Eternal State

Well, good morning. Well, as you see by the overhead, we're back again on the doctrinal statement. We're down to the eternal state this week. And then next week, Mike Doyle is going to do the church. Then actually, a little later in the summer, Vern's going to take a little vacation. And Mike's going to do the dispensational interpretation. So mark your calendars down for all those coming events. So let's see here. This is a neat study. Actually, your handout is basically this paragraph.

And this paragraph really is pretty specific. You know, the eternal state, in fact, actually in the Revelation class, you're going to be, the last part of Revelation certainly is going to be a lot of that. But this is pretty specific. It's really, this statement is kind of, can be broken down into four areas. Basically two about the believer and two about the unbeliever. And so I'm going to cover it just pretty much like it is in the doctrinal statement. There's a lot of neat things in here, especially the passage in Luke.

All right. So I said, again, there's a statement about the unbeliever, a statement about the believer. And I'm going to cover it, unbeliever first, then the believer. So we'll get to finish with the good news. Because actually, you get into the unbeliever, there's some pretty solemn things that really make you think about where an unbeliever is at, and it's not a pretty picture. So let's get into that. Basically, I thought I'd start with a comparison, which is actually like a summary, maybe, of what we're going to cover. Kind of comparing the believer and the unbeliever in terms of the eternal state.

First of all, at death, or actually right now, in some sense, we're the dead in Christ. The dead in Christ will rise first. So the dead in Christ versus the dead. And the dead in scripture for the unbeliever is actually used in a variety of places. Christ kind of said an interesting thing. He said, let the dead bury the dead. So you can be dead and still alive, which is kind of an interesting concept.

We'll see that in Revelation a little bit. Every being is eternal. Every created human is an eternal being. They'll either spend their time eternally with God or eternally separated from God. The believers will be resurrected at the rapture, and the unbelievers at the great white throne at the end of the millennial kingdom.

For the believer, when they die, they're present with the Lord. And the phraseology, as we'll see in scripture, it's immediate. Absent from the body, present with the Lord. At death, the believers are sent to Hades. We're going to look at that a little bit. They'll go to Hades in anticipation of their final destination. The destiny of the believer is forever with the Lord. The destiny of the unbeliever is the lake of fire. So, pretty grim picture in terms of the unbeliever.

So, we're going to go through that. If you have your Bibles, I would suggest we're going to look at the passage in Luke. This passage in Luke, it's Luke chapter 16, verses 19 to 31. And so let me just read the statement about what we're going to look at here. And this is from the doctrinal statement. It says, the souls of the unbelievers remain after death in constant misery until the final judgment at the great white throne at the close of the millennial kingdom. So in Luke 16, 19 to 31, we're going to go kind of verse by verse. If you haven't, I'm sure you've probably read this in your Christian life before. Every time I go through this, I'm astounded actually. It's incredible.

No human writing could show us what this passage is going to show us. This is a view into what happens after death that no human could ever invent or think of. People have invented all kinds of crazy ideas about what happens after death, all kinds of crazy experiences, but the Lord is going to tell us exactly what it's like.

And it's actually in the form of a parable, but it's kind of a unique parable in the sense that we're going to see that there's a man called the rich man who isn't given a name, but the poor man, Lazarus, is given a name. And a lot of Bible scholars believe that kind of separates it. that that's a truthful account of Lazarus.

And we will see Lazarus in heaven, basically. So some interesting thoughts about this parable. So verse 19. Now there was a rich man, and he habitually dressed in purple and fine linen, joyously living in splendor every day. And a poor man named Lazarus was laid at his gate, covered with sores. and longing to be fed with the crumbs which were falling from the rich man's table. Besides, even the dogs were coming and licking his sores.

So this kind of sets up the beginning of this passage. And it basically kind of says, from this account, you think, well, the rich man might be a guy I'd like to meet. He might be an OK kind of guy. The poor man, I'm not sure. He's kind of a guy laying in the streets.

