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III |
Questions About Heaven and Hell |
| 1. | What is the difference between soul and spirit? |
| 2. | Is there a Heaven and a Hell? |
| 3. | What is Heaven like? What is Hell like? |
| 4. | Where is Heaven and hell? |
| 5. | What does it take to go to Heaven? |
| 6. | Do we go to Heaven as soon as we die or is there a waiting period? |
| 7. | What about purgatory? |
| 8. | Is there any hope that my friend who committed suicide went to Heaven? |
| 9. | Why would I want to go to Heaven knowing that people I love won’t be there? |
| 10. | Do my pets go to Heaven when they die? |
| 11. | Do you turn into an angel when you die? |
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III |
Questions About Heaven and Hell. |
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1. |
What is the difference between soul and spirit? |
| The Bible describes us as 3-part creatures. “May your whole SPIRIT, SOUL AND BODY be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” — 1 Thessalonians 5:23 (NIV) The term “Body” obviously refers to our corporeal self, the physical substance that comprises our bodies. The Greek word for soul is “Psyche”, which means the same thing in English as it does in Greek. The American Heritage Dictionary defines Psyche as “the mind, both consciously and unconsciously the center of thought and emotion.” Our soul is that part of us that thinks and feels. It is eternal. The Greek word for spirit is “pneuma” the root of words like Pneumatic. It means literally, “a current of air”, like a wind, or a breath. Because God is our Creator, within the physical universe it should be impossible for us to make choices, which are truly independent from Him. In other words, when God created us, He had to give us a basic set of programming and it should be impossible for us to deviate from that programming. We can’t build a computer that is capable of making independent choices. All of its choices follow a pre-determined program designed by its creator. Its choices are based on the original set of instructions. Without that programming, the computer can’t do anything. The Bible says that when God created us, “He breathed into us the breath of life”. In other words, He placed a pneuma within us-a spirit like but not identical to His own. It is our spirit that allows us to connect with God, to relate to Him. It is our spirit that allows us to make truly independent moral choices. Choices not based on what I think or feel-my Soulish nature, but based on some external standard of righteousness, which I am inherently in touch with, namely the Spirit of God. Our spirits are eternal. My spirit is the part of me that chooses-the part that can connect with God. My soul is the part of me that thinks and feels-the part that can connect with you. My body is the part of me that inhabits the physical world-the part that connects with the universe. That’s the distinction. Concerning Heaven and hell, it is our spirits and our souls that live on in either Heaven of hell. Our physical self remains on the Earth. In the eternal state, God plans to reunite our spirits, souls and bodies and human destiny is to co-reign over this universe with Jesus Christ in our physical bodies. Job wrote, I know that my Redeemer lives, and that in the end He will stand upon the earth. {26} And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; {27} I myself will see Him with my own eyes—I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me! — Job 19:25-27 (NIV) |
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2. |
Is there a Heaven and a Hell? |
| The first thing that is important to understand is that the terms
Heaven and Hell are uniquely Judeo-Christian. That is, they originated
in the Jewish culture and received their full embodiment of meaning in
the later Christian culture. The ideas of ultimate rewards for the righteous and ultimate punishment for the wicked are as old as recorded history. But the terms Heaven and Hell embody much more. Although the terms themselves are used today by people of many different religious beliefs, and have consequently undergone redefinition to suit the users, the original concepts belong to Judaism and Christianity. Islam includes concepts of Heaven and Hell which are very similar to the Christian concepts yet included in Heaven are many delights of the flesh so as to make it more desirable. Since the Qu’ran was written some 629 years after Christ, it is my opinion that it borrowed the concepts of Heaven and Hell from Christianity with some modifications. The older religions of Buddhism and Hinduism do not describe a Heaven or a Hell per se. Hinduism is a polytheistic religion in which the gods are a part of the natural universe just the same as we are but with more power and abilities. The Buddhist concept of Heaven is the result of an indeterminate amount of advantageous reincarnations so as to achieve oneness with the universal consciousness. Again , this “Heaven” is a part of the natural universe. |
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| The Christian concept is far more sublime. Let’s begin by reviewing
the Biblical concept of God and consequently Heaven. There are
essentially 2 views concerning God. The first view is unique to
Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The second view is the view held by
almost every other religious system that has ever been held on the
planet. Let’s begin with the first view. According to this view, the
universe itself is self-existent and self-sustaining. The universe
encompasses all of nature that there is. Everything else exists within
the universe. |
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3. |
What is Heaven like? What is Hell like? |
| Heaven is the word we use to describe the place where we experience
God’s presence. Heaven is so wonderful that it cannot be described in human words because there are no words the do it justice. But the Bible gives us a hint in these words from Rev 21. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and HE WILL LIVE WITH THEM. They will be His people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. {4} He will WIPE EVERY TEAR from their eyes. There will be NO MORE DEATH OR MOURNING OR CRYING OR PAIN, for the old order of things has passed away.”{5} He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” — Revelation 21:3-5 (NIV) In Heaven, we will touch and see and talk with God like we do with each other. There will be no more disease, or pain, or sadness or anything bad. Contrast that to hell. The Bible says that hell is a place of eternal torment. It describes it using several graphic images. First, a bottomless pit. Imagine for yourself the nightmare of falling and falling and falling: in complete and utter darkness and silence. The Greek word embodies the idea complete emptiness, aloneness and loneliness. Another image is that it is a place of torment such as a lake of burning sulfur. There are no literal flames. But imagine the torment of being in the midst of a burning caldron: the searing of your flesh, the pain, the smells, the intensity. That is how awful hell is. But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars—THEIR PLACE WILL BE IN THE FIERY LAKE OF BURNING SULFUR. This is the second death.” — Revelation 21:8 (NIV) |
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4. |
Where is Heaven and hell? |
| In 1961, Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin became the first human being to
travel in space. If you were accorded that honor, what words would you
use to capture that moment? Yuri’s words were, “I have reached the
heavens and there is no Heaven to be seen.” The first problem with his arrogance was that even from his lofty position, there was a whole lot of the heavens that were still beyond his reach. But, more importantly, his was a gross misunderstanding of what the Bible means by the word Heaven. Per our discussion in question #2, Yuri Gagarin only ever reached the second heaven. The “heaven” he was looking for, the third heaven, the dwelling place of God, had eluded him. For that heaven is beyond the boundaries of the physical universe. Consequently, we cannot ask “where?” of anything in this region for time and space do not exist. They are properties of the physical universe only. As C.S. Lewis would say, we have just asked “how many minutes are in a quart of milk?” But, as long as we understand that we are using the term “where” metaphorically then we can proceed and answer the question at the heart of the question. Heaven is beyond the boundaries of the physical universe in that part of God that space, time, energy and matter are absent. According to the Bible, hell was not part of God’s original creation. God intended His creation to dwell with Him for all eternity. But certain creatures, initially the devil and certain angels, but eventually including humanity, rebelled against God’s will. These creatures chose to exist independently of God and His presence. So, to accommodate THEIR desire, God opened up a hole within His existence from which He withdrew His presence. He could not withdraw completely because there is nothing where God is completely absent. But God reserved a place in which no trace of His love and power would be felt. It is a place of complete and utter isolation and aloneness. It is called “hell.” It is described as a place of everlasting fire but not because there is anything resembling fire-fire itself is a consequence of God’s creation. The fire refers to the pain and agony one will experience there is similar to the pain and agony of burning. Jesus said God’s response to those who choose to live independently of Him will be, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the DEVIL and his ANGELS: — Matthew 25:41 (NIV) It was never God’s desire to create a place such as hell. Hell was demanded by those who desired somewhere where God was not King, where they could be their own masters, if you will. BUT hell by definition is a place where the presence AND the consequence of God are not experienced. Which means that our physical selves must be stripped away first and also, our spiritual self which is a gift from God. In fact, all of who we are must first be stripped away to be truly independent of God and so what is sent to hell is not a living soul but the remains of what was once a living soul. It is consciousness without substance; and without substance, without any means of interacting with any other inhabitant. In hell we can imagine ourselves to be king, because there is no one else to challenge us. Although there may be millions there, they will be forever beyond our reach. It will be absolute and utter aloneness. The primary torment being the knowledge that we chose such an eternity for ourselves. That is the full answer to where Heaven and hell are. |
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5. |
What does it take to go to Heaven? |
| The first thing God wants us to know is that God never SENDS anyone to
hell. He just doesn’t FORCE us to go to Heaven. God sets before us 2
doors. One door is marked , “God’s Way”. The other door is marked “My
Way”. We get to choose what door we want. God tells us that behind door #1, marked “God’s Way”, is the presence of God. We call that Heaven. He tells us that behind the door #2, marked “My Way”, is the absence of God. We call that hell. The Bible is very clear. There is a way that SEEMS RIGHT to a man, but IN THE END it LEADS TO DEATH. — Proverbs 14:12 (NIV) God does everything in His power to convince us to do things His Way EXCEPT overpower us and drag us through Door #1 against our will. That happens to be one of the things an All-Powerful God, CAN’T do. Because God wants our relationship with Him to be characterized by love. And Love DEMANDS that we CHOOSE to be with God. But what we really want is for God to rewrite the whole program. We want Him to cross the wires so that we can we can LOVE God “MY WAY.” In other words, we want a self-centered love relationship. At once, we see that is a contradiction of terms. That would make love out to be selfish and self seeking and whatever you called it, it wouldn’t be the thing we are talking about when we speak of love. Love is self-LESS and God modeled love for us when He came to Earth in the person of a man, the man Christ Jesus, and died in our place to pay the penalty for our sins. And He calls us to follow His example and die to ourselves in order that we might live in love with Him. The Bible tells us, For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that CHRIST DIED FOR OUR SINS according to the Scriptures, {4} that He was buried, that He was RAISED ON THE THIRD DAY. — 1 Corinthians 15:3-4 (NIV) If we believe that this is true and surrender the leadership of our lives to Jesus Christ, we can KNOW that we are going to Heaven. The Bible also tells us, And this is the testimony: God has GIVEN US ETERNAL LIFE, and THIS LIFE IS IN HIS SON. {12} He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.{13} I write these things to you WHO BELIEVE in the name of the Son of God so that you may KNOW that you have eternal life. — 1 John 5:11-13 (NIV) The good news is that you can KNOW that you are going to Heaven right now. Do you choose to believe that Jesus died on the cross for your sins and rose from the dead? If you can say “yes”, then Are you willing to give Him control of your life? If you answer “yes”, then you can KNOW, not hope, not guess, but KNOW that you are going to Heaven. Isn’t THAT the best news you’ve ever heard? For more information, click here. |
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6. |
Do we go to Heaven as soon as we die or is there a waiting period? |
| It should be obvious from the preceding discussion that only those who
choose to surrender themselves to God’s authority would go to Heaven.
Heaven is that place where stripped of all physicality, we commune
directly with God. In such a state the sovereignty of God will be
absolute. Anyone who cannot abide God’s authority over their lives
would naturally avoid such a place at all costs. Consequently the following discussion will pertain only to those who have surrendered the leadership of their lives to Jesus Christ. The Apostle Paul wrote, Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in HEAVEN, not built by human hands. …{6} Therefore we are always confident and know that as long as we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord.— 2 Corinthians 5:5,6 (NIV) The Bible does not explicitly state the chronology of what happens when we die, but this is what I understand from what I have read and what God has shown me. When God created us, The LORD God formed the man from the DUST OF THE GROUND and BREATHED into his nostrils the BREATH OF LIFE, and the man became a LIVING BEING. — Genesis 2:7 (NIV) The “dust of the Ground” means literally, “of the elements.” The Greek Old Testament uses the word pneuma for Breathe and Breath. It is the same word translated “spirit”. In the Greek Old Testament, “living Being” is literally, living soul-the Greek word being psyche. When God created us, He made us first of the elements of the physical universe-our bodies. He then animated those bodies by taking a part of His Spirit and endowing us with it. He “breathed” His Spirit into us. Humanity is made up of body-physical form-and Spirit-supernatural form. The place where those two forms meet we call our minds. In our brains, spirit and matter join to make something that is uniquely us, the Bible calls it the psyche or the soul. When we die, the elements that make up our bodies return to the Earth from whence they came. The spirit which originally came from God returns to that place beyond the physical universe that is the dwelling place of God that the ancients called the third Heaven and in that timeless place remains until Christ returns at the end of the age. At that time, our physical bodies will be resurrected complete and glorified and our spirit will rejoin our bodies reconstituting our souls. And, we will live forever in the body on the Earth. The final destiny of man is Earth, not Heaven. Here on Earth, when Christ sets up His Kingdom, we will co-reign with Him. Meaning, that we will serve Him in leadership responsibilities throughout His Kingdom on this planet. No angel wings, sitting on clouds playing harps. Real life lived where life was meant to be lived. Here on Earth. Because outside of the physical universe, there is no space or time, we will be keenly aware of being in the presence of God but not of the passage of time on Earth. For us, the moment of our death will seem to be the moment immediately prior to our resurrection. |
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7. |
What about purgatory? |
| Purgatory was invented during the middle ages as a place where a
sinner’s sins were atoned for. Surviving family members were
instructed to celebrate a mass and pray for their departed family
members as those actions were efficacious in providing the necessary
atonement. I have 2 problems with this. First, the Bible says, He [JESUS] IS THE ATONING SACRIFICE FOR OUR SINS, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world. — 1 John 2:2 (NIV) And secondly, the activities purported to make atonement came with a price tag and the Bible tells us that salvation is the free gift of God, based upon His mercy and grace and not a result of righteous acts that we do. Since the Bible never references anything that could be remotely interpreted as purgatory and since the death of Jesus Christ on the cross was completely sufficient to pay for all sin for all people for all time, I submit there is no such thing as purgatory. |
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8. |
Is there any hope that my friend who committed suicide went to Heaven? |
| Yes, with God there is always reason to hope. Jesus said to His
disciples, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are
possible. (Matthew 19:26)” The issue is a common one and fueled by a misconception concerning how God views sin and what He considers the entrance requirements for Heaven to be. Concerning the entrance requirements for Heaven, please see question #5 God’s view of sin has been warped by errors made by men throughout the ages whose influence extends even to today. The Church during the Middle Ages began to rank sins in terms of how much penance was required to absolve them. Part of this was in order to sell indulgences to raise money for the Church's building program which was clearly an abuse of the Church’s authority. It was out of this ranking that suicide earned its lofty position as an unforgivable sin. The abuses that led to this misinterpretation of God’s perspective on sin was overturned with the Reformation around 1520 AD. Unfortunately many of the specific errors of that era have continued to haunt the Church, including the errors concerning suicide. The Bible teaches that there is only one unforgivable sin and that is to reject the salvation that is found in Christ. Jesus said, "And so I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. (Matthew 12:31)" "Every sin" includes suicide. God does not place suicide in a special class of sin. It is murder, self murder, and it is definitely NOT okay with God that we murder anyone including our selves. God lists murder as one of the top 10 things He doesn’t want us to do in the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:13). However, the Apostle John says in 1 John 1:9 "if we confess our sin, He is faithful and just and will forgive our sin and cleanse us from ALL unrighteousness." To confess means “to agree” not to say your sorry. The suicide can never say he's sorry because he's dead, but he can still agree with God that what he is doing is wrong. That's all confession is. It's calling what is wrong, wrong, even as you commit the wrong. So there is nothing inherent in suicide that makes it unforgivable. That doesn’t make it GOOD or OKAY. It is a horrible crime, not just against the individual who does it and God, but against all of humanity for it withholds from the rest of us the Good that life was destined to accomplish. There is nothing inherent in suicide that prevents a person from entering Heaven, but likewise nothing that guarantees it either. The Bible says … “Who may ascend the hill of the LORD? Who may stand in his holy place? {4} He who has CLEAN HANDS and a PURE HEART, who DOES NOT LIFT UP HIS SOUL TO AN IDOL or SWEAR BY WHAT IS FALSE.” — Psalm 24:3-4 (NIV) In a nutshell, what are the requirements to enter Heaven?
Requirement number
1: Clean hands and a pure heart. How do we get clean hands and a pure
heart? The clean refers to the forgiveness of our sins. The only way
to get that is to place our trust in the death of Christ for our sins.
When we do that, God looks at us and sees Christ instead. By seeing
Christ in stead of us, God sees clean hands and a pure heart whatever
ours might look like otherwise. |
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9. |
Why would I want to go to Heaven knowing that people I love won’t be there? |
| This is a great question and strikes at the core of a big issue for
many people. The question reflects a perspective that I held during my
High School years. During the 70’s, what was called the “Jesus
Movement” was spreading over Orange County and the whole southwest.
Kids were turning away from the drug and free sex attitudes of the
60’s and were embracing Christianity in record numbers. Scores of new Churches popped up catering specifically to the young generation and grew into megachurches almost overnight. During that time, it was not uncommon for some longhaired guy to come up and ask, “Do you want to go to Heaven?” My standard response, like many of my friends, became, “Why would I want to lay around Heaven all day listening to harp music when I could be partying with all my friends in hell to Rock ‘n’ Roll?” The perspective, drawn primarily from Saturday morning cartoons I think, is that Heaven will be a boring experience in which we lie around remembering all the good times we had on Earth. Almost like the post-game show whereas hell will be the place where the real action is happening. The Bible describes the situation in exactly opposite terms. One of the Greek words used to describe hell is the word, “gehenna” which is translated “lake of fire”. It comes from the old Chaldee and referred to an actual valley where children were offered as sacrifices to the god Molech who received his sacrifices by fire. People actually burned their children alive in these fires. The old Chaldee was a very picturesque language and the word Gehenna brought to mind the sounds of the children screaming for their parents from the torment of the flames. The Bible adds the additional picture, “Hell, where the fire NEVER GOES OUT.” — Mark 9:43 (NIV) The Bible says that unlike the children’s torment, which was terminated by their death, the torment of hell will continue forever. The Bible uses the phrase “Gnashing of teeth” to describe the attitude of those in hell. In the movie, “Chariot’s of Fire”, Harold Abrams is grinding his teeth in the stands after losing a race to Eric Liddell. He is slamming his fists into his hands saying, “I looked back. You never look back. Grrrr.” It is that Grrr that the Bible refers to by the phrase gnashing of teeth. It is in hell, not Heaven, that we remember the choices and opportunities that we did not make the most of on Earth and that remembering will be torment. The final Greek word I want to look at is the word “abusso” which is translated “bottomless pit”. What is a hole? It is nothing. It is emptiness and a bottomless hole is nothingness, which stretches out to infinity. It is not Heaven, but hell that is the place of boredom because every consequence of God’s creation is stripped away. Our friends may be there with us but we will be totally unable to interact with them or with anything else. Our conscious spirit will be there but conscious of nothing else except itself and the absence of God. This is, very briefly, how the Bible describes hell. Heaven, on the other had, is described as a place of rewards. The first reward of Heaven is forgiveness. Rather than looking back on our Earthly existence with torment and gnashing our teeth, we will experience God’s total and unconditional forgiveness and Christ Himself will wipe away every tear from our eyes. The second reward will be rather than nothingness stretched out to infinity, we will experience the fullness of God and all His creative power stretched out to infinity. “In that day THE LORD ALMIGHTY WILL BE A GLORIOUS CROWN, a beautiful wreath FOR THE REMNANT OF HIS PEOPLE.” — Isaiah 28:5 (NIV) God Himself will be our reward. He will be our God and we will be His people. We will finally find our place in the universe. Finally, we will know the meaning and purpose that we have sought all our lives. There are many rewards of Heaven but let me just share one more. “Now there IS IN STORE FOR ME THE CROWN OF RIGHTEOUSNESS, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day--and NOT ONLY TO ME, BUT ALSO TO ALL WHO HAVE LONGED FOR HIS APPEARING.” — 2 Timothy 4:8 (NIV) Not just for Paul but for all of us there is in store a Crown of Righteousness. Notice that is says it is a crown OF righteousness, not a crown FOR righteousness. One of the rewards of Heaven is that we will finally experience the kind of righteousness that we have longed for all our lives. No more struggling with temptation. No more feeling powerless over our strong compulsions to do things we really don’t want to do. Finally, we will experience ultimate freedom to be good and right. Why go to Heaven when I know people I love from Earth won’t be there? For one thing, we never REALLY know. God calls to us right up to our last breath. And you won’t have contact with your loved ones anyplace but Heaven anyway. But the only answer to the question that really matters is that the most important loved one in your life will be there God. If you don’t love God, then you won’t want to be in Heaven because God is the central presence of Heaven. But if you do love God, then you won’t want to spend eternity anywhere else. The bottom line is whether you want God, not whether you want some Earthly satisfaction. My hope and prayer is that you do. If you have never surrendered your life to Christ, click here. |
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10. |
Do my pets go to Heaven when they die? |
| Hopefully our discussion of Heaven cleared this up a little bit. God
did not give animals a spirit like He did us. However, I believe that
in the same way that God imparts a part of His Spirit to us, we impart
a portion of our spirit to those animals we love. So in a sense,
similar but not the same as humanity, some animals possess a soul. I believe that in the resurrection, the souls of those animals will be present in some form probably not the same form in which we knew them on Earth, but some form which we will be able to recognize. So, the technical answer to the question is, no, the spirits of our pets will not go to Heaven in the same way that we go to Heaven when we die. BUT, the answer to the question behind the question is, yes, in the resurrection, the souls of our pets will be in some way present. The Scripture says, THE CREATION WAITS IN EAGER EXPECTATION FOR THE SONS OF GOD TO BE REVEALED. {20}For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one [Adam] who subjected it, in hope {21}that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God. — Romans 8:19-21 (NIV) This verse says that it was the sin of Adam that brought death and decay to all of creation. And as Mankind’s sin caused their death, I believe it is in mankind’s redemption that they find eternal life. So, the answer is, they don’t go to Heaven with us, but they will be present in some form on Earth when we return. |
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11. |
Do you turn into an angel when you die? |
| No. Angels are beings that God created in their own right. Like He
created humans and cows and crickets, He also created angels. They are different from us, because they are pure spirits and when we die, we will become like them a little bit in that we will also become pure spirits but only for a short period. At a definite point in time, Jesus is going to come back to the Earth. Those of us who are alive will have our bodies instantly transformed into new glorified bodies much like His body after His resurrection and those of us who have died will return with bodies like Jesus’. Bodies that can never die or be hurt. But angels are a different KIND of creature altogether. |
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Luke
15:10-32 In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents." Revelation 20:15
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 Life Spring Community Church - 5384-B Kazuko Ct - Moorpark - CA - 93021  Copyright © 2009 Life Spring Community Church |
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Heaven - Hell