When a Man Dies... What Then?

When a Man Dies... What Then?

A business man at his dinner table was reading aloud a letter from a family friend.

"And so Jack's illness grew gradually worse, until the doctors admitted they could do nothing for him. Just a few weeks later he died. You can imagine . . ."

"Daddy, what does 'die' mean?" interrupted his little girl, looking up from her plate.

The father hesitated, groping for an answer. "What would you have said?

How one shrinks from introducing a child to the reality of death! Yet it is the most universal fact of life. For death is no respecter of persons; it misses none—good and bad, rich and poor, old and young, the great and the small. It is the common enemy of mankind. The loneliness of a soul that has lost a loved one, the awful silence, awakens tender sympathy in the human heart.

What is death? Are we born only to die? Must death go on forever? Is it the end of the story? What is the experience of those in the grave? Can we help them? Can we talk with them? Just where are the dead? Is there any hope beyond the grave? Can we face death unafraid?

To solve the problem, certain people deny the existence of death—but they also die. Others say we are God's children, and therefore we cannot die; but these too become a part of the inevitable procession to the grave. The atheist and the unbeliever deny all hope of future life and declare that death is the eternal end of everything. Many Christians believe that the dead are not really dead—that they go to heaven, hell, or some intermediate place of conscious existence. This view is also shared by Muslims and, in fact, by hundreds of millions of non-Christians.

In a matter so important, so universal, why trust in some man's idea? Why not go to the Word of God for information? There the Creator, who knows all about life and death, will instruct us.

In order to understand from the Word of God the real truth about death, we must first understand how our Creator made us.

1. HOW WAS MAN MADE?

God might have made man from star-dust, or some other celestial substance, but He did not. Man was made of a very earthy material.

"And the Lord God formed man of the DUST OF THE GROUND."—Genesis 2:7.

Science agrees completely with this statement of man's composition. A person who weighs 140 pounds contains enough fat for seven cakes of soap, carbon for 9,000 lead pencils, phosphorus for 2,000 match heads, magnesium for one dose of salts, iron enough to make one medium-sized nail, sufficient lime to whitewash a wooden fence, enough sulphur to rid one dog of fleas, and water enough to fill a ten-gallon can. Man is composed of the elements found in old Mother Earth.

Further evidence of this fact is found in what a man eats. Everything that he puts into his mouth comes from the earth. Man was made from the soil, and his life is sustained by the soil.

But you could put all the soil elements together in the right proportions to make a man and still not have one. Only the Creator could combine all these elements and turn the inorganic into the organic. Man is a miracle of the all-wise God. He is the capstone of creation on this earth, for he is made in the image of God. (Genesis 1:26.)

After God had combined the desired elements of earth to form man, that still was not enough. His creative energy must give life to the inert form. It took something more to make that perfect body into a living soul—and that something more was the breath of life.

"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.

Note that the Bible does not say man received a soul; it says instead that "man became a living soul." Life flowed from God into and through the complex threads of the nervous system; muscles expanded and contracted, the lungs went into action. With "the breath of life" in his nostrils, man became "a living soul."

According to Genesis 2:7, we might write the equation of man thus:

"Dust of Earth" (Lifeless Body) + "Breath of Life" (Breath from God) = "Living Soul" (Living Being)

Man has a body, intelligence, memory, a mind to reason, a conscience, and a will. He has one personality and one character. He is one entity, not two or more. Just as long as he continues to breathe the breath of life he will be a human being, a living soul.

2. WHAT IS DEATH?

Death is the cessation of life. Let us take the above equation of man as a living soul and reverse it.

"Living Soul" (Living Being) - "Breath of Life" (Breath from God) = "Dust of Earth" (Lifeless Body)

According to the Bible, when a man dies,

"His BREATH goeth forth, he returneth to his EARTH; in that very day his thoughts perish."—Psalm 146:4.

"Then shall the DUST return to the earth as it was: and the SPIRIT [breath] shall return unto God who gave it."—Ecclesiastes 12:7.

The word translated "spirit" in this passage is translated "breath" in Ecclesiastes 3:19. We can only conclude that the terms "breath" and "spirit" are sometimes used synonymously. (For further study of these terms, compare Genesis 2:7, Job 27:3, and Ecclesiastes 3:19, 21.)

