Are our lives parts in a play scripted by God, or is this all there is? Is this life merely a stage, with life-like props? Is there life beyond this realm?
The vast majority of Americans believe that there’s life after death. We see it in popular movies like Ghost, Heaven Can Wait, even in Disney cartoons like All Dogs Go to Heaven. Most recently we saw it in the Robin Williams movie What Dreams May Come, with it’s dramatic portrayal of heaven and hell. Entertainment Weekly called What Dreams May Come a lost verse from the Beatles song "Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds" as it presents the afterlife as a kind of metaphysical candyland. Yet What Dreams May Come was a very popular movie.
Two years ago Time magazine devoted its cover story to the question of the afterlife.1 In that article, they published the results of a Time/CNN poll, where they found that 81% of Americans believe in the existence of heaven. Sixty-three percent of Americans believe that hell exists, although only 1% believe that they’ll end up there. So belief in life after death is certainly not on the way out in our culture.
Yet many people wonder if life after death is just wishful thinking. Are beliefs about an afterlife merely our way of dealing with our anxiety about death? Philosophers Paul and Linda Badham point out, "To many contemporary philosophers, life after death is not merely unlikely, it is inconceivable."2 Atheist philosopher Anthony Flew agrees, when he claims that the idea of life after death is a nonsensical statement that has no meaning, much like a square circle.3 This idea too has crept into our popular culture, as the band Collective Soul tells us "Heaven’s Already Here" (Hints, Allegations, And Things Left Unsaid), and Gloria Estefan reduces heaven to "how I feel when I’m with" the person I love ("Heaven’s How I Feel" Gloria).
Today we start a new five week series called BEYOND DEATH’S DOOR, where we seek to push away the curtain and catch a glimpse at what lies beyond this life. The former Swedish secretary generation of the United Nations and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, Dag Hammarskjold once said, "It is our conception of death which decides our answers to all the questions that life puts to us."4 He’s exactly right…and the Christian faith presents a very distinct concept of death and the afterlife that many people today have never been exposed to or learned before. So in this series I’m not making any assumptions about what you know or don’t know, but we’re coming to this topic with a freshness, an openness, to hear what the Bible itself says about what lies beyond death’s door. Today we’re going to talk about death, about some of the theories that have been suggested for what lies beyond death, and how death fits in to the message of the Christian faith and the Bible.
I. The Mystery of Death
In many ways death is a mystery. This is why we love movies about the afterlife. In his book The View from a Hearse, Christian author Joseph Bayly describes the mystery of death this way: "We may postpone it, we may tame its violence, but death is still there waiting for us. Death always waits. The door of the hearse is never closed."5
This brings us to our first idea we’re going to explore together. BECAUSE DEATH IS A MYSTERY, OUR WORLD HAS OFFERED DIFFERENT EXPLANATIONS FOR WHAT HAPPENS WHEN WE DIE.
It’s human nature for us to try to figure out mysteries, to explain away things that we can’t understand. Let’s explore a few of the oldest and most influential explanations. Probably the oldest explanation is DISEMBODIMENT, which is the idea that when we die our soul is liberated from the prison of our body. This is probably the oldest Western explanation, tracing its roots back to the ancient Greek philosophers Plato and Aristotle. According to this view the real "me" is not my body but my soul, or my mind, that non-physical, spiritual reality that makes me who I really am. My physical body is a prison for my soul, limiting it, preventing it from being free, so death is a kind of liberation. Thus this approach views the afterlife is a disembodied—-or bodiless—-existence. This view has been extremely popular throughout history, and it wields incredible influence today. That Time magazine poll found that 66% of Americans believe that only a person’s soul goes to heaven. This disembodiment view is what’s behind those who believe in ghosts, it’s the view of most tribal religions in primitive parts of the world. Yet disembodiment is not the explanation offered by the Bible.
