How to Know You're Going to Heaven: Assurance for Today, Hope for Tomorrow by John Ankerberg & John Weldon

Author:John Ankerberg & John Weldon
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Christian
ISBN: 9780736959421
Publisher: Harvest House Publishers
Published: 2014-08-01T00:00:00+00:00

Appendix A: Death and the Afterlife: Eternity Decided in Time

By John Ankerberg and John Weldon, copyright 2003. Used by permission. Available online at

http://www.jashow.org/wiki/index.php?title=Death_and_the_Afterlife:_Eternity_Decided_in_Time.

Death and Life

In contrast to the teachings of some cults, death is not merely an illusion, or something good, or eternal extinction, or an inevitable door to heaven or the next life, or multiple lives (reincarnation). Further, heaven is not merely a positive experience in life, such as feeling good, or a higher state of consciousness. Hell is not a negative condition in life, or a temporary purgatory, or the consequences of unenlightened consciousness in this life.

Death per se is a condition of separation. According to the Bible, there are only two kinds of death. First, there is physical death, which involves the temporary separation of the spirit from the body. In the resurrection, the body is later rejoined with the human spirit. Second, there is eternal spiritual death, or the eternal separation of the human spirit from God. This condition has no remedy. Death is not good; it has never been good. Physical death—separation from the body—is not good, since by it man is left “unclothed” in an unnatural state (2 Cor. 5:4; Phil. 3:21; 1 Cor. 15:53-54). Spiritual death—separation from God—is not good, since by it one is eternally separated from God.

“Death” and “life” are irreconcilable and opposite conditions of existence in both this life and the next. Apart from Christ, death leads to one thing only: eternal judgment. “It is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment” (Heb. 9:27). But with Christ, death leads to life. “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me shall live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me shall never die” (John 11:25-26). “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life” (John 5:24).

The Bible teaches that prior to salvation, even as they are alive, all men and women exist in a state of spiritual death or separation from God. Their human spirits are “dead” to those things that God is truly concerned about (Luke 15:24-32; Eph. 2:1; 1 Tim. 5:6, Rev. 3:1). Thus, even though they are alive physically, they do not consider the one true God, nor do they honor Him or care about His interests. Whatever God or concept of God they may believe in, they do not concern themselves with the concerns of the one true God (Rom. 3:10-18). This is why Jesus Himself referred to “the dead burying their own dead,” explicitly teaching that the living human beings around him were, as far as God was concerned, spiritually dead (Luke 9:60).

The Bible teaches that physical and spiritual death exists for one reason: sin. God warned Adam and Eve that if they disobeyed Him, in that day they would die (Gen. 2:17). They died first spiritually and then physically.

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