At death when the "spirit" or "breath of life" returns to God, and the body returns to "dust," what happens to the soul?

Is the soul an immortal entity? No! According to Ezekiel 18:4, 20, the soul is not immortal; it can die:

"The soul that sinneth, it shall die."—Ezekiel 18:4.

Death is a blackout of spirit, soul, and body. He who in life was a human being, a living soul, is in death only a corpse. The body returns to dust, and the breath, or spirit, goes back to God. God has taken back from man the life He gave him at creation or at birth. The soul dies.

Here is a candle. It is perfect. It stands ready to give light, but it has no light of its own. We strike a match and light the wick. Then we have a lighted candle.

Blow on the flame of the candle and it goes out. Where did it go? Out—that's all. And with the passing of the flame, the light also goes out.

Man is like that candle. It takes divinely given energy, the breath of life, to light him—to make him a living soul. God "strikes the match" and man becomes a living soul. Intelligence shines out of that human being.

But take the breath away from that man, and he dies. The light is snuffed out. The living soul perishes. His body decays. The brain and the nervous system no longer function. Intelligence can no more be a part of that man than can the extinguished flame be a part of the candle.

Death is not the friend that some would have us believe. The Word of God calls death an enemy.

"The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death."—1 Corinthians 15:26.

Death is the disintegration of a living soul, of the human being. It is the breaking up of the living organism—you, me, or any other person.

Jesus has "the keys of hell [the grave] and of death." Revelation 1:18. Without Christ, who has the power to unlock the tomb and raise the dead, natural death would be a one-way street ending in oblivion, the abyss that lies at the end of the road of sin.

Death blacks out intelligence; it snuffs out life, it disintegrates the human being, the living soul. A living soul is a human body plus life from God. A dead soul is a human body minus life from God. The whole man sinned, so the whole man dies.

Is there, then, no hope beyond the grave? Yes, there is hope: a bright, radiant hope. But before entering into a discussion of that hope, let us first examine the question:

3. HOW MUCH DOES A DEAD MAN KNOW? (Part 1 of 2)

In death, the mind ceases to exist and therefore no longer remembers anything, not even God.

"For in death there is NO REMEMBRANCE of thee: in the grave who shall give thee thanks?"—Psalm 6:5.

Since a dead person cannot remember anything, he cannot praise his Creator.

"The dead praise not the Lord, neither any that go down into silence."—Psalm 115:17.

All human emotion ceases at death.

"Also their LOVE, and their HATRED, and their ENVY, is now PERISHED."—Ecclesiastes 9:6.

The dead have no sense of accomplishment, no feelings of satisfaction, no reward for their life's endeavors.

"Neither have they any more a reward."—Verse 5.

The dead do not know anything that takes place on this earth. Their children rise to fame or sink into oblivion, but the dead parents know nothing about it. They have absolutely no contact with former human interests.

"His sons come to honour, and HE KNOWETH IT NOT; and they are brought low, but he perceiveth it not of them."—Job 14:21.

The dead neither guide the fortunes nor influence the affairs of their friends. They have no control over conditions on this earth. They are completely cut off from the land of the living.

"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."—Ecclesiastes 9:6.

In death the senses of the human being completely cease to operate. The disintegrated brain cannot function and therefore cannot comprehend or remember anything.

"For the living know that they shall die: but THE DEAD KNOW NOT ANY THING, . . . for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest."—Ecclesiastes 9:5, 10.

Death is a dreamless sleep. Frequently found in the Bible, death is referred to 50 times as a sleep. The psalmist calls it "the sleep of death." Psalm 13:3.

"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 14:12.

Job, Job of old, likened death to unconscious sleep.

"If I wait, the grave is mine house: I have made my bed in the darkness."—Job 17:13.

3. HOW MUCH DOES A DEAD MAN KNOW? (Part 2 of 2)

"There the wicked cease from troubling; and there the weary be at rest. There the prisoners rest together; they hear not the voice of the oppressor. The small and great are there; and the servant is free from his master."—Job 3:17-19.

