The Dead Are Dust.

 We all know people who have died. '… for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.' Gen. 3:19 (GOD SAYS THE DEAD ARE DUST because man was made from dust to begin with.) 'And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground…' Gen. 2:7 The Bible also tells us the following about those sleeping in the dust of the earth (the dead) -'And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.' Dan. 12:2 Everlasting life or everlasting contempt.

Obviously those who are sleeping in the dust are dead people, those who have returned to the dust they were created from. They sleep in the dust, sleep until they are awakened once more.  If you sleep, you wake from sleeping having only known the time before you fell asleep, not what has occurred while you were sleeping. Many people have woken up to amazing news of things that have happened while they slept. Good things and bad things occur while we sleep, but while we are sleeping we don't know they are occurring. 

When all our dead loved ones wake from their sleep in the dust they are waking up to the reality of eternal life or eternal death. They will have one or the other. This is truth. Until that moment they are woken up they know nothing. Thousands of years could have passed from the moment of one's death and they won't have known that, and it won't have mattered. It won't be as if they are waking up to live in our modern world -they are waking up to rise to meet their LORD in the air! They are rising to go to their heavenly home!  Some might think they rise to their heavenly home upon their death - a lie perpetrated by Satan to deceive. The truth is they are rising some of them thousands, some hundreds of years after they died.  The Bible tells us this- Heb 11:39  And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise:  Heb 11:40  God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.   

They without us are not made perfect and this is talking even of Abraham! Abraham will rise on the same day as anyone else who has died in the Lord. They will rise together, they will be made perfect together, they will receive their heavenly home together! There will be no mourning not having gone to heaven right upon their death some thousand, hundred, ten, a single year ago, because to them they have… they fell into death's sleep and then woke to heaven's reward, unaware of all the time in between the two facts! They've had NO concept of time passing, none! What a wondrous mystery this all is. The revelation of what death is can bring us such comfort! Comfort knowing our loved ones are truly at peace! They aren't up in heaven looking down on us as we suffer their passing. How terrible that would be. A mother in heaven having to watch her children suffer emotional agony when she dies. Maybe having to watch them be separated and placed into foster care and not good foster homes- we know there are many horror stories of terrible foster homes. Yet, people want to imagine everyone just going on to heaven upon their death, able to witness all the agonies of life below on earth. That is monstrous! That is sadistic That is such a horrific imagining, not the comforting that people have lulled themselves into believing, as Satan has spun his death's lullaby to seduce millions and millions into believing lies not truth. So many say they are comforted knowing their loved one is in heaven, a better place, a peace, not suffering, and they are there with full knowledge of the loved ones below missing them, longing for them, still loving them. How could we ever wish that upon our loved ones?! How cruel are we to want them to know of our agonies here on earth living through all the many ups and downs life throws our way. How cruel to believe our loved ones watch every single moment of our lives below, that is NOT anyone's idea of heaven or rather is should not be anyone's idea of heaven. The sad truth is, that is millions of peoples idea of heaven. God please, open the hearts and minds to truth, Your amazing truth! Please! We want only Your truth to live by!

All through the name of our LORD and SAVIOR JESUS CHRIST now and forever!!!!!!! Amen! 

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Resurrection of the Just and Unjust

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(EXCERPT)

The unjust will be resurrected, some object to this truth. The article we've been studying is vindicating the truth of the resurrection of the unjust- scripturally, logically. Pray for enlightenment through our Savior, by the Holy Spirit.

A Vindication of the Doctrine of the Resurrection of the Unjust

By J.H. Waggoner 

CONTINUING STUDY….

Dan 12:2  And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.

Rev. 1:7 says, "Behold, He cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they which pierced him." I do not know of any construction of this text which  makes its fulfillment possible without a resurrection of them that pierced him. 

Other scriptures which speak of "all" in such relation are evaded with the declaration that they only refer to all then living. But this text clearly points to his crucifiers, who shall see him at a future time, and of course must have a resurrection. 

Another positive testimony on the resurrection of the unjust is found in Rev. 20; not in a single verse only, but in the harmony of the entire chapter. The first evidence is found in verse 5. After stating that they who had been beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, lived and reigned, it says: "But the rest of the dead lived not again till the thousand years were finished." This is equivalent to a direct statement that they shall live again after the thousand years are finished.

