Words about the Word: Doug Thomas, Trinity Episcopal

What happens to us when we die? Surely, most people have entertained this question at some point.

Those with whom I have personally discussed this issue tend to fall into one of two camps. Some, being materialist, believe that this present reality is all that there is, and they conclude that when we die we cease to exist. If so, then we best “grab all the gusto we can” while we can. But most of the ones I’ve spoken with believe “the me that’s really me” is an immortal soul that will somehow continue to exist somewhere – perhaps in a place we call “heaven.”

However, Lutheran theologian Oscar Cullmann asks the question: “What does the Bible teach?” And in his book: Immortality of the Soul or Resurrection of the Dead? he concludes there is no biblical basis for a belief in the soul’s immortality. To illustrate his position, Cullmann contrasts Plato’s account of the death of Socrates with the death of Jesus.

For Socrates, death was regarded as a friend: the great liberator which would free his soul. And he is depicted as facing death with confidence because he believed the body was a burden and a source of evil. In order to become one’s best, the body must be “cast off.”

Cullmann contends, that over the course of time, Christian thinking about the body - soul relationship was contaminated by Neo-Platonism and needs to be corrected by a return to scripture. He says that scripture teaches the body was created by God; made alive by God; and is sustained by God. The soul is simply a way of speaking about how God makes the body live. Body and soul are not two distinct entities. As created by God, the body-soul is good. As corrupted by sin, the body-soul will die.

Now, consider Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane the night before his death. Mark’s gospel records he told his disciples: “I am deeply grieved….” He asked his heavenly Father to: “remove this cup from me.” He didn’t want to die. For Jesus, death is no friend: it is the enemy; it destroys life. But Jesus knew death could only be conquered by his dying, and trusting his heavenly Father to re-create what death destroyed. The implication is, if Jesus had not died and been resurrected, we would not be resurrected after our deaths. Our hope is not based on who we are. Our hope is based on who God is.

But, if the soul does not exist independent from the body, we face the question about what happens to us between death and resurrection. Scripture does not give a definitive answer. In both 1st Corinthians and 1st Thessalonians, the King James translation of the Bible uses the word “sleep” to refer to those who have died trusting in the Lord. But this is likely a metaphor; since the body continues to function while we sleep, but decays after we die. So the New Revised Standard Version replaces the word “sleep” with “dead.”

Perhaps the reason the Bible does not clearly tell us “where we are” and “how we’re doing” between death and resurrection, is because the desire of scripture is that we trust God. After all, what matters most is not “what” we know, but “who” we know. And the God we know is faithful: so that, Jesus is the “the first born from the dead” [Col.1:18]; the first born of the everlasting family of God [Ro. 8:29].

But there is still the question, what will we be like as resurrected beings? Again, there is much we don’t know. What we do know is that we are designed by God to be embodied. Remember, Luke’s gospel tells us that when Jesus appeared to His disciples after His resurrection, He said: “Look at my hands and feet; see that it is I myself. Touch me and see; for a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” Then, in 1st Corinthians we are told: “Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust [Adam], we will also bear the image of the man of heaven [Jesus].”

We live now as created bodies. We will live again as newly re-created bodies: made by God alone.

“What we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when He is revealed, we will be like Him, for we will see Him as He is” [1 John 3:2}.

All that we are, all that we have, all that we hope to be - is a gift. Let us therefore, gladly pledge to give our lives as body -soul for the glory of God and His kingdom come.