IN DEATH THE CREATION PROCESS IS REVERSED:

         When God created man, he made a body out of the dust of the ground.  Adam was a lifeless clay body with no life, no soul, no spirit.  When God breathed into Adam the breath of life, man became a living SOUL.  Without breath (spirit) there was no soul, no living body.

         In  life as long as we are alive, we are composed of BODY, SOUL, and SPIRIT.  The body is our physical being, the soul is the thinking part of man having to do with our thoughts.  Our thoughts, the way we think, believe, and act make up our character. Spirit is the part of man that is intangible. it is what and who we are.  It is the sum total of a living being.  Spirit controls the soul, in fact there is no sensory mechanism by which we can communicate with our spirit.

         Studies of the brain reveals that the temporal area of the brain (right behind the forehead), the frontal lobes of our brain is where the higher cognitive functions reside, a person's spiritual and moral values, consequently his conscience reside here.  This makes it easy to understand that this is where man's spirit dwells.  People who have sustained an accident or had a lobotomy to this area of the brain, lose the sense of values and moral judgment.  Right and wrong are obliterated.  They become like any other animal--uninhibited with out a conscience.

         That this is also the area where God's Holy Spirit resides when invited into our heart (the frontal lobes of the brain).  Watchman Nee the great inspired Chinese writer points out that this is the place where God's Spirit communicates with man.

         Let us consider again what happened at creation when God created Adam and Eve, they were imbued with the Holy Spirit which was wedded to their spirit making them spiritual beings in body, soul, and spirit.  The external evidence of this was the robe of light, or the righteousness of God that radiated from them because of the indwelling of God's Spirit, wedded to their spirit.
 
WHEN THEY SINNED:

         In order to get a picture of what this means in relationship with God today, we must look at what happened to Adam and Eve when they sinned.  The first thing the Bible says happened to them was, they lost the robe of light that surrounded them. Why?  Because when they sinned, the Holy Spirit withdrew (was forced out) and was replaced by the spirit of the enemy we call the "Spirit of Evil."

         Consequently,  man's spirit originally wedded with the Holy Spirit underwent a dramatic change.  His spirit wedded to the "Spirit of Evil," spiritual nature became an Adamic, carnal, fleshly man such as Paul talks about in Romans 7.

         After the fall God introduced the plan of salvation to begin to redeem man, and to reinstate within man his Holy Spirit.  Only as we constantly seek and ask for His Spirit, does His Spirit begin pushing out the Spirit of Evil.  We call this process, the impartation of Jesus Spirit and character in us, fitting us with our wedding garments.
 
WHAT HAPPENED TO ADAM?

         What happened to Adam and Eve is important in making sense out of what happens to us when we die.  As man, a clay model,  became a LIVING SOUL when God breathed His Spirit into him, so when he died, the process was reversed.  The breath (spirit) went back to God, the soul (the thinking part) ceases to think, and the body returns to dust, or the elements of which it is composed.  This makes understanding living and dying simple and uncomplicated.
 
WHAT ABOUT THE WICKED:

         Regarding the wicked dead, when they die, their breath (Pneumo=spirit) is taken from them, that is they stop breathing, the soul ceases to exist, as it was only as God breathed life into Adam that he became a living soul, and the body returns to dust.  All that is left of that man is a record book in heaven of the good deeds and the bad ones.  This book describes the essence of the man, his spirit or what he was when alive, including his character, a record if you please of the man's spirit which is the very essence of the man.
 
         As to the wicked dead, the Bible is very clear on that point.  They face two deaths, called the first death and the second. death.  It also says that there are two resurrections.  In the first resurrection, which will take place at Christ's second coming, only the righteous dead are raised and gathered up to meet the Lord in the air. The wicked dead are not raised at this time.  (1 Thess. 4:16)

         Paul in verse 17 goes on to say that "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."  John in Revelation 20:4 tells us that those taken to heaven "lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years."  To reign with Christ means we will sit as kings and queens.
 
SAINTS TO JUDGE THE WICKED:

        Paul tells us in 1 Cor. 6:2,3 tells us that at that time we shall not only "judge the world," also angels. We will sit as kings and queens, going over the character records of the wicked, sitting in judgment according to their deeds and then passing sentence upon them.  "And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever." (as long as it lasts) "And I say a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and thee was found no place for them.  And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.  And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell (the grave) delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works.  And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire (at the end of the thousand years) This is the second death.  And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire."

         This going over the records is because God wants no questions to remain about His justice and mercy and the way He has dealt with the wicked.  This lake of fire is the real hell fire and will burn until all evidence and traces of sin are purified.  Then God will recreate the earth all new and the saints will inhabit it forever.

         All this will take place in front of our eyes.  A prophet's vision of  this given in the 1800's gives a detailed account of how all this will happen.  This is available upon request..
 