Again, it is said of the re-living of the righteous: "This is the first resurrection." This implies that there will be a second resurrection; and, taken in connection with the previous statement and others in the chapter, it amounts to a certain affirmation that there will be a second resurrection. Again, it not only speaks of a first resurrection, and of the rest of the dead who do not live again until after a certain period, but also of "the second death" that has no power over those who are raised in the first resurrection; therefore, there will be a second death which will have power on them who have their part in the second resurrection. And this is confirmed by verses 14 and 15: "Whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire." This is declared to be the second death. And also by chap. 2:11: "He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death." Three points are proved by this text. 1. There will be a second death. 2. Some will be subject to its power. 3. They will be hurt of it. And thus it appears that if we set aside Rev. 20, on the

subject of the second death, we must set aside chap. 2, also. 

And again, "death and hades delivered up the dead which were in them;" "and whosoever"-of whom? Of them that were delivered up of death and hades-"was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire." This is the second death. But it is objected, if death delivered up all the dead, there was then no dead. This has only a degree of technical plausibility; in fact, there is no reason in it. Death is not destroyed while there is a sinner in existence; for the wages of sin is death, and while a sinner exists, death is ever ready to claim its own. But, on the other hand, it is a fact that when death delivers up the dead which are in it, they are not thenceforth dead until death receives them again. Death cannot deliver them up and they still remain dead. But when death receives them again in the lake of fire, which is to them the second death, then it is said that death and hades are also cast therein. For, from that time onward, even to eternity, there are no more subjects for death to prey upon. The work of death ends with the utter destruction of the wicked in the lake of fire. Now in regard to the objection that this is the only scripture that speaks of the second death, I remark that one plain declaration of Scripture is sufficient for those that "tremble at the word;" and this is in perfect harmony with the general tenor of the Scriptures, which largely bring to view a future judgment of "indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish, to every soul of man that doeth evil;" also there are numerous texts which plainly speak of the same things revealed in Rev. 20. A few I will notice.

John the Baptist compared the wicked to chaff, and said they should be burned up with unquenchable fire. Rev. 20 confirms this statement, and gives the time and order of the event. Mal. 4:1, 3, also speaks of the same day, when "all the proud and all that do wickedly shall be stubble, and the day that cometh shall burn them up." There is nothing in Rev. 20 that is not taught here, either directly or indirectly. Directly, in that it says all the wicked shall be burned up in the day that cometh, that is in the coming or future judgment day. Indirectly, in that if all that do wickedly are burned up in that day they must have a resurrection to meet that fate. Many other declarations in the prophecies and Psalms are similar to this.  2 Pet. 3; 7-10 says the heavens and earth which are now are reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men; and in that day the fire shall melt the elements and the earth. This is not figurative language. It agrees with Malachi, and embraces all that is found in Rev. 20. The earth is melted-becomes a lake of fire; it is in "the day of judgment" unto which the unjust are "reserved;" it is the day of perdition of the ungodly, because in that day, and in that lake of fire, they shall be burned up, root and branch-devoured. This destruction in the lake of fire is the second death: the only death to which their probation related; and to fulfill all and any of these scriptures a resurrection of the unjust is necessary. Paul identifies this day of judgment as "the day of wrath," in which "every soul of man that doeth evil" shall suffer "indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish." Rom. 2:5-9. And Job, using the same language that Peter afterward used on the same subject, said, "The wicked is reserved to the day of destruction," and also, "they shall be brought forth to the day of wrath." Job 21:30. Language could not more forcibly express the doctrine of Rev. 20. 2 Thess. 1:9 says the wicked "shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power." Not, as it has been often quoted, "banished" from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power, the possibility of which I cannot conceive; but punished with everlasting destruction, which destruction comes from the presence of the Lord. This destruction is by fire, as scores of texts clearly prove. Rev. 20:9, says the same thing. "Fire"-the agent of this destruction-"came down from God out of heaven and devoured them;" destroyed them; burned them up, root and branch. David says they shall consume away into smoke as the fat of lambs. Ps. 37:20. And thus from the glorious presence of the Lord their destruction comes down. And in regard to that class embraced in "the rest of the dead," Rev. 20:5, in distinction from the blessed and holy, verse 6, and on whom the second death is said to have power, the Saviour said of them, as evil-doers, they shall come forth from the graves to the resurrection of damnation. Paul said of them, there shall be a resurrection of the unjust; and the angel spoke to Daniel of them who sleep in the dust of the earth who shall awake to shame and everlasting contempt.

