Am I Immortal?

Am I Immortal?

Like most people, I never did care much for the Crematorium. My friend Jimmy was dead; and standing there, watching the last rites being performed, I felt that there was something about cremation which leaves one with a sense of utter nothingness; a feeling of irrepairable loss as a loved one disappears into less than a handful of dust. At least, I thought, the old-time burial service left one with a place where respects could be paid, a grave in which something remained of one who had gone But now my friend Jimson simply did not exist; he has vanished. Of course Bob, my next door neighbour, assured me that cremation made no difference and that Jimmy still lives on. Yes, that would have bee some comfort, if I had been true. For years, I had thought the same. I had been brought up in this belief, but I did not realise the falsity of such an idea until I began to study the Word of God. Then my inherited views received a rude shock.

I had often wondered why, if good clean-living people were, and had always been, immortal, right from the days of Adam, why it should have been necessary for the sacrifice of Jesus at all, and how then was it possible for Him to bring as the apostle Paul said in 2 Tim. 1:10 "life and immortality to light", if it had always been the possession of man. It seemed to me to be so contradictory, and so unnecessary. Therefore, after studying my Bible, I asked myself the following questions:

1. If men and women, good and bad, have immortal souls, how is it possible for "the soul that sinneth it shall die?" (Ezk. 18:4). How could an "immortal soul" die?

2. If man after death is still conscious, how could the Psalmist say, "In that very day (of death) his thoughts perish?" (Psa. 146:4).

3. If Adam and Eve were created immortal from the very beginning, does it not seems strange, that, after the Fall in the Garden of Eden, it was necessary to restrain them from eating of the Tree of Life so that they should not live for ever; thus we read, "And now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the Tree of Life, and eat and live for ever, therefore the Lord God sent him forth..." (Gen. 3:22).

4. If eternal life is the "Gift of God" (Rom. 6:23) only to be bestowed by Jesus (John6:40) at the resurrection (John 11:24), how then can eternal life be the natural birthright of man?

5. If the "dead know not anything" (Ecc. 9:5) and if they "praise not the Lord" (Psa.115:17), how can they, after death, be forever praising God in heaven or cursing Him in Hell?

6. If David, a righteous man, had definitely not gone to heaven for at least a thousand years after his death, as said the apostle Peter, "For David is not ascended into the heavens" (Acts 2:34), how is it likely that any other righteous person could be there?

7. If Jesus said, "And I will raise him up at the last day" (John6:40) and also "My reward is with Me to give every man according as his work shall be" (at His second coming-Rev. 22:12), how could it be possible for multitudes to have received this reward of eternal life prior to His coming?

8. If men and women have always been immortal, whether righteous or wicked, how then could Jesus have been given the wondrous office of Judge and Rewarder? ( John 5:27; Acts 17:31).

9. If Job could say of the righteous and wicked alike, that in death "they cease from troubling" (Job 3:17), and Solomon that "their love, their envy and their hatred was now perished" (Ecc. 9:6), how then could they be conscious after their decease?

10. If there is a resurrection (which the Bible declares) does it not seem a strange procedure to bring men and women back to Judgment (when they have supposedly been in heaven or in hell) to see if they are worthy of eternal life in either place? Is not this the strangest of all reasoning?

11. If the righteous have always gone to heaven, how could Jesus say in His day, "No man hath ascended up to heaven?" (John 3:13).

12. If righteous men and women had received eternal life during the 4,000 years from Adam to Jesus, how then could Jesus have been the "Firstfruits of them that slept?" (1 Cor. 15:20). Also, how is it, that if righteous men and women who lived during these forty centuries before Jesus, went to heaven, why did they not mention such an expectation. THERE IS NOT ONE REFERENCE TO HEAVEN-GOING at death in ALL THE PAGES OF THE OLD TESTAMENT.

13. If there is consciousness in death, even for righteous ones, why did David say, "0 spare me that I may recover strength, before I go hence and be no more?" (Psa. 39:13). Further, why did he also say, "For in death there is no remembrance of Thee: in the grave who shall give Thee thanks?" (ch.6:5).

14. If the dead righteous servants of God are in heaven, how could Hezekiah (a righteous man) say- after God had hearkened to his plea that he might live a few years longer - "I shall go to the gates of the grave ... I shall not see the Lord ... For the grave CANNOT PRAISE THEE: they that go down into the pit cannot hope for thy truth." (Isa. 38:10, 11, 18.)

WHAT, THEN, IS THE TRUTH OF THIS VITAL SUBJECT ?

THE BIBLEANSWERS: That man is mortal and knows nothing in death. He depends entirely upon Jesus to raise him from the dead at His coming . That it is only at that time he receives the reward of life eternal, if found worthy. To obtain this reward it is necessary to believe in Him, to repent, and to be baptised.(Mark 16:16; Matt. 28:19; Rom. 6:3; John 3:5; Gal. 3:27-29.)
C.H.F.

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