Thief On The Cross:

         Consider what the Bible says about the thief on the cross.  The Bible did not have originally have punctuation marks.  They were added as they were translated.  The answer to the statement made by Jesus to the thief on the cross is most simple.  Put the punctuation mark where it belongs and the statement makes sense. "I say unto thee today, thou shalt be with me in paradise."  But the clincher is Jesus' statement to Mary when she saw him after He arose.  He said: "Do not touch me for I HAVE NOT YET ASCENDED TO MY FATHER."  If we are to believe Him, Jesus did not go to heaven that day when he died, but rested in the grave over the Sabbath, His statement to Mary proves that.
 
About 1 Peter 3:18,19:

         I Peter 3:18,19 says: "For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened (made alive) by the Spirit."   This verse is of course talking about Christ's death in the flesh. He was again after three days made alive, raised by the Father's Holy Spirit back to life.  You will notice that the word Spirit here in my Bible is capitalized.  This refers to deity not a human spirit. We have Jesus' words that he had not yet ascended to heaven or paradise when He rose up from the tomb.  To be quickened by the Holy Spirit can only mean to be brought back to life.  This cannot be twisted to mean something about a spirit life as you have tried to do.

         Verse 19 reads: "By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison."  Verse 20 tells what spirits and what prison. "Which sometime were disobedient, when once the long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water." It clearly says those who were living in the days of Noah, while he was preparing or building the ark. The prison referred to here was the earth, where men were imprisoned by sin and Satan.  The earth was living in sin continually.  There were some who did follow God, but made mistakes and were disobedient, but died.  Jesus died  to save them also.

         In effect, Jesus' death and resurrection bore witness to those who died in the Lord before the flood, that someday they would rise again because of His death and resurrection.  Peter referred to them not as dead corpses, but to their human spirit or what was left of their spirit which is the character record of their lives.  In effect he was saying that Jesus' resurrection meant that at the second coming, they would be raised from the grave and their spirits revived.
 
BIBLE IS CLEAR:

         With the texts in the Bible stating that the dead know not anything, and that their thoughts perish, there is no way, except by twisting the Scriptures and interjecting human thought, that they can be interpreted as meaning anything else.  It must also be understood that some Scriptures are obscure, but by comparing scripture with scripture, the Bible is its own best expositor.
 
ENEMY IS WORKING HARD:

         It is most obvious that at this time in history the enemy is trying to get people to believe not only in life after death, but also in a spirit world where souls are alive and cognitive. Only in this way can he convince people about spiritualism and the occult spirit world.  Supposedly conjuring up peoples loved ones to make it appear that they are alive in a spirit world is part of his last day delusions  The TV shows "Highway to Heaven," and "Touched by an Angel" both support the concept than when a person dies, their spirit ascends to heaven and comes back as an angel in human form, which is directly against what the Bible teaches.
 
WHAT ABOUT NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCES?

         One topic related to death needs our attention, for if true, near-death experiences would counter the Bibles statements by supporting life after death.  There have been TV programs on this subject, which gives very persuasive evidence that indeed there is an after-life.  In no area is the enemy working harder to prove that when people die they go to heaven or hell (the next delusion discussed).  This phenomenon the enemy closely related to the work of his evil hordes in producing spiritual apparitions of departed loved ones coming back from the grave to communicate with family.

         Thousands of eye-witness accounts surface from all over the world of people who have come to the brink of death, and recovered.  These need serious consideration, for they counter Scripture.  The question must be asked and an answer found to this dilemma, for the Bible clearly indicates as we have shown, that when a person dies, they know not anything?

         Providentially, there is an answer to this problem, which blows this assumption apart.  In the March 1999 issue of the "Signs of the Times" Dr. Jack Provonsha wrote an article entitled: Exploring the Edges of Death, which explores this phenomena well.  He began the article with the question,  "Do near-death experiences prove that life continues after death?  He suggests that "Other 'out-of-body' experiences suggest that something else is going on," and tells the following story adapted from the book Life After Life, by Raymond A. Moody, Jr.

         "'About a year ago I was admitted to the hospital with hart trouble.  The next morning I began to experience very severe chest pains.  I pushed the call button, and the nurses came in and started working on me.  I was quite uncomfortable lying on my back, so I turned over.  As I did so, I quit breathing and my heart stopped beating.  Just then I heard the nurses begin shouting, "Code pink! Code pink!"

         "'As they were saying this, I could feel myself moving out of my body and sliding through the rails on the side of the bed to the floor.  Then I started rising slowly upward.  I drifted up past the light fixture--I saw it from the side very distinctly--and then I stopped floating right below the ceiling.

               "'I watched from up there while the doctors and nurses worked to revive me. My body was lying down below, stretched out on the bed in plain view.  I heard one nurse say, "She's gone!" while another one leaned down to give me mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.  As I saw them beating on my chest and rubbing my arms and legs, I thought Why are they going to so much trouble?  I'm just fine."

         "People of many cultures and religions have believed that some part of us transcends our bodies in death.  But solid evidence for survival beyond death has been singularly hard to come by.  Modern medical technology, however, seems to have changed all that. It is now possible, we are told, to bring the 'departed' back, sometimes to tell us what it is like on the other side.

