Heaven and Hell

Heaven & Hell

by Richard Joseph

Most people’s religious view never goes past this simple statement; “good people go to heaven and bad people go to hell”.  Of course when their child molesting perverted uncle dies they totally forget the later part of that statement and proclaim he still went to heaven.  Life would be a lot simpler for me if I could boil my “religion” down to such a simple and naive statement.  I am, however,  a little too high strung to live in such blissful ignorance.  People like me dig and dig and dig until we prove what we believe.  The good thing about it is that we do eventually find answers but unfortunately for every answer we find, ten more questions pop up.  The existence of a true heaven and hell is one of those areas of contention among certain biblical scholars.  Some believe in a literal heaven and hell and some do not.  Some believe in eternal conscience rewards and punishments and some do not.  A healthy discussion can do much good but this is one of those areas that the answer could make or break someone’s faith and that could  be dangerous all together.   It could also lead you to Heaven or Hell!

So, what am I really talking about?  As you know, most Christian outlets believe that our souls are eternal and therefore are not subject to destruction but lives on after physical death in either an elevated state where we can commune with our creator and, conversely,  some believe that we are similar to animals in that we just die and that is the end of it; they believe we are annihilated at death.  This discussion really has far reaching implications and concerns, not all of which I can address in a blog setting.  So what is annihilationism?

Annihilationists have much in common with Deists, Universalists and Eastern mysticism.  One explanation is that there is a god but he only concerns himself with the perpetuation of sensible life on earth (eternal life), not with the after life.  They continue with the idea that our good deeds and the proper upbringing of our children is the eternal life that God meant, not the eternal existence of our souls.   This is not any different than Buddha or Confucius giving us good advice to spread our good karma to the next generation.  This places Jesus squarely in the same camp as other religious philosophers.   I hope I don’t have to explain why this is a serious misconception of what Jesus Christ is.  I also hope I don’t have to explain to anyone that, that type of hippie philosophy is a complete failure.  So, what does the bible actually say about heaven and hell?

Admittedly there are no scriptures that plainly say “good people go to heaven and bad people go to hell”.  That, however, does not mean that this subject was not discussed or even commonly believed throughout biblical scripture.  The very concept of “God” necessitates that there is a heavenly abode.  God is not man and does not live on earth; so this begs the question “where is he”?

He is in heaven, of course.  Jesus plainly teaches us in Matthew chapter 6;

9 “Pray, then, in this way:

‘Our Father who is in heaven,

Hallowed be Your name.  10 ‘Your kingdom come.

Your will be done, On earth as it is in heaven.

This verse tells me that God’s abode is different than ours.  I have heard by some annihilationists that heaven really only means a higher authority.

The problem with that is that Jesus didn’t say “our father who has authority over us”.  That was already assumed.  Jesus said “who is in heaven”.  Heaven has several meanings which could include any of these:

1. Authority.  

“For as the heavens are higher than the earth,

So are My ways higher than your ways

And My thoughts than your thoughts. (Isaiah 55:9)

2. Physical.

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.  (Genesis 1:1)

3. Abode.

The first account I composed, Theophilus, about all that Jesus began to do and teach, until the day when He was taken up to heaven, after He had by the Holy Spirit given orders to the apostles whom He had chosen  (Acts 1:-2)

4. Governmental state of affairs.

7 But by His word the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. (2 Peter 3:7)

When Jesus said “who art in heaven”, he was talking about God’s abode.  Let’s look at Matthew chapter two where angels suddenly appeared out of nowhere to the shepherds.

13 And suddenly there appeared with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying,

14 “Glory to God in the highest,

And on earth peace among men [g]with whom He is pleased.”

15 When the angels had gone away from them into heaven, the shepherds began saying to one another, “Let us go straight to Bethlehem then, and see this thing that has happened which the Lord has made known to us.”

