What We Know About the Afterlife
Part III: Life After Death

by Rev. Sterling Durgy

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What happens when we die? "The intermediate state" is one of the more difficult areas of Biblical teaching. By "the intermediate state" we mean the state of existence between the time a person dies and the time he or she is resurrected from the dead. As with other areas having to do with the afterlife, there is much about this that we do not know, and some Scripture relating to this matter is among the more difficult to interpret accurately. It is certain that there are many things about the afterlife that God does not want us to know at this point in time. However there are also things we can know for sure, things that Scripture makes plain and which are helpful for us to know.

Before going on to consider what the Bible teaches about life after death, it is important to consider the sinfulness of seeking knowledge beyond what Scripture teaches on this subject. Samuel was summoned from the dead by King Saul, the first king of Israel (I Samuel 28:1ff.). In "calling up" Samuel, Saul violated his own commands, for he had eliminated mediums from the land in obedience to the Law of Moses. God does not allow the dead to be called up. Generally, if anything supernatural occurred, an evil spirit would have impersonated Samuel. God allowed the appearance of the real Samuel only to announce Divine judgment upon Saul. At Mount Sinai God clearly instructed the Israelites that they were not to learn the abominations of the pagan cultures around them; and one of those abominations was consulting the dead (Deuteronomy 18:9-14, Leviticus 19:31, 20:6-8, 26-27). There are at least two reasons for these Divine commands. First, God wants us to rely upon His Word. Scripture may not completely satisfy our curiosity, but His Word is sufficient for our needs until we ourselves experience death or He returns to claim His own. To seek other sources of information is to call into question God's wisdom in this matter - and to question God's motives or wisdom is sin. Secondly, to seek communication with the dead or information from the occult is to bring oneself into contact with Satan and his delusions. Both reasons make any connection with the occult detestable to God.

We should also take a clue from the silence of the New Testament on many issues. Considering that several people were raised from the dead in the ministry of Jesus and the apostles, most notably Lazarus, that many Jewish saints were resurrected on Easter Sunday, and that Jesus returned from the dead on the third day, it is significant that upon their return they gave us no account whatsoever of any of their experiences while dead. If they said anything to those they knew the apostles chose not to pass this on to us. So there is, at the very least, no surviving account, and certainly no Scriptural account. This is consistent with the fact that Samuel, in his appearance to Saul, gave no information about his state except that he had been disturbed by Saul. Generally, arguments from silence aren't very reliable, but in certain cases they are, especially when combined with other evidence. Given the warnings of Scripture against spiritism and the occult, its silence upon some matters concerning existence after death must be taken as God's decision not to give us such information. If it is God's decision that we should trust Him in such matters, we surely have every reason to trust Him - the only One Who can deliver our souls from eternal death as evidenced by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

That having been said, Scripture is not completely silent on this matter, and, as Deuteronomy 29:29 teaches, "The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our sons forever . . ." In the fifth chapter of II Corinthians Paul uses the symbolism of tents and buildings to communicate spiritual truths. Paul refers to our present body as a "tent" to emphasize the temporary nature of these bodies. Some translations may read "house," but the true sense here is "home" or "dwelling." In fact, the literal translation is "dwelling of tent" or "house of tent" (oikia tou skenous). The figure nevertheless emphasizes the temporary nature of our earthly bodies. They serve us while we are "pilgrims" in this land (cf. Hebrews 11:13-16), but that pilgrimage comes to a close when we die. Paul's symbolism here is richer than it might immediately appear. The Hebrew "Tabernacle" in which God "dwelt" in the midst of His people was also a tent. By using this wording, Paul was alluding to the fact that our "earthly tent" is the dwelling place of our spiritual being - our true self. Our glorified resurrection body, which will house our spirits for eternity, Paul calls, "a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." The word "house" in this case is oikodomen - a "building." Since this word is sometimes interchangeable with oikia, we must seek the full meaning in the words Paul uses to describe this building - and it is these that emphasize the lasting nature of the resurrection body, whose "Builder" is God Himself.

