“FIFTEEN MINUTES AFTER DEATH”

2 Corinthians 5: 1 – 10 (NRSV)

June 28, 2009/Second in a series You’re Questions Please

Focus: God holds us in life and in death.

PRAYER FOR ILLUMINATION

            Almighty God, you have spoken to us through your Son, the Word made flesh. Let your written Word now be spoken and heard by each of us—regardless of our age, level of education, or degree of our faith. Give us ears to hear and hearts to understand, that we may not refuse your calling or ignore your voice. May we all be taught by you through your powerful Word. Bring our every thought captive to obeying Christ, to the glory of your holy name, we pray. Amen.

WHERE AM I?

            Our nation experienced two very public deaths this week as Michael Jackson, the recording artist, and Farrah Fawcett, the actress, both died this past Thursday. Notable deaths quickly generate recaps of lives and careers. An unexpected death like Michael Jackson’s brings this uncomfortable truth home: death can come when you aren’t looking for it. Wherever Michael Jackson was last Sunday, I doubt if he thought that he wouldn’t be alive a week later.

            What happened to Michael Jackson 15 minutes after he was declared dead? Where is he now? Is he in heaven or hell? Or, has Michael Jackson simply ceased to exist and he will never exist in any form again?

            My two friends who submitted their questions for today weren’t thinking of Michael Jackson when they asked, Who gets to go to Heaven?  How does one get to Heaven?  After death, how long is it until one gets to Heaven? Who gets to go to Hell?  How does one get to Hell?  After death, how long is it until one gets to Hell? The husband and wife who asked, added some other comments to their questions: “There seems to be conflicting information in the Bible and certainly in present day popular thinking.  As we age, it's somewhat natural to think more about dying.  We both need to strengthen our faith, not our fears.  [One Christian author wrote] ‘Jesus is preparing for you a place.  A perfect place of perfected people overseen by our perfect Lord.  And at the right time he will come and take you home.’ But is it that simple?  After dying, where are we until "the right time"?

            The vast majority of Americans believe in both heaven and hell. According to a Gallup poll taken five years ago: “According to Gallup's most recent May 2004 Values and Beliefs poll*, 81% of Americans currently say they believe in heaven, 10% are unsure, and 8% do not believe. As expected, regular churchgoers are more likely than others to say they believe: Virtually all (98%) of those who attend church weekly do so versus 89% who attend "nearly weekly" and 64% of those who say they attend church seldom or never.”  

            When it comes to hell, “The 2004 data reveal that 70% of Americans overall believe in hell, while 12% are not sure and 17% do not believe in hell.

Again, the percentage is much higher among regular churchgoers: 92% of those who attend weekly believe in hell, as do 74% of those who attend nearly weekly and just half (50%) of those who attend church seldom or never.”[1]

FAITH WALK

            The Apostle Paul had a love-hate relationship with the Corinthian Church. Paul helped start the church and he loved that the church was so filled with the Holy Spirit. More than any other congregation Paul knew, whenever he put one foot in the door of the Corinthian church, he would feel the Spirit’s power. He loved the church; but he hated it sometimes too. The Corinthians were a proud group of people who could be petty and cruel to each other. They acted like a bunch of spoiled Junior High students sometimes.

            Likewise, the church loved Paul and hated him too. They were grateful for all he had done for them. Every person in that church could point to Paul as their spiritual father. The Apostle had told them about Jesus Christ and introduced Him to them. Paul had shown how to walk with Jesus day by day. But Paul was like a grumpy old man sometimes—impossible to please and quick to find fault.

            Paul had been away from Corinth for some time as he traveled around the Roman Empire. He had told the Corinthian Christians that he was coming for a visit, but his plans changed. Meanwhile, there were new people in the Corinthian Church who couldn’t stand Paul. They said that Paul wasn’t reliable. They said that Paul was only in it for the money.

            So Paul sat down with a pen and paper and opened his heart and poured it out in a letter, what we call 2 Corinthians. Reading it is like reading a diary. The ministry wasn’t a picnic for Paul. In truth, working for the Lord and serving His people made Paul feel like a football. Think about how a football gets treated: If it stays in the arms of a player as he runs through a field of players who are forever trying to slap the football away. If he makes to the end zone what does the player do with the football? He spikes it to the ground! That’s how Paul felt. The conflict and criticism Paul regularly received from the First Church of Corinth reminded him of death.

LIFE IN A TENT

            Paul’s struggles and failures all led him to the place where he recognized that his life was significant but short. Life, for Paul, was like a tent. A tent is made for temporary living. You put up a tent one night and take it down the next morning. As he was getting knocked around by life and ministry, Paul started looking more at the what awaited him at the end. I like how The Message paraphrases, verses 1 –  5 of chapter 5: “We know that when these bodies of our are taken down like tents and folded away, they will be replaced by resurrection bodies in heaven—God-made, not handmade—and we’ll never have to relocate our ‘tents’ again. Sometimes we can hardly wait to move—and so we cry out in frustration. Compared to what’s coming, living conditions around here seem like a stopover in an unfurnished shack, and we’re tired of it. We’ve been given a glimpse of the real thing, our true home, our resurrection bodies!

The Spirit of God whets our appetite by giving us a taste of what’s ahead. He puts a little heaven in our hearts so that we’ll never settle for anything less.”