My questions are this; where did the angels come from and where did they go?  Did they come from a higher authority?  Even though a higher authority sent them, they didn’t come “from” there.  Did they come from the sky (as in the air, clouds, sky).  No.  Did the government send them?  No.  That leaves the idea that they came from the very abode of God.  They came from a different dimension.  What I am really saying is that if there is a real God then there is a real abode that he really dwells in.  It is a spiritual realm as far as we are concerned but it is a physical realm as far as God is concerned.  Verse 15 above said the angelic host had gone away from them into “heaven”.  My point is that there is a different dimension that we as humans cannot understand.  When Jesus ascended he was in essence transferred from one dimension to another.  He didn’t necessarily “float” away but was taken up into a cloud back to his father.  The cloud represented the power of God himself.  The crux of this is that Jesus is really “somewhere”.  It also appears that our souls are somewhere also.

The book of Revelation is the announcement proclamation that the Parousia of Christ was about to begin.  The scroll that Daniel was forbidden to open was opened at this time.  The resurrection that Daniel was told about was about to occur also.

2 Many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake,these to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting[a]contempt. (Daniel 12:2)

13 But as for you, go your way to the [n]end; then you will enter into rest and rise again for your allotted portion at the end of the [o]age.” (Daniel 12:13)

Try as you may but these verses cannot be successfully twisted into meaning a resurrected state of Israel.   They are very personal and direct.  It clearly states that Daniel himself will rise again at the resurrection event.  It clearly talks about those that are dead in the ground.  Of course it is their souls that will rise, not their physical bodies.  That is what sheol is all about.  At the beginning of the Parousia, Jesus emptied hades out and each person was given a new body suited for their new abode in the realm of God.  This makes our faith very personal and sacred.  God is not just about a philosophy of love and tolerance and peace.  That is what the hippies were about and that didn’t work so well.  God is about eternity, truth and justice.  So, yes we are to live in the New Jerusalem on earth and rule the earth by the justice of Christ but there is an ultimate state of being for our souls.  And make no mistake about it, we will not be just floating around on some cloud; there is work to do in heaven.  Idleness is not a part of God’s vocabulary.  We will have real work to do and real pleasure doing it.  Revelation chapter 20 is the chapter that concerns itself with our eternal state.  

Then I saw thrones, and they sat on them, and judgment was given to them. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of[b]their testimony of Jesus and because of the word of God, and those who had not worshiped the beast or his image, and had not received the mark on their forehead and on their hand. (revelation 20:4)  Beheaded people are not just regular people who lived after AD 70, they are dead people.  Their bodies have been killed but their souls were now under the auspices of God himself.  There are many other verses that make this type of statement.

At the last supper, Jesus comforted his disciples by saying;

36 Simon Peter *said to Him, “Lord, where are You going?” Jesus answered, “Where I go, you cannot follow Me now; but you will follow later.”

(John 13:36)

Jesus did not appear on earth after AD 70 so he could not have been talking to them about that.  Besides none of the disciples made it past that date either.  So, when would the disciples follow Jesus “later”?  It would have to be in his heavenly abode.  

“Do not let your heart be troubled; [a]believe in God, believe also in Me. 2 In My Father’s house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you. 3 If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am, there you may be also.(John 14:1-3).

I very much realize that there was a new order after AD70 but that does not negate a heavenly realm.  This was assumed throughout the bible and is also heavily  expressed in other extrabiblical accounts such as the Book of Enoch.  If Jesus was talking to his disciples about them being where he is, then how can anyone stretch that to mean that the disciples are with Jesus on earth now?  How did Paul tell the Thessalonians that they will meet Jesus in the air along with the risen dead?  There is no way to interpret that into Israel’s resurrection into the church age.  

In conclusion, I can go on and on and quote one scripture after another but the real point I want to make is that it was already assumed that there is an afterlife.  Infact that was one of the big arguments that the Pharisees and Sadducees had.  Jesus put the Sadducees to shame when they asked him about which man would have the woman that they all married.  He informed them that there is no marriage at the resurrection.  If the resurrection is, like the annihilationists say, the church age then why are we getting married now?  Jesus must have been talking about the resurrection of the dead.  The resurrection of the dead apparently occurred about AD 66 when Jesus emptied Hades and then cast it into the pit.  So, yes, I do believe in heaven and hell and a real judgement and account of our lives on earth.