Job prayed:

"O that thou wouldest hide me in the grave, that thou wouldest keep me secret, until thy wrath be past, that thou wouldest appoint me a set time, and remember me!"—Job 14:13.

Jesus said, "Lazarus sleepeth." Yet Lazarus, the friend of Jesus, had been dead four days before Jesus came. But when the Son of God came to the tomb, He demonstrated how easy it is for God to awaken the dead as for one of us to awaken a sleeping person.

Three persons who were resurrected—the son of the widow of Nain, the daughter of Jairus, and Lazarus—said not one word about having gone to heaven or hell. Is it likely that if they had been in either place they would have had nothing to say about it? Had they been in heaven, would it not have been cruelty to bring them back to earth? And if in hell, would it not have been equally strange to take them away from their punishment?

Why, after their return to life, did these three persons not have something to say about so important a matter as Paradise or hell? There was nothing to say. God's Word teaches that while dead they were in unconscious, dreamless sleep. They knew nothing, for there is neither wisdom nor knowledge in death. Had these three reported anything from behind the closed door of death, they would have contradicted the Holy Scriptures. God's Word has but one story to tell concerning death.

4. DOES GOD FORGET THOSE WHO SLEEP IN DEATH?

On this earth, death comes to all forms of life. Animals and birds die just as man dies. Because of this, the atheist would have us believe that death ends all for eternity, that man is no better than the dumb animal.

The Bible denies any such teaching. At Lazarus' tomb, Jesus announced:

"I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live."—John 11:25.

When death comes to a human being, that person goes to his sleep in the grave. But in the records of the infinite God there is a complete picture—a photostat, if we may call it that—of the individual. God does not forget a single one of His created beings.

Job had confidence in God's unerring memory and love for the people of His creation. The patriarch expected to live again, the same Job as before his death-sleep began.

"If a man die, shall he live again? all the days of my appointed time, will I wait, till my change come. Thou shalt call, and I will answer thee: thou wilt have a desire to the work of thine hands."—Job 14:14, 15.

God will never lose track of a single one for whom Christ died. We may die and return to the dust. But in the mind of God the record of our individuality remains. Our life is "hid with Christ in God." Colossians 3:3. And He will raise us from death as He raised Lazarus long ago.

"When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory."—Verse 4.

"For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and THE DEAD IN CHRIST SHALL RISE FIRST."—1 Thessalonians 4:16.

Job looked for the time when God would bring him back from the prison house of death:

"For I know that MY REDEEMER LIVETH, and that HE SHALL STAND AT THE LATTER DAY UPON THE EARTH: and though after my skin worms destroy this body, YET IN MY FLESH SHALL I SEE GOD: whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold."—Job 19:25-27.

When Jesus comes again, the righteous will be raised. Man will breathe and live again. How simple the story really is, when we lay aside our preconceived ideas and take the Scripture just as it reads.

5. IS MAN IMMORTAL? (Part 1 of 2)

God says that man is mortal, subject to death.

"This MORTAL must put on Immortality."—1 Corinthians 15:53.

In the beginning, man's heritage as a created son of God was not death, but life. Had Adam remained obedient to the will of God, to the principles of His holy law, he would never have died.

But man sinned. He forfeited his right to eternal life, and by disobedience he became subject to death.

Man is now mortal. The Bible speaks of the soul as dying or being subject to death.

"Behold, all souls are mine; as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is mine: THE SOUL THAT SINNETH, IT SHALL DIE."—Ezekiel 18:4.

Although we find the Hebrew and Greek words for "soul" and "spirit" in the Bible 1,700 times, never once (when referring to man) are they spoken of as being immortal or as never dying. Not once is there any intimation in the Bible that the human "soul" or "spirit" is capable of conscious existence apart from the body.

At the "resurrection of life" foretold by Jesus in John 5:28, 29, all the saved will receive immortality. Paul did not expect to receive his immortal crown until all the saved receive theirs together.

"Henceforth there is laid up for me A CROWN OF RIGHTEOUSNESS, which the LORD, the righteous judge, SHALL GIVE ME AT THAT DAY: AND NOT TO ME ONLY, BUT UNTO ALL THEM ALSO THAT LOVE HIS APPEARING."—2 Timothy 4:8.