So we really can't tell many times, based upon observing a person, where he's at spiritually. We don't know, based upon that, whether the rich man knows God. It doesn't really say that one way or the other. Later on we'll see that apparently it never talks about any kind of faith upon either the rich man or Lazarus. It doesn't even discuss that issue. So I think it's telling us that we cannot tell by how a person looks or even their position in life what's going to happen afterwards. God knows that. So now we kind of make the step from this life into a life which we actually have no view other than Scripture.

Now the poor man Lazarus died and was carried away by the angels to Abraham's bosom. And the rich man died and was buried. So right away we see that Lazarus really had immediate, once upon death, there's an interesting phrase here, and was carried away by the angels.

I'll tell you a story about that. And I think Courtney may remember this. This goes back a long time. There's a brother that we knew. really a neat guy, and he did a funeral service. And in the funeral service, he used this phrase, and the person that died, a believer right now, was carried away by the angels. And I kind of remember that over the years.

And when I started studying this, I said, interesting. So keep in mind, is that true of us today? Is that going to happen to us today? Carried away by the angels? And see if we answer that question for yourself. And maybe Courtney will remember. We'll see. I'll talk to him later about that. Anyway, so it says, carried away to Abraham's bosom.

And the rich man, notice the rich man, there's no one. Apparently he's by himself. He's alone. He dies and he was buried. So let's go on. 23. In Hades, and I'll just stop there.

In Hades is this place that is called the place of the dead. In the Old Testament, it was called Sheol. Basically, it seems to be a place prior to the Lake of Fire. But it's interesting, at this time period, there's a particular aspect of Hades which is unique.

In Hades, lifting up his eyes, being in torments, and saw Abraham far away and Lazarus in his bosom. So, first of all, we see this man is in Hades and he's able to see and comprehend. He recognizes people. He recognizes Abraham. He also recognizes Lazarus.

Abraham's bosom is like, I gather, close fellowship. I didn't actually totally study that out, but that phraseology speaks of the closeness of Abraham to Lazarus. So based upon this, another aspect here is that the rich man being in torments. So we have torments And we have Abraham or Abraham's bosom. So many people have constructed a picture and this is my attempt at that picture. Torments is where the rich man is at and Abraham's bosom is where Lazarus is at.

And we're going to see later there's a great chasm. between these two compartments. The whole thing comprises Hades. But this picture is going to change, and I'll show you toward the end of this section. This picture will change. Abraham's bosom is not going to stay in Hades after the cross.

So at this point in time, the rich man is able to look across this great chasm, and he's in torments, and he sees Abraham far away. So then based upon that, he's going to He's going to make a request. He makes two requests, the rich man, of Father Abraham.

The first request is, it says, So his first request is for some kind of relief. He wants to be relieved from his agony. And it's interesting to note, he doesn't say, I don't belong here, I don't deserve to be here, get me out of here. He just says, I want relief. And it's interesting, he asks that Lazarus provide the relief. I thought that was very interesting. He asks that Lazarus provide the relief. He doesn't say, Father Abraham, you do it. He says, send Lazarus to do it. He's going to ask another request of Father Abraham. We'll see in a few minutes here. So Abraham answers.

He says, Child, remember during your life you received good things and likewise Lazarus bad things, but now he's being comforted here and you are in agony. You know, this might sound like a harsh statement. You know, you read that and say, boy, it's like a harsh statement. You had your good times on earth and now you're here and the roles are reversed. But I think, once again, it's just to say, you know, the goodness you had, that was all the goodness you could have since you've come to this place. Whereas Lazarus is under the blessings and the closeness of Abraham. So let's go on here. Okay, so now he describes the additional aspect is that, and besides this all, between us and you there is a great chasm fixed.

