Life and Death

     I intended this morning to teach on regeneration. However, it occurred to me that before regeneration can be understood, degeneration must be. Is not degeneration death? Let us proceed.

     To understand life, anyone must understand death. Consider death; death is _______________. (You fill in the blank). Most would say, death is the cessation of life, or words to that affect. Of course, that brings to mind, what is life? Any mature person should understand life because they are living it. Tell me, then, what is living?
     We have become accustomed to human understanding. Most understand "living" as the summation of all experiences. Experience is interaction, or motion, with nature. Life must be animate. Nature requires material, both living and non-living. Is not death, then, the cessation of experience, or when living creatures cease to interact with nature? Perhaps. Perhaps not!
     Does cessation of interaction with nature culminate in death? How long does dying last? Could it be that there is interaction and experience after death? That implies that there is something supra-natural after death. If there is a supra-natural, cannot living be in the hereafter, or interaction with things beyond the natural? Note that I use supra-natural rather than supernatural, because the latter may include paranormal activity, or ghosts.(para means "beside" whereas supra means "above")
     If there is life beyond, then, are their ghosts? What are ghosts? "The seat of life or intelligence," also, "a disembodied soul." A soul is "the immaterial essence" of a human being. It has nothing to do with living or dead. (Merriam-Webster Dictionary). The soul is a permanent state of being.  That implies that everyone always existed in some form or the other.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love... (Ephes 1:3-4; italics mine)

There are several key points in that passage:

• Everyone was blessed by God in Heaven. (blissed or intended for complete happiness.)
• In Christ. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
  The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men" (John 1:1-4, italics mine). Jesus is the source of life, and that intelligence (the soul) is the light or knowledge of Christ. Sin dimmed that life and the souls of men were in darkness. Is not darkness associated with death? Close your eyes; what do you imagine death to be?
• Christ has chosen us in him. To be like him. "God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness" (Gen 1:26). What was he Designer's intent for Adam-kind? To be like Him. What are the characteristics of God? Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God is Mind, Jesus is His Flesh, and His Holy Spirit is His power. God's Spirit is what? The universe, or all of Existence I AM). "Space", then is God's "container." What is our container for God's Spirit? The human soul. God's plan was to fill the soul of everyone with His Holy Spirit.
• When was that planned? Before the foundation of the world. Our souls were tagged for life before the world was ever created. Souls, then are permanent, or immortal - exempted from death. We all have always existed and will never cease to exist. Our souls are also tagged after death. In he beginning all were tagged for life, but after natural animation ceases, a few are tagged for eternal life, but most for eternal death.

      Remembering that the soul is a permanent state of being, then death does not kill the soul. Jesus said, "Father"... "take away this cup from me" (Mark 14:36). Of course, he was referring to his purpose but also the "container" for his soul. The human soul is a permanent "cup" which was designed to hold God's Spirit.

     Are you beginning to understand what death is? Say it aloud: It is the separation of God's Holy Spirit from the soul, or lack of communion with God. Now, let's refer back to our genesis: The first commandment was, "But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die" (Gen 2:17).

     It should seem logical. Adam was expected to know what "die" means. That is imperative because the penalty for disobedience is death! Now let's look at the original sin:

And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die (Gen 3:4), and when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat. (Gen 3:6).

     What did they not understand? What the meaning of "die" is. They perceived death to be the cessation of motion. What do you say death is now? It is not to cease interacting with nature, but losing communion with God!
     Life, then, is having communion with God. It's having the soul endowed with God's Holy Spirit.
     What happened when Jesus died? "Jesus cried with a loud voice, and gave up the ghost" (Mark 15:37). "Ghost" is a disembodied soul. Jesus's death was when his body was torn asunder from his soul. For a short time, God seemed to have "forsaken" him (Mat 27:46). Adam missed the point. Why did Adam eat of the forbidden fruit? He saw that Eve ate, yet she still appeared to live. He could not see into the supra-natural because the Serpent has cast a shadow.. Inside, Eve died, then Adam ate and he died.
     By grace, God restored the life of the two. They were regenerated (a re-genesis) because they were ashamed. How did God regenerate them? (Hint: the coat made from the skin if a living creature.) They surely had an intense feeling of despair, and preferred bliss.
     They were born again as new creatures. Where have we heard that before? "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new"(2 Cor 5:17). That goes back to before the foundation of the world - where God's intent was that man be in Christ - in his doctrine. Eternal death, then, is loss of communion with God forever. It's the immortal soul "living" in isolation from God, and in communion with the author of death. Eternal death is more like eternally dying. What is it that Christians are saved from? Their souls are saved from eternal tribulation.
     The creation of mankind is described: "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul" (Gen 2:7; italics mine). On the other hand when God sucks the "breath" from a living soul, he or she becomes a dying soul.