What happens to the soul at death?


What, then, happens to the soul at death? The question is similar to the question of my little girl, "Where is the wardrobe?" Planks plus nails neatly put together by a wise carpenter who gave it to us. When the two constituents are separated, what happens? The wardrobe is not in the planks, not in the nails, and certainly not with the carpenter. But the carpenter has the power to remake it.

The analogy holds good for the soul as well. We have seen that the body plus the life-giving power of God makes the living soul. At the time of death the power of God is withdrawn, and "then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it" (Ecclesiastes 12:7).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 spirit that returns to God is not the soul. The spirit is the life-giving power of God, under whose gracious providence "we live, and move, and have our being" (Acts 17:28). When this spirit is withdrawn, death strikes and man who is described in Genesis 2:7 as the "living soul" no longer exists. The soul simply ceases to be. It is not in the dust. It does not go to God. But one thing is certain: God has the power to remake or, to use the Biblical phrase, "resurrect" the body and bring the dead to life again.

This certainty of resurrection is God's answer to the problem of death. With this hope of resurrection Job faced the mystery of life and death. "If a man shall die, shall he live again? all the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my change come," "for I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God" (Job 14:14; 19:25, 26).

The Apostle Paul assures us: "For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words" (1 Thessalonians 4:16-18).

Mark those words, "comfort one another." The Christian must face death not by deluding himself with the fictitious doctrine of soul survival but by resting in the divine assurance of resurrection.

To the men of the Bible, victory over death is found not in the doctrine of the immortality of the soul but in the resurrection of the dead. The message of resurrection is thus basic to the Christian proclamation. There is no riddle or magic in this message. "Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you," Paul asked King Agrippa, "that God should raise the dead?" (Acts 26:8).


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