And he says this great chasm, I won't read the rest of it, this great chasm fixed there is no, and the word chasm is actually a gulf, some have translated bottomless pit, there is no way to transverse this great chasm. And there's actually no access. You can't come to me, and I can't come to you. There's no way to get across. So he says, I can't send Lazarus. Besides, you've had all the good on your earthly life. That was it. You're not going to have any more. It seems very harsh. OK, so let's go on. So now the rich man asks another request. And this is the one that really is pretty phenomenal. The rich man said, I beg you, Father Abraham, send him Lazarus to my father's house.

So what's interesting is he's concerned about his father's house. There's all kinds of talk about, well, Hades or hell is going to be a place of all kinds of things. He has concern that others, especially his family, do not come there. For I have five brothers in order that he may warn them so that they will not come to this place of torment.

So Abraham's going to answer him now about this. And his answer is very interesting. And actually, it's interesting for us today. In talking with people, and maybe not the sufficiency of God's word really comes into view here. But Abraham said, they have Moses and the prophets. Let them hear them. So his answer to his request is, They can listen to God's word that's gone forth.

And this really, if you think about it, this is really an Old Testament picture. This picture we're seeing here, it's in the Gospels, but it's an Old Testament picture. Because Abraham's in view. Christ is not in view. Abraham's in view. And he's speaking to someone who's a Jew, apparently. And so this is an Old Testament picture. They have Moses and the prophets.

But the rich man said, no father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent. So his rebuttal to that is, well, I know what you can do. You can send, you can send one back from the dead. So he's basically, um, you know, he, he said, send Lazarus. He's basically asking to send Lazarus back from the dead and that's going to really convince him. Well, Abraham answers that question.

But he said to him, If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, they will not be persuaded, even if someone rises from the dead. That, to me, is just so incredible. If you think today, one has been risen from the dead, the Lord Jesus Christ, but do men believe him? Is that sufficient?

Abraham says, God's word is sufficient. I don't have to do something special. Man always thinks there's something special that he can do that may convince a man of his need for salvation. God's Word is totally sufficient. That's why that's what we need to use when we talk to others.

It's God's Word. some scheme or, you know, Lazarus was asking for some supernatural, not Lazarus, the rich man was asking for some supernatural event, and Abraham said, no, they have God's word, and even if one were to rise from the dead, that would not be sufficient. So I think that's really interesting, and actually I have a quote from J. Verdon McGee, he said, kind of based upon this passage, he said, if a loss could come back they would preach the gospel to us. I think that kind of captures what's here. He had great concern for his family, great concern that they know, we'll talk about Christ in a bit, to know, to be warned about this place, not to come there.

So this is really the most complete view we have of the unbeliever's life after death, prior to the final judgment. OK, let's go on. OK, here's a picture. This is part of the picture that the Revelation class will be getting into. This is a segment, and it kind of shows the Abraham's bosom down toward the bottom there. It shows a timeline of the Old Testament and the Gospels, and it shows the church age, and then it shows the first heaven, which is the atmosphere, the second heaven, which is the stars, space and the stars, and the highest heaven, the third heaven.

At the cross, from what we can understand in scripture, Abraham's bosom, there appears to be a change. From pre-cross, Abraham's bosom becomes paradise. The Lord Jesus talked to the thief in the cross and he said, today you will be with me in paradise. He didn't talk about Abraham's bosom. And then Paul was caught up into the third heaven, which he identified as paradise. Abraham's bosom after the cross seems to be transferred to paradise.

So for the present state now, Hades is now only composed of that one compartment called torments. And Abraham's bosom has now become paradise. So the outlook of the believer is he will be absent from the body, present with the Lord. That's his homecoming he's looking for. Okay, so let's go on. Part two. So we continue on. They, the unbelievers, shall be cast into the lake of fire, separated eternally from the presence, power, and glory of God.

In Revelation 20, 11 through 15, we have a description of what's called the Great White Throne Judgment. And this judgment is a judgment, if you think about it, the timing of this judgment, if you look at Revelation and where it fits, this is at the end of the millennial kingdom, the thousand year reign of Christ on the earth. And so at this point in time, all the believers are with the Lord, basically. So this is, the only ones left are unbelievers. And we kind of see that phraseology as we go through this.