To Be Continued…

Animated Dust.

You are nothing more than animated dust.

Does that sound preposterous? It does to me. To think I am nothing, absolutely nothing more than animated dust seems bizarre. I think of a wooden puppet brought to life and then that magic of life is taken away and the puppet is nothing more than wood again- lifeless. Are we all in some way dust Pinocchio's? Is Pinocchio who was made of wood, ultimately a dust Pinocchio if the wood decay breaks down to that level? Wood decays, it rots. Even some of the best preserved wood without renewed applications of preservative would over time hundreds, thousands of year eventually end up as dust- right? Wood rots and is eventually ground into dust.

When our animation ceases and the last breath of life is expelled from our animated dust bodies and returns to God who gives that breath of life, another part of us sleeps death's sleep.

Every animated dust person is given a uniqueness that makes them special, one of a kind. We are flesh, spirit and soul.

Heb_4:12  For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

Soul divided from the spirit, just as bones from their marrow.

1Th 5:23  And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Your whole spirit AND soul AND body.

We animated dust beings are more than the dust. Just as- yes, I'm going back to Pinocchio- when he was brought to life everyone became invested in him as a living wooden being because he had a personality, he was more than an automaton that simple responded to commands. He had a power of choice in him, a curiosity in him- he wasn't brought to life only to remain a controlled puppet.

We are not controlled animated dust beings.

Along with the life in each and every particle of our bodies that will eventually return to the dust as the original, first ever animated dust body was created from, we were given a power of choice and a spirit that could be born within us united to the Holy Spirit, one of the three separate beings that had a hand in our very creation.

When Adam's dust created body lay there on the ground newly formed it had no breath of life in it, it had no ability to think, it had no ability to communicate with its Creator. Separated from the breath of life, separated from the ability to think, to choose, to commune with God- the body was an empty shell.

God breathed that life into Adam, God brought to life the spirit within Adam, God gave to Adam the power of individual thought outside of His control. God did not raise a robot to life, a controlled dust being forced to obey His commands.

The power to bring us to life to form us so that we live was not an accident, it didn't happen over billions of years, we were created beings, designed beings. When we chose to leave our Creator's guidance and step out on our own- drastic changes occurred all around us and in us.  With the glorious light of our Creator stripped from us, we became creatures subject to pain, to decay, to death. So much of us was altered so that we could continue to function physically without God's glorious light, without the fruit from the tree of life to sustain our grand design. With those things taken from us we reverted to a most basic animated dust being without the power of eternal life. That we were allowed to continue to live at all was a blessing, and it was given to us only because there was a way already in place to save us and return us to the eternal glory originally designed for us- should we individually choose to accept the Way.  The accepting of the Way, is an accepting wholly and truly that the power behind that Way was of God, and NOT anything we could manufacture on our own.  The Way was given to us, not made by us. The power is God's.

2Co 4:7  But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us. 

The Way is the TREASURE in our dust animated bodies (earth made vessels). The Power of God is the Way. The Kingdom of God was preached to us by His only begotten son, Jesus Christ- who is the WAY.  Jesus came to expound on the knowledge that there is a HOPE for a return to our original God designed being. We can be reunited with God! We can be brought back to eternal life! All hope is not lost! We don't have to return to dust permanently! On resurrection day, the day our Lord returns and calls us from our graves, or from this world still living should we be among those blessed, we will be raised up and transformed back into the original design!

1Co 15:52  In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. 

1Co 15:53  For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. 

1Co 15:54  So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. 

Changed. Yes, we'll still be animated dust beings but restored to immortality, to eternal life, to incorruption- to the light of God's presence!

All glory to God in the highest! All praise and honor unto Him! All worship to our Creator, our Sustainer, our Redeemer, our LORD, Jesus Christ! All through the Holy Spirit may we belong to them and no others!