WE DIE: THEN WHAT?

 

WE DIE: THEN WHAT?

 

We all die. The rich, the super-rich, hate death, hate to become like those in the grave, of which there is no escape. Apparently, many of these billionaires don’t believe the Apostles’ Creed, which ends with the words: “I believe in the resurrection of the body and Life Everlasting.”

My real topic is exploring the connection between body and soul. Since nobody has come back from death – except Jesus and Lazarus – and he is not telling – I rely on what the Bible says. I remember that, as a youth, I questioned Lazarus’ resurrection because, spoon-fed on the glories of heaven, I wondered why Lazarus was pulled away from that beautiful place, to face this ‘vale of tears’ again. 

 

Jesus consistently called death ‘sleep’, indicating a temporary condition from which people will be awakened, to face ‘judgement. Being clinically dead, does not mean death of consciousness. 

 

I have this book, given me by my brother Drewes, in the Netherlands, written by Dr. Pim van Lommel, entitled “Eindeloos Bewustzijn” = Endless Consciousness. In it, this medical doctor, a cardiologist, describes how he has witnessed scores of “Near Death Experiences”. I, too, had one: My father, about to die, said to me: “I hear music: is the radio on”.

Van Lommel, in his 400 pages book, writes that – and I translate – “In the end, it is difficult not to conclude that endless consciousness always has existed independent from our body, and always will continue to exist. There is no beginning and there never will be an end to our consciousness.”

 

The Apostles’ Creed says that Jesus, in clinical death ‘descended’ into hell’. That speaks volumes: his spirit was still alive, and, while dead, he experienced hell, so that we need not go through hell. Hell being ‘God’s absence.

We, humans, are more than a mere body: we are body and soul. The body dies, the soul lives on. 

Where does the soul go? It is not, as Greek Philosophy proclaims, that death frees us from a sinful body, from which the pure spirit can, finally, come into perfection. That’s what Socrates believed. He gladly drank the poison that killed his body, seeing it as a release from a sinful entity, his body. This view has been adopted by the Roman Catholic Church, and by many Protestants as well: they see heaven as the refuge for the soul, contrary to Scripture which categorically states that nobody has gone to heaven, except Jesus who came from there. (John 3: 13} 

 

So, what is soul?

 

The soul is not the spirit that, after death, goes to heaven or hell, but the soul is our deepest being, the nucleus of what we are, the real ‘me’, our very essence. The soul is our true self, shorn of all personal embellishments, devoid of any vanity, completely naked before God. In that intermediate state, between death and resurrection, we see ourselves either in our lostness – perhaps called hell – or our salvation, perhaps called heaven, that blessed state, when our souls will be united with our bodies upon Christ’ return in all his glory.

 

My dreams.

 

I have had, in my dreams, indirect contacts with my wife, who died more than 4 years ago. In my first dream I saw her, confused and somewhat at a loss. Her father, a minister in a large – 1,300 members – church in the Netherlands, died when she was 9 years old, the eighth child, with the twelfth yet to be born. It left a mark on her, I believe, especially in the first two decades of our marriage, which also saw one child, a boy, die within 24 hours of birth. 

We were married for 67 years, of which the first 20 years had their rocky moments. She really wanted to study. Her intellectual gifts, fortunately, were transferred to our five children. She did become a talented grapho-analyst – a handwriting professional, and public speaker.  

 

So, she lives on in my dreams. Just last week, I had a dream in which she, relaxed and happy, swam in a large waterbody while I was walking on the shore. She loved swimming.

 

I believe we will be re-united in eternity, not as a married couple, but as friends. Jesus is quite clear that in eternity there will be no marriage, and complete equality. Whether there will be sex in eternity is doubtful, citing Jesus’ words that “When the dead rise, they will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven,” (Mark 12: 25.).

 

In my book, Day without End, available on the web, I reason differently. There I pose the possibility that, rather than we become like the angels, angels want to become like us. 

Well…..