It says, Then I saw a great white throne, and him who sat upon it, from whose presence earth and heaven fled away, and no place was found for them. So actually, Vern will be getting into this in Revelation. But actually, what's interesting is that it talks about heaven and earth fled away. It seems like this judgment is not really in heaven or in earth.

Maybe somewhere in between. That's just kind of an aside. Okay, so let's go on. So the judgment starts this way. I saw the dead. Notice again the phrase, y'all, is the dead. I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne. And the books were opened. And another book was opened, which is the book of life.

And the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books according to their deeds. I think really significantly here, they're judged according to their deeds. And that's kind of a little flashing light, if you will, when we see that they're judged according to their deeds. Man's deeds, what does man bring to the table in terms of salvation? What can he bring? Does he bring his good works? Is that sufficient for salvation? He brings his faith. He trusts in what Christ has done for him on his behalf.

So the fact that these people are being judged in their deeds is kind of an indication that they have not trusted Christ. And so God's going to lay out in the books what their deeds are, and their deeds are going to be found wanting. We see no mention of their faith in here. We see no mention of grace. There's nothing that's acceptable to God in this, because their deeds cannot be acceptable.

In verse 13, And the sea gave up the dead which were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead which were in them, and they were judged, every one of them, according to their deeds. So what's interesting here is that death and Hades, we talked about Hades being this compartment with torments, it's going to cease to exist at that point and be thrown into the lake of fire, as well as death. Really, the concept of death, if you think about it, at that time period, all believers are with the Lord, the concept of death will cease to exist. It kind of blows your mind a little bit. Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. So I think that last statement is just kind of showing God's mercy there. He's going to, as it were, check one more time as if he needed to check. I'm just going to make sure that there's none that I may have missed.

I mean, an almost rhetorical kind of thing. Because at this point, there are no believers present. Okay, so that's kind of the... Actually, I'm ahead of the artist's conception. Probably nothing like that. But anyway, probably a lot worse. Okay, so that's the bad news. So, the good news... Actually, I'm sorry, one more verse. I apologize. I have myself here.

Okay, and this is kind of an interesting one here. This talks about God being just. It says, for after all, It is only just for God to repay with affliction those who afflicted you and to give relief to you who are afflicted. And to us as well, then, the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire. Actually, it's verse 8 that I want to kind of focus here.

And dealing out retribution on those who do not know God and those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. So basically, that word obey is the idea to hear under, to listen under, And so those who didn't listen to the gospel will have God's wrath upon them. They will pay the penalty of eternal destruction away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power. The penalty of eternal destruction, not annihilation, they're eternal beings, away from the presence of the Lord, away from his face. We will be face to face with the Lord. The unbelievers are away from his face. Kind of a neat contrast there.

And I was kind of thinking, you know, maybe it's appropriate to hear you say they didn't listen under, they didn't obey the gospel. You know, what is the gospel? We say it here many times, you know, 1 Corinthians 15, Christ died for our sins, or better, on behalf of our sins.

He was buried to prove that he was dead. And he was raised, or has been raised. He's a risen Savior. So that's what we're to believe, to know the Lord Jesus. Okay, so now we get to the believers. Yay! Okay, so this is the good news. We believe that the soul and human spirit of those who have believed in the Lord Jesus for salvation due at physical death immediately pass into his presence to be forever with the Lord.

So in 2 Corinthians 5, this series of charts is going to talk about, I want to kind of cover two parts here, before the rapture and then at the rapture. And then the third part will be, my mind is going here, what's the third part Roger? The third part is our resurrected body. So that's kind of the three parts we're going to cover. So what happens to the believer if we die today, before the rapture? If we die today, what's going to happen to us? And then what happens at the rapture, which is a really unique situation? And then what will our glorified bodies look like?

Okay, 2 Corinthians chapter 5. Therefore, being always of good courage, and knowing that while we are at home in the body, we're absent from the Lord, We are of good courage, and I say, and prefer rather to be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord." Actually, King James has it, and to be present with the Lord. So let's just stop there for a second.

We're going to see here that it's going to talk about two kinds of homes. We're going to go through this thing. We have a bodily home. and we have a home with the Lord Jesus in heaven. So it's going to contrast those two kinds of homes. And then the last part of it is that therefore we also have as our ambition, whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to him. I drew a couple of pictures here, small little pictures. So the contrast here, we are at home in our body, we have this body, versus to be away from home.

So it basically says you can't be in two places at one time, which isn't fairly obvious. You can be at home in your body, if that's the case, and you're absent from the Lord. So Paul's kind of struggling with himself. He says, you know, I have a ministry here, but if I'm at home here, I can't be with the Lord. And then he goes on to say the reverse is also true.

He says, to be away from our bodily home is to be at home with the Lord. So basically, that's that last statement. Our true home is with the Lord Jesus Christ. That's our true home. And so he said, I would prefer rather, and that prefer is the idea that it's pleasing, well-pleasing. He would prefer rather to be absent from this earthly body and present with the Lord Jesus, his true home. And I also was thinking, his true home, because we already have that in our position, right?

We're seated with Christ in the heavenlies. So we're now making, we're physically going to our new home, in essence. And then the last verse here in this passage is, therefore, we also have as our ambition, whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to him. Okay, let's see here. Alright, let's go on.

Philippians, continuing on before the rapture, Philippians 21-23, For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. But if I am to live on the flesh, this will mean fruitful labor for me. For I do not know which to choose, but I am hard pressed from both directions. having the desire to depart and be with Christ, for that is much better. So this same kind of struggle kind of goes on in this verse. I want to kind of focus on 23. And what's interesting is that I'm hard-pressed from both directions.

And actually, I'll kind of show you a little picture on this one, an illustration. What he's saying is that he's being tugged. Ever been in a tug-of-war? Of course, they'll pull you one way like this, and then you'll pull back the other way. Well, he's saying that the forces on him are equal. And actually, he's being pulled equally hard by this way as that way.

And actually, Weiss has it just, I just like his phraseology so many times. So Weiss renders this first part of 23 as, rather I am being perpendicular, I'm being held perpendicular. Perpendicular is, I'm perpendicular, right? Maybe you might argue for that. I'm standing perpendicular. I am being held perpendicular. by an equal pull from two, so I'm not able to incline toward either one. He's saying the pull is equal. To be with the Lord or stay here, I have an equal pull.

Okay, that's a lot of talk for tomorrow. Okay. Having a desire to depart. And Wiest has this having a passionate desire towards striking my tent. Pulling up the stakes and I'm out of here. So his desire is to be with the Lord, but he has this this equal pull to be at home or to go and be with the Lord. Okay, and then the last part, which is really kind of cool, and to be with Christ, to be is this word eimi, which is a state of being verb, and with the with is soon, so it could be translated to be continuously together with Christ. So his preference is to be continuously together with Christ. Okay, now at the rapture, This is a tremendous...

You know, I had a thought here. Have you ever heard people talk about... I think it was Vani's mom talked about it. People are concerned. Well, I want to be here for the rapture. I don't want to miss the rapture. So I have a question for you. Will any church-age Christian miss the rapture? Any answers? Amen. OK. Great. Great. Good. You guys are good Bible scholars. Excellent. Excellent. We'll see that. All right. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will not precede those who have fallen asleep.

So basically, group one. Group one, we who are alive, the ones living, if we're alive at the rapture, where he calls us the one who are alive and remaining, the living ones. Group two, those who have fallen asleep, the dead in Christ. So those two groups are involved in the rapture.