Another popular explanation is REINCARNATION, which is the idea that after we die we are reborn as another living being based on our karma. This view goes back to 1000 years before Christ, and it lies at the heart of the eastern religions of Hinduism and Buddhism. Reincarnation is tied to the idea of karma, which is believed to be the universe’s justice system. Karma claims that everything painful that happens in our lives is a direct result of bad things we’ve done in previous lives, thus our suffering is the universe’s way of balancing the scales of justice. This means that all pain and suffering in this life is deserved, whether it’s the Albanian refugees we see on TV or a ten year old who’s been abused by her uncle, all suffering is a direct result of bad things we’ve done in previous lives, and suffering bad things in our present life is the universe’s way of settling the score. Reincarnation and karma have emigrated from the East to the west, and been popularized by people like Shirley MacClane and Peter Sellars and by groups like the Unity School of Christianity and Astara. According to a 1996 poll in George magazine, currently 30% of Americans believe in reincarnation.6 The Bible nowhere affirms that reincarnation is true, and in fact the whole idea of karma goes against the entire message of the New Testament, yet belief in reincarnation remains strong.
Finally, some people believe in EXTINCTION, which is the idea that when we die we cease to exist. Period. Although view people believed this in the past, for the last 100 years extinction has become a very dominant, popular view. For instance, the Humanist Manifesto II states, "There is no credible evidence that an individual life survives the death of the body."7 Extinction assumes that God does not exist, that matter is the only thing that’s real, and that scientific knowledge is the only kind of knowledge that’s true. This is why the atheist philosopher Anthony Flew suggests that the entire idea of life after death is meaningless, since he assumes that life is biological life, which ceases at the moment of death. Atheist Keith Augustine admits, "When confronted by the death of someone close to me, or contemplating my own inevitable death, I am not comforted by such words of wisdom. Nevertheless, we cannot base our beliefs on what we want to be true." Although only 13% of Americans hold to this view, it is the dominant view of the major cultural power structures in our world today.
These three views—-disembodiment, reincarnation, and extinction—-are the major explanations we find in our culture today, as we seek to probe the mysteries of death.
II. Death Not Natural
But what does the Bible say? What perspective does the Bible offer? Well the very first mention of death in the Bible is found in the very first book, Genesis:
"But from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you shall surely die" (2:17 NASB).
These are the words of God to the first man—Adam (which is Hebrew for "man"). I’ve used the New American Standard Bible translation because it’s more literal—-and in this case more accurate. It brings out the fact that God told the first man that the very day he ate of the tree he would die. Now the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was simply a source of wisdom and truth apart from God, so to eat of the tree was to declare independence from God.
In English when we want to really emphasize a word, we underline it, we put it bold letters, maybe we make the font bigger. In Hebrew instead of doing that kind of stuff, they’d use a grammatical form called an infinitive absolute to really emphasize the verb, to underline it and call our attention to it .8 This is the form that the Hebrew for word "die" is in here in Gen 2:17, that the emphasis is on the verb die, that the very day they eat of this tree, they would die, underlined, bold, in a large font.
Now we know that the first man and first woman did eat of the tree—-declaring their independence from God—-but they didn’t physically die that very day. This is because death is used in the Bible in several ways. The word "death" in the Bible can refer to our MORTALITY, which puts emphasis on the process of physically dying. This is what the Bible means when it says "outwardly we are wasting away" (2 Cor 4:16 NIV). Our bodies are slowly breaking down, as our hair starts to fall our, our energy starts to wane, our memory begins to fail us. This kind of death is the process of decay that ends in our physical deaths. This process began the very day the first man and first woman declared their independence from God.
But "death" can also describe the actual event of PHYSICAL DEATH, which is what our mortality leads to. Although this didn’t happen the day the first man and woman disobeyed God, physical death became inevitable for them at that moment. Physical death does not mean non-existence, but it means a separation of our physical body from our non-physical soul, or mind, or spirit, or whatever you want to call that part of us that’s not composed of atoms.
In the Bible death can also refer to SPIRITUAL DEATH which is a state of being alienated from God. This is what the Bible means when it describes us as "dead in our sins" (Eph 2:1; Col 2:13). We have biological life-—we’re breathing, our hearts are beating—-but we’re dead to the things of God, separated from God, unable to respond to God, deaf to God’s voice. This separation from God—-this spiritual death—-occurred immediately the moment the first man and first woman declared their independence from God.
Finally, in the Bible there’s a thing called ETERNAL DEATH, which is a person’s final separation from God. This is where "spiritual death" inevitably leads to without intervention from God, the final destination of those who are spiritually dead. This became inevitable for the first man and woman when they ate of the tree, what the book of Revelation calls "the second death" (Rev 20:6, 14).
