Satan was so successful with his first lie to the human pair in the Garden of Eden that he has been elaborating on it ever since. No one wants to believe that they or someone they love will be gone forever.
The devil has many tricks up his sleeve to cause us to misunderstand the state of the dead. Even though the Bible repeatedly refers to death as a “sleep”, the enemy of God has been able to get most of the world to believe that all of us do indeed go on living forever.
For ancient pagans and believers in several world religions today, Satan’s lie has caused them to go to great lengths to bow down to other gods, or ancestors, who they feel will give them a chance for the best afterlife possible.
In addition, most of the Christian world has been given the impression that we go straight to heaven or hell immediately upon death. This prospect is wonderful for those we know to be righteous followers of God. But it also means that when sinners die, they immediately suffer ongoing, excruciating torment in the fires of hell.
This erroneous belief does not reflect well on a loving, merciful, just God, nor is it supported well by Scripture. The belief in this kind of hell has caused many to reject God altogether, which is just fine with Satan. He wants to keep the numbers of God’s faithful as low as he can.
There’s another reason Satan has promoted this questionable belief about death though. When people believe their loved ones may already be in heaven, they are more inclined to have a desire to speak to them in the so-called spirit world. Numerous movie and entertainment venues help spread such false ideas about death. Thus, spiritualism, spiritism, the belief in psychic powers, witchcraft, Ouija boards, horoscopes, and tarot cards entice many people to the devil’s playground.
Thinking they are dealing with friendly forces, they are instead setting themselves up for deceptions of the devil. The Bible warns us that these supernatural beings, who are in reality fallen angels, can perform wonders and miracles (Revelation 16:14). We can easily be deceived by the disguises of these “spiritual hosts of wickedness” (Ephesians 6:12).
The good news is we don’t have to fall into any of these traps of Satan when we have a correct understanding of what death is. The Old Testament describes the death of both good and bad kings as “sleeping”, or “resting”, with their fathers See 1 Kings 2:10, 1 Kings 15:24, 2 Kings 20:21, 2 Chronicles 28:27, and 1 Kings 16:28.
Will there be an afterlife? Of course, but the Resurrection is an event in the future, when Jesus comes again. Lazarus’ sister Martha understood and affirmed her belief that her brother would rise at the last day (John 11:24).
The apostle Paul also had faith in a future Resurrection, writing to the Thessalonians that at the Second Coming, those who are alive would join those who have just been resurrected, and together they would be taken to heaven. One would not precede the other (1 Thessalonians 4:13-17).
It’s a comfort knowing that my loved ones are having a wonderful, dreamless sleep, and none of them are burning forever and ever, or even are in heaven, looking down sadly on the things happening in the world.
Will there be a punishment for sin? Of course, but that, too, is in the future. Revelation 20:13-14 describes how fire will come down from heaven after the millennium and devour the wicked, even calling the event “the second death”.
I can more easily believe in such a loving, wise God as this outcome portrays. Although we hate to see anyone lost (and so does God, by the way—2 Peter 3:9), we know that the total eradication of the wicked (Malachi 4:1) is the only way the universe can be in perfect peace and harmony again, and we can exist forever in the earth made new.
For more evidence to share this topic from a non-denominational source, see this video about the book “The Fire That Consumes”, by Edward Fudge:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k8Zlh__Xx2E
…or watch the family-approved movie about the life of Edward Fudge, called “Hell and Mr. Fudge”:
