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The Lostness of Mankind (Part 3)
The Intermediate
State of People without Christ
What
does “lostness” mean when unsaved people pass into the next world?
What happens when a person, saved or not, dies?
Thankfully,
we are not left to vague conjecture on this most important subject.
The declarations of the Scriptures, especially the New Testament,
are clear—sufficiently abundant and decisive. They lie everywhere
upon the surface of the text, precisely designed to supplement the
imperfect guesses and feeble hopes of a humanity that naturally
longs to know what happens after death.
That the human
soul survives the shock of death we can affirm on the authority
of the Scriptures. Both Old and New Testament writers fully expected
the conscious survival of the soul-apart from the body-after death.
With positiveness and directness, Job, possibly the earliest of
the Old Testament writers (Job 19:25–27) and the Psalmist (Psalm
17:15; 49:15), declare that the life of the soul does not die when
the body dies.
I know that
my Redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand upon the earth.
And
after my shin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God;
I
myself will see him with my own eyes. Job 19:25–27
The frequent
expressions, “gathered to his people” (Genesis 25:17; 35:29; 49:33)
and “rested with his fathers” (I Kings 11:43; 14:3 1) do not mean
simply that the persons died, for the words are added to statements
that properly express that idea. Neither do they mean that the persons
were buried in the family cemetery, for this, too, is often stated
specifically by the use of a different phrase. The expressions signified
to the Hebrews a reunion with their forefathers in the other world,
or, as David tenderly expresses it with regard to his deceased child,
“I will go to him” (2 Samuel 12:23) The writer of Ecclesiastes, in
referring to death, adds, “And the spirit returns to God who gave
it” (Ecclesiastes 12:7)—further biblical corroboration of the
survival of the human soul after death. 4
Jesus' account
of the rich man and Lazarus (Luke 16:19–31) is also legitimate and
essential to our understanding of what occurs immediately upon death.
Note that:
Consciousness
will continue after death, together with memory and the same instincts
and sentiments as characterize people during the present life.
The good will
be happy and the wicked miserable, and both from a recognition of
their true character and what they deserved.
They will be
aware of others' final destinies, as well as their own.
There is no
means or possibility of a transition from the condition of the lost
to that of the blessed.
All further
efforts on the part of God for salvation after death are abandoned.
5
Jesus said
to the penitent thief dying beside Him at Calvary, “Today you will
me in paradise” (Luke 23:43). Paul anticipated his own death as
“be[ing] with Christ” (Philippians 1:23). The writer to the Hebrews
saw in “Mount Zion, . . . the heavenly Jerusalem,” not only an innumerable
company of angels “in joyful assembly,” but “the church of the firstborn,
whose names are written in heaven,” and “the spirits of righteous
men made perfect” (Hebrews 12:22–23)
From these
Bible references, by no means exhaustive, we can be certain that
the soul will be conscious in the disembodied state. The faculties
that constitute or belong to the soul—thought memory, feeling,
imagination—will remain after death, unaltered and unimpaired
in their nature We are also warranted in saying that during this
interim period, pending the reunion of soul and body, the saved
will be occupied with unalloyed delights of a spiritual nature.
Those, however,
destined to everlasting condemnation will suffer misery. As if their
present incarceration in the agony of hell's fire was insufficient,
they suffer the suspense of their anticipated eternal doom. They
are like criminals in the interval between conviction and execution.
Theirs is the “fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire
that will consume the enemies of God” (Hebrews 10:27).
Article 40
of the Church of England, adopted during the 16th century reign
of Edward VI, states the case briefly and clearly:
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