the image of our Maker)
It was the abuse of free will that unleashed this unfortunate life we have been subjected to….it’s not permanent and the undercurrent you feel is the beginning of the last refinement in the process that leads to perfection.
Do you have any history in Christianity at all….or do you need to start from scratch?
If you have no idea what the Bible teaches, start from the beginning and take it a step at a time. You will soon see what makes sense to you and what doesn’t.
And you are correct…..it’s not our decision entirely…..God plays a great part in our understanding of his word…..it is his only instruction manual….so all our queues have to come from that one book.
He is looking to find right hearted ones who want what he is offering…..all he requires is our obedience out of a willing heart. When he finds such a heart, someone will have planted a seed in it…..but God is the one who makes it grow.
You will probably have many willing helpers here, so ask God to direct you to the ones who makes the most sense…..nothing God teaches is unbelievable…..or horrible. (There is no burning hell. The grave is a place to “Rest in Peace”, not somewhere to dread.) When you “sleep” are you conscious of the passing of time? The dead aren’t either.
I‘m happy to help if you need to know more……
I have no idea. I'm not even sure we have a soul. Have you ever seen someone die? I have. There was nothing supernatural about it. No soul leaving the body. No mysticism. There's just nothing. A person with a personality, hopes, dreams, etc, reduced to nothingness.
You might think that the soul is invisible and that is why we don't see it. Infared is also invisible to the human eye, but can be detected with certain equipment. So far, none of the mechanisms we have can pick up any trace of the human soul departing the body upon death.
Why is that? Is it because the soul is undetectable, or is it because we don't have a soul?
Thanks. :)
Yes. Four years at a Christian private school. My high school years. Prior too that, I was in the public school system. As you can imagine, it was quite the adjustment. But the Christians were good people. I enjoyed their company, even if I did feel like an outsider.
I appreciate it. Thank you.
Actually, while many are taught otherwise, the Bible doesn’t say anywhere that we have a soul; but rather, that we are souls. Please read Genesis 2:7…. Adam “became a living soul.”
KJV…”And the LORD God formed man ofthe dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.”
(Notice that most other translations don’t say “soul”. But that’s the Hebrew word (“nephesh”) there.)
Where does the body fit into this? We exist in these bodies. The soul would have to exist within the body. But where is it?
Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
Did you know that the Bible says we ARE a soul…not that we have one. A soul in the Bible is a living, breathing creature….the word never means a disembodied spirit.
That is my experience too…once breathing stops the soul dies. There is nothing that lives on after death….that is a perpetuation of the first lie told in the garden by a deceiver who had an agenda of his own.
It was he who told the humans that they would not die…and when they did he invented a way for them to go on living…..invisibly in another place. It was a lie.
Because there is no soul that is separate from the body. The Bible does not teach this and it never has.
God told Adam that he would return to the dust…..nothing more.
Since we are the soul…..it is not immortal…..it does not live on after death. (Ezek 18:4)
A soul needs two things to live….a body and breath in their lungs. When breathing stops the soul dies and the body returns to the elements of the earth from which it is made.
The Bible teaches about a restoration of life, which is an act of our Maker in returning the soul or person to life….as Jesus resurrected his friend Lazarus.…..he did not say that his friend had gone to heaven…he said he was “sleeping”. (John 11:11-14)
What’s a body without the conscious person we are?
It’s basically you, as a person.
The Bible says that even animals are souls. They do tend to have their own personalities.
Debp
Well-Known Member
Why not just a simple faith in Christ and what He says? Read the Gospels to start...
Simplicity of faith to me is best. Of course, maybe I'm just a simple person.:)
1For we know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. 2For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven, 3if indeed, having been clothed, we shall not be found naked. 4For we who are in this tent groan, being burdened, not because we want to be unclothed, but further clothed, that mortality may be swallowed up by life. 5Now He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who also has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.
6So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord. 7For we walk by faith, not by sight. 8We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. 2 Corinthians 5:1-8
"Absent from the body and present with the Lord" is a verse of great comfort....my mom passed away on June 21.
Upon believing on Christ as my Savior when I was 22, I found peace of heart and mind. I am now just turning 74.
Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
The promise of heaven was granted to a chosen few….the first Christians were all of that group…..these will rule with Christ in his kingdom and bring redeemed mankind back to where we started…..to wonderful, endless life in paradise, free from sickness, old age and death….as God first intended. A world free from war, violence, hatred and bloodshed.Riven said:
This is not a training ground for heaven….God already has a large family of spirit “sons” up there…he created us to live on the earth forever….to take care of it and it’s creatures, as well as each other…..we lost all that in Eden because three individuals disobeyed their God and sentenced us to this life, where death is an enemy. We all know in our heart of hearts that this is not the life we should be living…..everything that is wrong was introduced by disobedience and an abuse of free will…..God is allowing us to experience first hand how horribly wrong things can get when we ignore his commands. Our Creator, made us as his cherished children, but our first parents threw that all back in his face when the devil offered them something better…..or did he?
We get the whole story from the Bible….what we lost in the beginning, Jesus came to buy back for us.
It was a loving thing to do to rescue us from this situation and bring us back to God’s original purpose for us.
Going to heaven was never in that first purpose. But God chose some from the earth to rule with Christ, and he did so because only humans know what it’s like to live with sin constantly in front of us and how hard we have to work to avoid it. They will act as guides when the Kingdom rules redeemed mankind which will include all those in their graves…..a resurrection is promised for them. (John 5:28-29)
Today’s world is the result of humans abandoning God’s standards and adopting those of the devil…..it has created a self-focused and hate filled world where greed and corruption hold sway….but not for much longer….God has promised a spectacular showdown with the forces of evil, no matter where they are. There will be one victor! and no hiding place. He will return to us all that we lost, and give us back the life we never got to live…..(Rev 21:2-4)
That’s not the way you described your thoughts on death in post #451 and post #453.
Bodily resurrection is on hold but it’s just a matter of time, and the dead aren’t conscious of the passage of time.
“Christianity is not some feel-good belief system that asks you to check your brains at the door. Rather, it is based on reliable and documented evidence of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, thereby justifying His claims and promises. …
Jesus was alive. They had seen Him. It transformed their lives, and they had to go and share this message with others. They were real people like us, yet God used them to change the world.”
Bodily resurrection @Riven. That’s God’s deal. Once you’ve decided that bodily resurrection of the dead is a “rotten deal” then you’re no longer an agnostic; you’re decided at that point against the one true God and the Messiah, an atheist.
P.S.
You’re going to hear a lot of voices on the subject and mine will quickly be drowned out by the majority. If you’re serious about the matter then you’re going to have to block out the voices, including mine, for a while and read the New Testament for yourself.
Jesus was alive. They had seen Him. It transformed their lives, and they had to go and share this message with others. They were real people like us, yet God used them to change the world.”
Bodily resurrection @Riven. That’s God’s deal. Once you’ve decided that bodily resurrection of the dead is a “rotten deal” then you’re no longer an agnostic; you’re decided at that point against the one true God and the Messiah, an atheist.
P.S.
You’re going to hear a lot of voices on the subject and mine will quickly be drowned out by the majority. If you’re serious about the matter then you’re going to have to block out the voices, including mine, for a while and read the New Testament for yourself.
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Put your trust in God. He knows what is going to happen,
I’ll be eating dinner shortly @Riven and just before I do I’ll be thanking and blessing God (not scientists) and asking God (not scientists) to bless the food I’m about to eat. You’ve made some highly significant comments to me, one of the most significant among them being your attitude toward bodily resurrection, and I’ll be thanking God and you for them.
The Apostle Paul encountered your mindset in Athens, and throughout the Hellenistic world, and it’s position that the concept of bodily resurrection is foolishness. It is the philosophical mindset of Western civilization and the majority of Christianity.
Tertullian, an early, Ante-Nicene Church Father, asked the pertinent question: “What does Athens have to do with Jerusalem? What concord is there between the Academy and the Church?”
In Paul you will meet, as you have met in me, Jerusalem. In Christianity you will meet, primarily, Athens.
What does Athens, the center of Greek philosophy, have to do with Jerusalem, the center of Jewish revelation?
What do the Greek philosophers have to do with the Jewish prophets (of which Jesus of Nazareth himself is one - “the prophet like Moses”)?
The Apostle Paul encountered your mindset in Athens, and throughout the Hellenistic world, and it’s position that the concept of bodily resurrection is foolishness. It is the philosophical mindset of Western civilization and the majority of Christianity.
Tertullian, an early, Ante-Nicene Church Father, asked the pertinent question: “What does Athens have to do with Jerusalem? What concord is there between the Academy and the Church?”
In Paul you will meet, as you have met in me, Jerusalem. In Christianity you will meet, primarily, Athens.
What does Athens, the center of Greek philosophy, have to do with Jerusalem, the center of Jewish revelation?
What do the Greek philosophers have to do with the Jewish prophets (of which Jesus of Nazareth himself is one - “the prophet like Moses”)?
