Recently, there has been some stir in Evangelical Christian circles because of certain preachers talking about immortality, and stating that we can and should live immortal on this earth. The way they propagate to achieve this immortality is by daily partaking in Holy Communion. Some of those who preached this are already physically dead, but their followers continue to teach the same erroneous doctrine.
So let us see what the Bible has to say about life, death and immortality.
Life
Man became a living soul (some newer translations render it ‘living creature’ instead of ‘soul’) when God breathed the breath of life (spirit of man) into the body that He had formed from the dust of the earth (Genesis 2:7). So, life comes from God; it is His gift. James goes further to state that “the body without spirit is dead” (James 2:26), indicating that the spirit is the life in the body. When the breath or spirit leaves the body, the person dies.
Death
God gave Adam a commandment, a charge to keep. If he flouted the commandment, he would ‘surely die’. The literal translation would be “dying, you will die”. It literally talks of two deaths. When God created the fish, He spoke to the seas to bring forth fish, and it did. Take a fish out of the water; it dies. God spoke to the earth to bring forth trees and plants, it did. Pluck a plant out of the earth; it dies. When God made man, He spoke to Himself – “Let Us make man”. Separate man form God; he dies!
Death is separation. Physical death is separation of the life (spirit) from the body. Spiritual (eternal) death is separating man form God who created him.
Death is inherent in the physical world. Entropy cannot be avoided. But spiritual things are not limited to the inherently entropic physical nature. The way to escape the death that is inherent in the physical state, the corruptible condition that we are in has to ‘put on’ incorruption and this mortal must ‘put on’ immortality so that death will be swallowed up by life (1 Corinthians 15:53-54). This upgrade happens when we are upgraded form natural people to spiritual people and it will be complete when our bodies are transformed from our present vile condition to the likeness of the glorious risen body of our Lord Jesus Christ (1 John 3:2).
What happens when a person dies?
Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it.
Ecclesiastes 12:7
So the spirit that God gave to the man leaves his body and goes back to God who gave it. There is no distinction between saved and unsaved, Jew or Gentile, bond or free. The same happens to all men. It is also to be noted that the spirits of men (human beings) go back to God, not the spirits of animals, angels or half-humans (Nephilim).
No mention is made of the soul, however.
The soul is the personality. When a person dies physically, the soul either takes it’s rest waiting for the resurrection when it will be eternally in the presence of God or it is dragged to Hades (the temporary hell) where it is held captive in torment till the Day of Judgment where it is cast into the Lake of Fire (eternal hell) to be tormented eternally, depending on whether the person has believed and obeyed the Gospel of Christ or not.
Alive, but dead
Now, let us consider that while the person is still alive, the Holy Spirit comes into his body, as when a person is baptized or filled in the Holy Spirit. Instead of man’s spirit going to God, God has come to man’s spirit. The result: the same as happens when a person physically dies. Now, the body is dead because the spirit has gotten united with God (as when man’s spirit goes to God at his death), but it is still alive because the spirit is still in the body (it would have left the body when the person died), though it is united with God. The person in whom the Spirit of God is continues to be alive, he is in fact dead because of union with the Creator.
Eternal life and Immortality
Jesus came to give us eternal life (John 3:16), a gift (Romans 6:23) that effectively demonstrated God’s love and power (Romans 1:16-17). Eternal life really means that the life does not end in death anytime, not now, not later, not after a million years; never! If we have the Eternal Life that Jesus promised, WE WILL NOT DIE. That’s immortality.
In the Garden of Eden, God freely provided the option of immortality to Adam. The Tree of Life was in the garden and God had placed no restriction to Adam (and Eve) eating of it. But in their fallen state, God had to make that restriction “lest he should also take of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever” (Genesis 3:22), so that man would have death at least as an escape from the consequences of his sin.
Death doesn’t have complete hold on us
If we have been given eternal life, we should not die. It should mean that we are immortal, but it also should mean that we don’t have to do anything to achieve that immortality, because why would we have to do something to become what we already are? So all believers should not die.
But we see believers die.
The New Testament describes physical death for a believer as rest or sleep. Once our work on earth is done, we rest till the Lord returns – after that we have a lot to do again! Believers ‘sleep in Christ’; they don’t ‘die’. Death is swallowed up in victory. That victory over death is so sure, that even those who are alive and remain till the second coming of our Lord Jesus will not die, but they will instantly be transformed (bodies upgraded to the glorious body) and will meet the Lord in the air (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17).
But does that mean that as long as we live on earth we will not see physical ‘death’? Not at all. But it does mean that death has no power over us. It does mean that we need not fear death or dying, knowing that it is but a rest from our labours and that when the Lord returns, He will wake us up to spend the rest of eternity with Him.
Right mind-set
The Biblically correct way to consider immortality is not in defying death. It is not in seeking to live forever, which is actually driven by the fear of death (physical death) – the same tool the devil uses to keep people in bondage to his ways (Hebrews 2:15). The last enemy to be defeated is death. That victory was already won for us when Jesus rose from the dead. But that victory will be made fully manifest in us when the Lord returns and we are raised incorruptible or remain till that day and are transformed so that we do not taste physical death at all.
The right way to see immortality or eternal life is to consider that we are dead indeed to sin (Romans 6:11), crucified with Christ (Galatians 2:20), living by the faith of Christ rather than our own spirits, so that death has no power over us, to cause us to fear or to manipulate us. We live not subject to the fear or terror of death, we live with the boldness of life, and life eternal. Physical death cannot damage or hinder us, rather it liberates us to our rest and inheritance in Christ. We can boldly say along with the Apostle Paul, “for me to live is Christ and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21).