The intermediate state Paul calls being "unclothed." Christians in their earthly body want to be released from the burdens of earthly flesh, for our mortal bodies to be replaced with the immortal and glorified bodies of the resurrection - which Paul refers to simply and powerfully as the "mortal" being "swallowed up" by "Life." Until then, while we live, we live in the hope of the resurrection. The guarantee of our resurrection is the Holy Spirit Who dwells in us, and we "walk by faith." In Romans 8:11, Paul writes that the same Spirit Who gave life to Christ will give life to our mortal bodies. This verse is often inappropriately cited for God's work in Christians prior to the resurrection. I say "inappropriately" because while God can certainly heal our bodies by the same Spirit in this age any time that He wills to do so --- and He certainly does at times -- it is also true that this is not a benefit given to all Christians, whereas resurrection and glorification are. The healing of our bodies, therefore, cannot be seen in the same sense as justification, regeneration, sanctification, and adoption, which are always promised in this age to those who love and serve Jesus Christ. The healing of our bodies is promised for all Christians only at their resurrection at Christ's bodily return - otherwise, no one would die.

In II Corinthians 5 Paul writes that if we die, we are "unclothed," not having a body. However, Paul declares that our "intermediate state" is to be "with the Lord" (cf. Philippians 1:21-24, "with Christ"). This is consistent with Stephen's prayer as he was being stoned, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit" (Acts 7:59). When we die, then, the spirit of the person who dies, the essence of their personality and nature, that part of them which is eternal, goes to be in the presence of Jesus Christ. By following the use of the word "Paradise" in Luke 23:43, II Corinthians 12:4, and Revelation 2:7, it is possible to draw the conclusion that the dead in Christ are present with Him in heaven at God's throne (the first heaven being the sky, the second the starry universe, and the third heaven the seat of God's throne). Where this is, however, we do not know except that it is either outside our present universe or we do not have the ability to see into the spiritual realm and locate it.

In The Revelation to John we find confirmation that those who die "in the Lord" are in God's presence. Because this book was written at a time when Christians were very much in peril of their lives, and one of the purposes of this book is to emphasize God's victorious grace on behalf of His people in the face of vicious Satanic and human opposition, the state of Christian martyrs is emphasized. However, nowhere does The Revelation contradict other Scripture such as Paul's' writing in II Corinthians 5 and Philippians 1 that indicate that all Christians will be in God's presence after death. In The Revelation we find an indication of the consciousness of those who have died, of their awareness of God's presence, of joy, of active praise, and of communication with God which can certainly be characterized as "prayer." We can probably even think of this as "prayer" even if these saints are unaware of directing their thoughts towards God, but God is reading their inner desires that God complete the righteous plan He has put into motion concerning mankind, especially with regard to resurrection (II Corinthians 5:4).

Because prayer cannot be addressed to these spirits of the departed, any conscious prayers concerning earth and loved ones may well be limited to what they knew before they died. In any case, there is no possible ground for praying to departed saints to have them intercede on our behalf as is the custom of Roman Catholics. Although the prayers of the departed must then be non-specific, we can comfort ourselves that any sort of prayer they might offer on behalf of God's work in a general sense finds fulfillment in specific acts of mercy by God on our behalf. Because of the highly symbolic way truth is presented in The Revelation, other truths about existence in the intermediate state are more difficult to determine, and so probably should not hold our attention. In any case, we need to be very careful not to read the wrong conclusions into the visions John presents - word pictures meant to communicate spiritual truths, not to provide a visual image of what we would see in heaven - the place of God's throne.

Likewise, we must be careful about deciding what the Bible teaches about the intermediate state in the time before Christ's resurrection. All speculation here isn't wrong, but we must be cautious about being too dogmatic in a subject area that doesn't have any real importance for us at this time. In this regard, while there seems to be strong evidence that the story of rich man and Lazarus in Luke 16:19-31 is a true story, we don't know this for sure, and it seems certain that Jesus told this story for reasons other than to give us specific details about the intermediate state. What this story does, however, is to emphasize the separation between the state of God's people after death and the state of those who die outside Christ, and to emphasize that there is no second chance to respond to the Gospel after death.

As for the condition of those who die outside fellowship with Christ, Scripture gives us few reliable details about their state. We know that they are separate from the presence of the Lord and are kept until the time of judgment (I Peter 2:9). As with other truths about life after death, we can trust these to God's righteous and capable care. Our place is to respond to the call of God in Christ, and to preach the Gospel, while there is still time to respond to God's grace.


First printed in The American Night Watch Newsletter, Volume VII, Part 8, August 1999.

Copyright 1999 Sterling M. Durgy. All Rights Reserved.

The American Night Watch is a trademark of the Christian ministry of Sterling M. Durgy.

Scriptures taken from the New American Standard Bible, Copyright 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968,1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977 by the Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.

Permission is granted to reprint this article as long as the copyright is included, this statement is included, and the article is not sold to the recipients.

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This page was last updated October 22, 1999.