 Posted Wednesday, May 07, 2008 8:47 PM
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| A previous post made the statement: Since God is eternal Life itself, to Him/Her there is no death. Your uncle can feel this love just as much now as anytime previous to his passing. The above statement agrees with CS beliefs, but it disagrees with the Bible. I'll start with a statement from Hebrews: "Just as man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment, so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many people; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him." Hebrews 9:27-28 (emphasis added)
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Posted Friday, May 09, 2008 2:56 PM
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| Dear Linda, Thanks. I'll check that out in my NIV, it has a lot of comments to related passages and their connections to other parts of the Bible. If I see something interesting, I'll add on.
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Posted Monday, May 12, 2008 1:53 PM
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CS views death as a misconception, but the Bible views both physical death and spiritual death as real. In fact, the Bible says that we all start out spiritually dead -- separated from God and in a state of rebellion against Him. I'll give a few Bible verses to illustrate both physical and spiritual death.
The reality of physical death
Jesus physically died on the cross. The apostle John points out that "when they came to Jesus and found that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. Instead, one of the soldiers pierced Jesus' side with a spear, bringing a sudden flow of blood and water." (John 19: 33-34) At the time John wrote his gospel, gnosticism and Docetismwere problems in the Christian church, and John probably pointed out the blood and water as further proof that Jesus was, in fact, physically dead and not just in a swoon.
Throughout the Bible, physical death is presented as what it is -- the end of functioning for the physical body. When Jesus raised Lazarus from the grave, his body simply started functioning again (without any decomposition, which was part of the miracle). But Lazarus didn't gain a new understanding of his spiritual nature and rise above the physcial senses -- he was simply physically alive again. One has to presume that he had to go through the physcial death process again at a later point (if he had ascended as Jesus did, I suspect we would have heard about it in Church history).
Both Paul and Peter anticipated their physical deaths (both were martyred). If they expected to demonstrate their understanding over physcial death, neither makes that apparent in Scripture. (See 2 Peter 1:13-14, 1 Timothy 4:6-8)
The reality of spiritual death
Not only does sin result in physcial death, it results in spiritual death. God told Adam that he would surely die if he ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. He didn't drop over dead when he ate the of the tree, but his fellowship with God was immediately damaged and his longterm physical death process was set in motion (Gen 3:19). He and Eve had made themselves clothes of fig leaves, but God killed an animal to cover them -- a clear picture of the blood sacrifices to come throughout the Old Testament and then the final blood sacrifice of Jesus Christ.
Spiritual death and resurrection are addressed all over the New Testament. Consider, for example, Ephesians 2. (Please note that Paul's letter is written specifically to followers of Jesus Christ -- not to the general public):
"As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. (Ephesians 2:1-10, emphasis added)
The book of Romans also deals with sin and its consequences (physical and spritual death). An excerpt from Romans 5 states:
"...just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men. For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous." (Romans 5:18-19) The whole chapter is worth reading.
In saying that death is just a misunderstanding to be overcome, CS misses the point of Jesus' life, death, and resurrection.
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