So as someone answered there, that takes in all the church-age believers since the church started, right? The day of Pentecost. All those believers up until now, the dead in Christ, including our brother Hal, we'll meet them. We'll see them in the air. And think about what we saw back in the Luke there. We recognize people in heaven. I mean, if you take that passage in Luke there, actually unbelievers recognize believers in that passage. Why not believers recognize them? So we'll see everyone that's gone before us. And actually it's a coming, it's a parousia, and it's the idea that when Christ comes down in the clouds, there's an arrival aspects and there's a presence with. That word parousia kind of takes in both those words, arrival and presence with.

So the Lord will descend in the clouds. So let's go on here. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel. I was reading this coming aside here. It's interesting. The Lord's going to come himself. There's going to be a shout of the archangel, but he's going to come personally. He's not sending, well, I'll send some of my angels, I guess. There's an angel's voice there, maybe. Some even argue that's not even an angel's voice. It's the Lord's voice. I don't know. That's an aside.

Anyway, but he comes personally. He comes personally for us, much like with Abraham. Abraham's bosom, there's a personal interface with us. And it says, the dead in Christ will rise first. I'm going to go through a little timeline here in just a second. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we shall always be with the Lord. So there's this catching away, caught away. That's where the word rapture comes from. We're caught away, snatched away. So here's a timeline. Some picture it as a long parade of believers. At the head of the parade, some picture the first believer in the church. Stephen, maybe? I've heard, you know, J. Ver McGee thinks that.

We who are alive, if we're alive at the rapture, so we have this long series of all, and we're caught up together, snatched away, We meet the Lord in the air, and we shall always be with the Lord. And that's always be together with the Lord. Always be together with the Lord. Never to be separated. So what a contrast. If you notice, the believer, because Christ is our Savior and our Lord, we meet him. We see him. Whereas the unbeliever basically seems to be alone. A stark contrast.

Okay, so the last part of this is, what will our new bodies look like? So what do you think? We're going to have, I'm going to, Vernon, he had one of those big muscle guys, right? And he had Roger's head in the muscle guy or whatever. I don't know, maybe a little silly. So, what are our glorified spiritual bodies going to look like?

Okay, let's just go on here. There are actually quite a few passages on this. So I'm just going to go through part of this one and I'm just going to give a summary here. There are also heavenly bodies and earthly bodies. So he's going to talk about here, he's going to talk about if you think that there are heavenly bodies and there are earthly bodies. And he's going to compare that with our our body here on earth with our resurrected body. So he says in 42, so also is the resurrection of the dead.

It is sown a perishable body, it is raised an imperishable body. It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power. It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there's a natural body, there's also a spiritual body.

And then in 2 Corinthians 5.1 it says, For we know that if this earthly tent, which is our house, is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. So God is able to make us a new body, just like he made Did he work hard with his hands? It's made without hands. God doesn't need hands to make something. He's able to do it without hands.

The following passage says, long to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven. So actually, I have three additional verses, but let me just kind of summarize some of the aspects of our heavenly resurrected body. It's called a heavenly body. It's called an imperishable body. It's called a spiritual body. It's called a building from God, a dwelling from heaven.

And these are some of the characteristics as kind of denoted in here. It says, we will be like him. conformity with the body of his glory, we will bear the image of the heavenly." So we have a wonderful future to look forward to, to being with our Savior, whether we die now, absent with the body, present with the Lord, whether we stay until the rapture happens and we're caught up together to meet the Lord in the air. And we have a wonderful body, which is like his body, which is pretty mind-boggling.

So let's pray. We thank you, Father. We thank you, Lord, for the blessings we have in our Savior. We thank you that we have his very life and that we'll have a body suited out for heaven to fellowship with you. We're thankful that we'll recognize and see those who have gone before us. We thank you for the wonderful reality of our Savior, the reality of your Word, and how it puts things in perspective, that we might know the Savior. And we ask it in His name. Amen.