So as you can see, when God said that in the day they ate of the tree they’d surely die, there was a lot to that statement. The Bible presents a complex idea of what death is.
But we’re likely to say, "That was then, this is now. What’s that got to do with me?" So let’s continue to trace this theme of what happened in Genesis into the New Testament.
Romans 5:12—"Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned" (NIV).
Here we find that what happened in Genesis is our story too, that somehow—-in some mysterious way—-we were present in the first man and first woman’s declaration of independence from God. This thing called sin entered into the realm we live in through that act, and right on the heels of sin was "death," mortality, physical death, spiritual death, and ultimately eternal death. Somehow our sins—-our own failures to live up to God’s laws, our own rebellion against God—-is somehow linked to what happened back in Genesis. Now this verse is not telling us exactly how this happened; it’s not giving us a theological theory of original sin, but it’s merely establishing a link between what happened in Genesis and what’s repeated in every human being’s life since then.9 Adam sinned, and we’ve sinned; Adam died, and we die.
Now 1 Corinthians 15 takes this another step forward.
1 Cor 15:21-22—"For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive" (NIV).
Just as the first man’s action had cosmic consequences for the entire race, so Jesus Christ’s action is claimed to also have similar consequences. If Adam’s failure marked the start of death—-with all the different aspects of death—-Christ’s resurrection from the grave marks the defeat of death—-with all the same different aspects of death. Again, we’re not told exactly how this works—-we can leave that to the theology classrooms in the seminary for now—-but we’re merely told that whatever happened when Adam sinned (and when we sinned) is answered when Jesus Christ rose from the grave.
This leads us to Hebrews 9:27, which says, "It is destined that each person dies only once and after that comes judgment (New Living Translation).
In this progression of thought we find our second truth about life after death. BECAUSE DEATH WAS NOT PART OF GOD’S ORIGINAL INTENTION, WE CAN BE CERTAIN THAT DEATH WILL NOT HAVE THE FINAL WORD.
Virtually every book on grief and dying tells us that death is natural, that death is simply part of being human, that we need to accept death. Yet something within us rages against death, it defies death, it refuses to accept that this is the way things are supposed to be. This is because death was not part of God’s original intention, it is not natural or neutral. The Bible calls death "the last enemy to be destroyed" (1 Cor 15:26). So although death is the fate for every person, it’s not natural, it’s not the way it was supposed to be, it’s not part of God’s original intention.
This is why we know that death won’t have the last word, because God is in the business of restoring things that are broken, of taking things that have gotten all mixed up and setting them right. If Adam made a mess of things—-and we’re all co-conspirators with Adam because of our own sins—-then Jesus Christ—-God’s Son—-is able to set things right, to clean up the mess we’ve made.
III. Easter and the Afterlife
That final word is connected to what we celebrated last Sunday, Easter, the resurrection of Jesus Christ over death. When Jesus himself faced the death of his friend Lazarus, and when Lazarus’ sisters Mary and Martha suggested that somehow Jesus had failed them because their brother died, Jesus said these words: "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies" (John 11:25 NIV).
The Bible’s teaching about the afterlife is not Plato’s disembodiment, it’s not Hinduism’s reincarnation, or atheism’s extinction. The Bible’s teaching is summed up in that word RESURRECTION. God seeks to not only preserve our souls after death, but also our physical bodies. We’ll talk more about how that works in the weeks to follow, but here we’ll just mention that this is the claim of the Bible, that since humans are composed of both body and soul, since we’re not souls chaned inside bodies and we’re not bodies without souls, but since our essential identity is both physical bodies and non physical souls, our afterlife existence will be both body and soul.
In this passage Jesus claims to hold the key to this existence, this resurrection of the body, this reuniting of body with the soul. Jesus claims that even though a person may die, fullness of life awaits on the other side.
Look also at what Jesus said as he himself was dying on the cross to one of the thieves crucified next to him.
Then he said, "Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom." Jesus answered him, "I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise" (Luke 23:42-43 NIV).
Somehow even in the face of physical death, conscious existence awaited both Jesus and the thief on the other side. We’ll speak more about these things later in the series. But for now I want to state this third and final reality about life after death. BECAUSE JESUS CHRIST CONQUERED DEATH ON EASTER SUNDAY, WE CAN TRUST WHAT JESUS SAYS ABOUT THE AFTERLIFE.
