What Happens After Death? (13)

God's Word provides assurance of life after death—though not in a heavenly afterlife as thought by so many!

God promises that life will return through a resurrection of the dead. This is how mankind can receive His gift of eternal life.

In the first chapter we dealt with God's gift of physical life. In the second chapter we discussed death itself. We have learned that we are mortal; life is temporary. Now we will focus on what happens after death.

Even though our bodies are temporary, subject to decay and death, God has planned for us much more than just this limited, physical existence.

Thousands of years ago the patriarch Job asked the same question we ask ourselves: “If a man dies, shall he live again?” (Job 14:14). He went on to answer the question in stating to God: “All the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my change come. Thou shalt call, and I will answer thee” (verses 14-15, KJV). After death a person is unconscious, waiting for God to call him from the grave and restore him to life.

What does the Bible say about the remarkable phenomenon of restoration to life? When will it take place? What else happens at this time? Will the resurrected still be flesh and blood, or will they be brought back to a different kind of life?

The answers to these questions go to the core of the meaning of our existence. As we study the Bible to find the answers, we can be encouraged, motivated and inspired by God's plan for life after death.

The promise of the resurrection:

Paul, as we saw briefly in the last chapter, spoke of a great change that will take place when he referred to both the resurrection of the dead and the state of those who remain alive at the time of the resurrection at the return of Christ. A marvelous transformation must occur before we can receive the gift of eternal life. The dead in Christ will be resurrected to an “incorruptible” existence, and those in Christ who are still alive will be instantly changed from a mortal, physical existence to an incorruptible state.

Notice again Paul's description of this astounding event: “Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep [die], but we shall all be changed —in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed” (1 Corinthians 15:51-52).

As explained in the previous chapter, those who have died are unconscious, as if they are sleeping a dreamless sleep, awaiting their time to be called out of the grave and resurrected to a new life.

The period from the last moment of consciousness until they are awakened in the resurrection will seem as if no time had passed at all, just as if they were waking from sleep or from a coma.

Paul shows clearly that this resurrection will occur when Jesus Christ returns to the earth: “But I do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who have fallen asleep [died], lest you sorrow as others who have no hope.

For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who sleep in Jesus. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will by no means precede those who are asleep.

“For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord” (1Thessalonians 4:13-17).

To be cont'd. 

God bless you all.