            The real hope we have is for God to resurrect our bodies. That’s why Paul is a good Hebrew and not a good Greek. A good Hebrew believed that life without a body is impossible, while a good Greek believed that our bodies are little more than prisons to be released from. It would be difficult for Paul to imagine living without a body, which make his words in verse 6 - 8 so interesting. “We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord—for we walk by faith, not by sight. Yes, we do have confidence, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord.”

AWAKE AFTER SURGERY

            There are two ways of looking at what happens to Christians when they die. The first is that we leave our bodies and enter into some intermediate state, without a body, in heaven. The other view is that we die, and we cease to exist; but we wait in faith until the day Jesus calls us home. I tell people that the first face you’ll see after you die is the face of Jesus. Death may well be like going under for surgery. One second you are awake, the next second you are awake. There may have been four or six hours between those two moments of awareness. But remember: one thing is required for you to receive eternal life. You have to die.

            We trust Jesus, who promises that we will live. And we do look for the day when we will be resurrected and inherit bodies that will not fail us or fade with age.

            What is true of the reality of heaven is true also of the reality of hell. There is hardly a more politically incorrect subject today than hell. You have more questions about it than I can answer.

            Years ago, I came across a religious pamphlet that had this intriguing question on the front of it. What do you have you to do to go to hell? I opened the tract and it was blank. Nothing, you don’t have to do anything to go there.

            C.S. Lewis once said that if heaven is the place where a persons says to God, “Thy will be done”, it could be said that hell is the place where God says to a human being, “Your will be done.”

 One writer says, “What roads lead there? They are interior, of course. In fact, heaven and hell may be the very same objective place—namely God's love, experienced oppositely by opposite souls, just as the same opera or rock concert can be heavenly for you and hellish for the reluctant guest at your side. The fires of hell maybe made of the very love of God, experienced as torture by those who hate him: the very light of God's truth, hated and fled from in vain by those who love darkness. Imagine a man in hell—no, a ghost—endlessly chasing his own shadow, as the light of God shines endlessly behind him. If he would only turn and face the light, he would be saved. But he refuses to—forever.”

Whatever I think or say about heaven or hell is un-provable.If you drop dead tomorrow you aren’t coming back to me to tell me that I was right or wrong. Everyone, believer, atheist, or agnostic walks by faith and not by sight on this subject. You know who said more about heaven and hell than anyone else in the Bible? Jesus.  That’s why I trust Jesus when it comes to the subject of death. I trust Him when He tells me not to worry about tomorrow, because each day God will provide for me what I need. I trust Him when He tells me to forgive as I have been forgiven. I trust Him when He tells me that the kingdom of heaven is for those who become like children. I trust Him when He tells me that I must so something for the hungry, the sick, the imprisoned and the desperately poor. If He can be trusted to teach me about those things, He can be trusted for what happens after death.

            Rick Warren, author of The Purpose Driven Life lives life in the future. He writes, People ask me, What is the purpose of life? And I respond: In a nutshell, life is preparation for eternity. We were made to last forever, and God wants us to be with Him in Heaven. One day my heart is going to stop, and that will be the end of my body– but not the end of me. I may live 60 to 100 years on earth, but I am going to spend trillions of years in eternity. This is the warm-up act – the dress rehearsal. God wants us to practice on earth what we will do forever in eternity. We were made by God and for God, and until you figure that out, life isn’t going to make sense.[2]

            Amen.

“Your Questions Please” Study Guide: June 28, 2009

Question: Who gets to go to Heaven or Hell? After death, how long is it until one gets to Heaven or Hell?

Key Biblical Passages:

1. Eternal Life Promised

 Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die like everyone else, will live again. They are given eternal life for believing in me and will never perish.” (John 11:25, 26)

“And even we Christians although we have the Holy Spirit within us as a foretaste of future glory, also groan to be released from pain and suffering. We, too, wait anxiously for that day when God will give us our full rights as his children, including the new bodies he has promised us.” (Romans 8:23)

2. Eternal Separation Described

Jesus said, “Dear friends, don’t be afraid of those who want to kill you. They can only kill the body; they cannot do any more to you. But I’ll tell you whom to fear. Fear God, who has the power to kill people and then throw them into hell.” (Luke 12:4, 5)  

Jesus said, “But many Israelites—those for whom the Kingdom was prepared—will be cast into outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

Further Insights (from The Westminster Confession of Faith, 1649)

“The bodies of men [and women], after death, return to dust and see corruption; but their souls (which neither die nor sleep), having an immortal subsistence, immediately return to God who gave them. The souls of the righteous, being then made perfect in holiness, are received into the highest heavens, where they behold the face of God in light and glory, waiting for the full redemption of their bodies; and the souls of the wicked are cast into hell, where they remain in torments and utter darkness, reserved to the judgment of the great day. Besides these two places for souls separated from their bodies, the Scripture acknowledges none.

At the last day, such as are found alive shall not die, but be changed; and all the dead shall be raised up with the self-same bodies, and none other, although with different qualities, which shall be united again to their souls forever.

The bodies of the unjust shall, by the power of Christ, be raised to dishonor; the bodies of the just, by his Spirit, unto honor, and be made conformable to his own glorious body.”