Although hundreds of thousands of people claim to have had near death experiences, only Jesus Christ died a complete physical death, and three days later rose from the grave to never die again. This is why the literal resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead is the central claim of the Christian faith, because without a literal resurrection the entire Christian message crumbles. Claremont McKenna College professor of philosophy Stephen Davis says that this resurrection was so real, so historical, that if the disciples would’ve had a camera they could’ve taken a picture of Jesus’ body. The British theoretical physicist John Polkinghorn is exactly correct when he says, "The Christian’s belief in a destiny beyond death finds its principle support in the particular event of the resurrection of Jesus Christ."10
We can trust Jesus Christ, we can trust him because he rose from the grave, we can trust him because he’s God’s son, we can trust him because Jesus Christ doesn’t lie.
Now there are other reasons to believe in life after death that I’ve listed on your outline. I wish I had time to explore them with you but I don’t, so I’ll merely recommend the book listed in your outline by Gary Habermas and J. P. Moreland, it’s recently been re-released under the title Beyond Death: Exploring the Evidence for Immortality.
The existence of the soul suggests life after death. If we don’t have a soul or a mind, or whatever you want to call it, if we don’t have a non-physical component to who we are, then we’re merely atoms and our thoughts and personality are merely a complex chain reaction of bio-chemical reactions in our brain and nervous system. If all we are is body, then our brains are secreting our thoughts and beliefs like our livers secret bile.11 We know from physics that our atoms are completely replaced every few years, which means there is no continuity to who I was, say, seven years ago and who I am today.12 But if we are composed of both body and soul—-as the Bible claims and as many philosophers today contend—-then it makes sense that we would survive physical death.
Also the need for justice suggests an afterlife. If God is real—-as the Bible claims and Christians believe—-and if this world is filled with injustice, then it makes sense that a justice God would rectify the injustices of the world we live in.13 The natural place for that to occur is the afterlife.
Finally, the hundreds of thousands of near death experiences that are reported suggest that there is an afterlife. Now I’m not saying we should believe everything a person who has had a near death experience says. We can’t use near death experiences to try to describe the details of the afterlife, but the fact that they do exist suggests that there’s such a thing as the afterlife.14 Frankly, I’m extremely skeptical about anybody who claims to have details about heaven or hell from a near death experience—whether it’s Betty Eadie with her message in Embraced By the Light, or whether it’s a TV evangelist who will sent me his chronicle of heaven for the right price. Christian researcher William Alnor warns us that these stories "are usually contradictory on significant details. Out of all the stories I’ve examined there are no perfect matches. In other words, one man’s picture of heaven did not correlate to the pictures given to us by any of the others."15 Yet these experiences do suggest that we do survive beyond death’s door.
So this brings us full circle, back to the question the drama left us with: Is this life a carefully crafted script or is this all there is? Because death is a mystery there are lots of opinions about the afterlife, but we can be sure that death will not have the final word. Because Jesus rose from the grave, we can trust what he said about the afterlife.
ENDNOTES
1. "Does Heaven Exist?" Time 3/24/97.
2. P. and L. Badham, Immortality or Extinction? (Barnes & Noble Books, 1987), p. 3.
3. Anthony Flew, The Logic of Mortality (Basil Blackwell, 1987), p. 2.
4. Dag Hammarskjold, Markings (Knoph, 1964), p. 160.
5. Joseph Bayly, The View from a Hearse (Cook Publishing, 1969), p. 11.
6 George 12/96.
7 Humanist Manifesto II, cited in J. Sire, The Universe Next Door (InterVarsity Press, 1976), p. 65.
8 J. Weingreen, A Practical Grammar for Classical Hebrew (Clarendon, 1959), p. 79.
9 D. Moo, Romans 1-8 (Baker Books), pp. 334-35.
10 John Polkinghorn, "The Scientific Worldview and a Destiny Beyond Death" in Immortality and Human Destiny (Paragon House, 1985), p. 180.
11 Pierre Jean Georges Cabanis cited in J. Sire, p. 64.
12 Polkinghorn, p. 181.
13 Gary Habermas and J. P. Moreland, Beyond Death: Exploring the Evidence for Immortality (Crossway Books, 1989), p. 36
14 Habermas and Moreland, p. 93.
15 William Alnor, Heaven Can’t Wait (Baker Books), p. 32.