         "In the book from which I took the story above, Dr. Raymond A. Moody, Jr., discussed these 'near-death experience' (NDEs).  He said that most of his subjects experienced the feeling of being outside of their bodies.  They reported feelings of weightlessness.  For some, time seemed to stand still, and others felt intense time acceleration.  Frequently the senses seemed to be more acute.

         "Many of Moody's subjects experienced an encounter with a light that, though dim at first, became increasingly brighter until it reached unearthly brilliance.  All who experienced this had no doubt that the 'light' was a personal being, the identity of whom varied according to the religious presuppositions of the subjects involved.  Some spoke of an angel, others of Christ.  All agreed that they felt total love and acceptance in the presence of this being.

         "Often, Moody's subjects recalled their past lives in a series of brilliant flashbacks.  Many reported that the near-death experience 'broadened and deepened' them; that it had made them 'more reflective and concerned with ultimate philosophical issues.'

         "Same story, second verse: Fascinating parallels to the NDE accounts of Moody and others are found in the so-called psychedelic literature. Almost every aspect of the near-death experience is matched by the users of hallucinogens such as LSD.

         "One characteristic both these groups reported is indescribability; their experience seemed 'beyond words.' Another is the illusion of being 'out of the body'; one person on LSD said, 'I could see myself from head to foot as well as the sofa on which I was lying....I was floating on a solitary island in the ether.  No part of my body was subject to the laws of gravitation.'  Still another shared characteristic is belief in one's immortality.  To Jane Dunlap, 'what had heretofore been merely an intellectual concept...became an emotionally charged conviction: that our souls, the God part of ourselves, would live throughout all eternity, remaining forever deathless.'

         "More than half of one group of individuals who took LSD claimed that they had encountered 'the deepest spiritual experience of their life.'  Many users reported 'a greater awareness of God, or a higher power, or Ultimate Reality,,' 'greater tolerance of others,' and 'a set of new decisions and new directions for...life.'  And Timothy Leary said a feeling of intense love dominated the chemically-induced state of mind.

         "And again: Interestingly, an overdose of carbon dioxide elicits effects similar to those produced by NDEs and psychedelic drugs.  L.J. Meduna summed up the results of the administration of thirty-percent carbon dioxide on a large number of subjects with the statement 'We definitely can see that the form-constants in Mescal [mescaline] vision...are present in the sensory alterations produced by CO2'

         "Subjects on carbon dioxide report separation of the self from the body.  And as with the drugs and NDEs, there were reports of caves, tunnels, intensely bright light, visions of other persons, luminaries, reliving of the past, and 'spiritual' experiences.  Following an initial vision of brilliant colors and designs, one subject reported. I felt myself being separated; my soul, drawing apart from the physical being, was drawn...seemingly to leave the earth and to go upward where it reached a greater Spirit with whom there was a communion, producing a remarkable new relaxation and deep security....I seemed to receive assurance that...whatever was bothering...me...would work out all right....I felt the Greater Spirit even smiling indulgently upon me in my vain little efforts to carry on by myself, and I pressed close [to] the warmth and tender strength and felt assurance of enough power to overcome whatever lay ahead for me.

         "So, altered central-nervous-system chemistry can produce illusions and hallucinations, whether that alteration is induced by extrinsic agents such as psychedelic drugs or by internal, biochemical factors.  The point is that during the dying process when the body starts to shut down--as in a heart attack--big changes take place in how the body works. Lack of blood circulation causes a buildup of carbon dioxide and other by-products of metabolism.  This buildup could well produce the hallucinations reported in NDEs.  Significantly, the experiences Raymond Moody described occur only when cardiac arrest is gradual--allowing time for the metabolites to accumulate.  They do not occur when the heart stops suddenly.

         Dr. Provonsha concluded his article with these closing comments.: "Much remains unknown about the biochemical changes that occur during dying.  But hallucinations brought on by psychedelic drugs and overdoses of carbon dioxide parallel extremely closely the near-death experiences.  This fact suggests that these experiences are likely the product of distorted brain chemistry conditioned by belief systems, expectations, and environmental cues.  WE SHOULDN'T CONSIDER THEM PROOF THAT LIFE CONTINUES AFTER DEATH." [emphasis added]

         All in all, the idea that the dead are not dead is in opposition to everything the Scripture teaches. It propagates the enemy's first lie told to Eve in the Garden, that if she sinned she would not die.  He has ever since been trying to convince people that this is true; that there is an afterlife.  In closing, I would like to point the readers attention to a far more important matter.  That has to do with our salvation and eternal life.  There is only one thing that matters at this point in time, not doctrinal issues or prophetic interpretations, not what church we go to. The only thing that will save anyone is having sought the Lord with all their heart, seeking a living and loving relationship with Our Lord Jesus Christ.  Only this relationship can prepare us for what is ahead. Anything else is a diversion and distraction.