Paul tells us that we will not receive immortality until the day of judgment:

"But after thy hardness and impenitent heart treasurest up unto thyself wrath against THE DAY of wrath and revelation OF THE RIGHTEOUS JUDGMENT OF GOD; who will render to every man according to his deeds: to them who by patient continuance in well doing SEEK FOR glory and honour and IMMORTALITY, ETERNAL LIFE."—Romans 2:5-7.

The promise of immortality was made certain when Jesus burst the tomb. Since that victorious morning, the Christian world has the gospel assurance that immortality awaits those who look for Jesus' appearing:

"But is now made manifest by the appearing of OUR SAVIOUR JESUS CHRIST, who hath abolished death, and HATH BROUGHT LIFE AND IMMORTALITY TO LIGHT through the gospel."—2 Timothy 1:10.

5. IS MAN IMMORTAL? (Part 2 of 2)

God alone now possesses immortality.

". . . the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords; WHO ONLY HATH IMMORTALITY."—1 Timothy 6:15, 16.

Only once in all Scripture is the word "immortal" used, and it applies to God:

"Now unto the King eternal, IMMORTAL, invisible, the only wise God, be honour and glory for ever and ever. Amen."—1 Timothy 1:17.

Paul made it very clear to the Corinthian church that man in this life is mortal, subject to death. But when Jesus comes again, our nature will undergo a radical change: "this mortal" will "put on immortality."

"Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and THE DEAD SHALL BE RAISED incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and THIS MORTAL MUST PUT ON IMMORTALITY."—1 Corinthians 15:51-53.

Then death will be "swallowed up in victory." Verse 54.

"THY DEAD MEN SHALL LIVE, together with my dead body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead."—Isaiah 26:19.

Man is not now immortal. But by faith we can now claim the promise of immortality. This is the Christian's hope, which will be realized when Jesus comes again.

6. FACING DEATH UNAFRAID

The Bible teaches, as we learned in the last lesson, that a day of judgment is yet to come. Would God take a person to heaven before the heavenly court sits in judgment and examines his life record? Would a just God send a person to punishment at death before his case comes to judgment in the heavenly court?

At death God does with us the only thing a just God can do. He allows us to rest in the grave in unconscious sleep until our cases come up in judgment before His throne. When the investigative judgment is completed, Jesus will come in the clouds of heaven to reward the righteous with immortality.

The Bible speaks of the resurrection of the righteous, when Jesus comes, as the "first resurrection," which will take place at the beginning of the thousand years. (Revelation 20:6.) But the wicked will not receive their reward until the one thousand years are over. Then they will come up in the "second resurrection" and face their punishment. (Revelation 20:5-10.)

Death is an enemy. It robs us of life. But death will not reign in this old world forever. Its power will be broken, and it will be destroyed, never to cast its shadow over a redeemed people. The devil, the wicked, death, and the grave will be destroyed by fire. "This is the second death." Revelation 20:13, 14.

Here are four simple suggestions for facing death unafraid: (1) Give your life to Jesus, and you will be prepared for death at any moment. Jesus died, not only to deliver you from death, but to deliver you from the "fear of death." Hebrews 2:14, 15. (2) By the grace of Christ be obedient to His commandments, and you will be prepared for a second life in which you will never die. (3) Think of death as a short sleep from which Jesus' gentle voice will awaken you when He comes a second time. (4) Cherish always in your heart the fond hope of a Paradise home in which you and those you love will dwell with Jesus for eternity.

In God's tomorrow we will be reunited with loved ones. Babes will be restored to their mothers' arms. Families will be reunited.

"Death is swallowed up in victory."—1 Corinthians 15:54.

In Christ there is hope of life after death. He is the "resurrection and the life." He promises: "Because I live, ye shall live also." John 14:19. When He comes again He will raise you from death and give you life, eternal life. This hope is yours, if Jesus is your Saviour. If you have never accepted Him as your Saviour, will you do it now?

O God and Father of all living: I am grateful for Your justice and mercy in dealing with the souls of mortal men. I love You, and long for the day when by Your grace I will receive immortality with all Your children. Help me to trust You completely and to believe the Bible with all my heart. Hasten the day when I will be united with my loved ones in the great resurrection morning. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen.