The State of the Dead

Questions in this section...

Where does a Christian go at death?

What happens to a person at death?

What happens after death?

Question: Where does a Christian go at death?

“When a Christian dies where does he go?”

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Answer:

This is an excellent question. The Bible says, “But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope.” (1 Thessalonians 4:13) The Bible says that after we die, we are asleep.

Where do we sleep after we die? “And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.” (Daniel 12:2) “All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again.” (Ecclesiastes 3:20) “In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.” (Genesis 3:19) When we die we turn into dust again, and sleep until the Lord awakens us.

“Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit [Hebrew: Ruwach] shall return unto God who gave it.” (Ecclesiastes 12:7) When a man dies, there will be a time when he lives again, whether he is raised in the resurrection of the just, or of the unjust. His mind, which contains his life history, will be given to him again at his resurrection. He will come forth from the grave with the same character and manner of thinking that he had before death.

When the dead are raised God will give them back their spirit (mind, or breath), which was in them before. During their sleep in the grave they were not alive anywhere. “For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.” (James 2:26)

When God formed man out of the dust of the earth, He breathed into his nostrils the breath (spirit of man) of life. “All the while my breath is in me, and the spirit [Ruwach] of [or from] God is in my nostrils.” (Job 27:3) The breath of life is that spirit that goes back to God who gave it. Even the wicked—when they die their spirit goes back to God who gave it. “Who knoweth the spirit [Ruwach] of man that goeth upward, and the spirit [Ruwach] of the beast that goeth downward to the earth?” (Ecclesiastes 3:21)

The spirit of man goes upward to God who gave it. Whether the man was the vilest of criminals, or whether he was the most righteous saint, his spirit goes back to God who gave it. Man will live again, hence it is necessary for God to keep the record of what that man was like. A beast, on the other hand, will not live again, so his spirit goes down to the earth, never to be revived.

Are dead people conscious right now? The Bible says “the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing.” (Ecclesiastes 9:5)

“But,” some may say, “don’t the righteous go straight to heaven when they die?” “Men and brethren, let me freely speak unto you of the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried, and his sepulchre is with us unto this day. … For David is not ascended into the heavens: but he saith himself, The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand.” (Acts 2:34) David will be in heaven, but he has not yet ascended to heaven. Peter’s argument was “We know that David is not in heaven, because his sepulchre is still with us.” Peter knew that David’s bones were still in the grave.

Christ is risen from the dead. Are His bones still in the tomb where He was buried? No! Anyone who still has bones on this earth could not possibly be in heaven. This is the argument that was made on the day of Pentecost in Acts chapter two. When Christ was raised from the dead, the Bible tells us, many were raised at that time. Are their bones still in the grave? Certainly not!

“And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, And came out of the graves after His resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.” (Matthew 27:52, 53) All those who are in heaven now do not have bones that remain on this earth.

“So Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the Lord. And He buried him in a valley in the land of Moab, over against Bethpeor: but no man knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day.” (Deuteronomy 34:5, 6) Moses died, and was buried, but no man could find his sepulchre because the Lord raised him from the dead.

“Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke thee.” (Jude 9) The fact that Moses was raised from the dead is evident by his appearing with Elijah at the mount of transfiguration. Elijah was taken to heaven on a fiery chariot without seeing death. “And, behold, there talked with Him [Jesus] two men, which were Moses and Elias.” (Luke 9:30)

David, who has not yet ascended to heaven, said, “As for me, I will behold thy face in righteousness: I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness.” (Psalm 17:15) David will be satisfied when he awakes from death, not during the time that he is dead.

“Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead.” (Isaiah 26:19) The first thing we notice about this verse is that the dead men shall, at some time in the future, live again. These people are not living now, but they shall live at some time in the future. Right now they are those who dwell in the dust. We have already seen that when we die we return to dust, there to remain in unconscious sleep until the Lord raises us from the dead.

This question and its answer were printed in the April 2000 issue of Present Truth.

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Question: What happens to a person at death?

“What happens a minute after a person dies? According to your literature, if his spirit goes back to God, does God have a warehouse where those spirits are kept? Or does God breathe in the spirit as he breathed to Adam and he became a living soul?”

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Answer:

The Bible says, “Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help. His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish.” (Psalms 146:3, 4) When a person dies, their thoughts perish. Solomon wrote, “For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing.” (Ecclesiastes 9:5)

From these verses it is clear that at the point of death man goes to an unconscious state. The Bible says, “Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it.” (Ecclesiastes 12:7) We also read, “Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth?” (Ecclesiastes 3:21) Here we are given a distinction between where the spirit of man and the spirit of a beast goes at death. The spirit of the beast goes down to the earth because a beast will never experience a resurrection, and therefore there is no need for their spirit to be retained. However, regarding man, the Bible says, “there shall be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and unjust.” (Acts 24:15) In order for man to be resurrected and still retain their peculiar character traits, God preserves their spirit in an unconscious state until the resurrection, when they shall live again. Isaiah wrote, “Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead body shall they arise.” (Isaiah 26:19)

God has informed us that our spirit returns to Him at death, that we will be resurrected, and that in the interim we will be unconscious. I have heard people use the analogy of a cassette tape and a tape recorder as a means to illustrate this point. While a cassette tape is in a tape recorder you can record information on it and play back what is written. A faithful copy of what has been recorded is retained on that cassette. Yet, when the cassette is removed from the recorder it is unusable. Information cannot be played nor recorded. You can take the cassette and put it in another tape recorder and again utilize the information stored on the cassette. This is a crude illustration, but I believe it helps to understand how God can retain a man’s spirit in an unconscious state until the resurrection where he will be given a new body, but retain the same spirit.

Exactly how God retains man’s spirit in an unconscious state is not given for us to know. There is no mention in the Bible of a warehouse, nor a need for such a warehouse. I am content to leave this portion of the question with God. “The secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.” (Deuteronomy 29:29)

I hope this helps to answer your question.

This question and its answer were printed in the April 2002 issue of Present Truth.

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Question: What happens after death?

“I was told by a friend that when an unbeliever dies, after he is judged by God, his soul will go to hell and his spirit will stay with God. It is my understanding that the spirit will also go to hell.”

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Answer:

This demonstrates the importance of not trusting in friends to tell you the truth. The Bible says, “Trust ye not in a friend, put ye not confidence in a guide: keep the doors of thy mouth from her that lieth in thy bosom.” (Micah 7:5). This counsel also applies to me or any other minister. You should not trust us to tell you the truth, but should check everything out in the Bible yourself to see what is truth. Speaking of the Bereans, Paul wrote, “These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.” (Acts 17:11). We should receive things with an open mind, but always compare them with the Bible to see if they are true.

The Bible says, “Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it.” (Ecclesiastes 12:7). This is spoken for all people, whether they are righteous or wicked. When anyone dies, their body returns to the earth, and their spirit goes back to God. The Bible says, “Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help. His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish.” (Psalms 146:3, 4). Even though the spirits of all men return to God when they die, they do not return in a conscious state. “For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten.” (Ecclesiastes 9:5).

The words soul and spirit are used interchangeably at times. For example, Jesus said, “Fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.” (Matthew 10:28). Here Jesus used the word “soul” to refer to the spirit of a man that goes back to God at death. He says that when a man kills your body, he has not killed your soul, but there will come a time when God will destroy both the soul and the body of the wicked. Jesus is talking about two deaths. The Bible says, “Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years.” (Revelation 20:6).

Everyone will die the first death, with the exception of a few saints, such as Enoch, Elijah, and the 144,000. This death is called “sleep.” (Acts 7:60; Daniel 12:2). The righteous will be resurrected, never to die again. God preserves the record of their lives, their “souls,” or “spirits” to be joined with a body in the resurrection. The soul or spirit does not die, or cease to exist, at the first death, but after the thousand years, the wicked will be destroyed, both soul and body. There is no chance of a resurrection from this death.

In respect to a soul going to one place and a spirit going to another after death, this could not be, for they are both the same thing, when spoken of after death.

I hope this helps to answer your question.

This question and its answer were printed in the September 2007 issue of Present Truth.

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