Agreed.
I would have a different take on that.....no one can be "in Christ" until after Christ actually came and took up his ministry.....his teachings formed the basis upon which salvation rested......and they had to make the choice to become a footstep follower of his, based on what he taught..."to the Jew first, also to the Greeks". (Rom 1:16)
All souls are created by Christ and in His light. All have sinned, so all are not the first to be in Christ by faith.
The first to be "in Christ" in that case, would have been the apostles, who form the very foundations of God's Kingdom. These were the first to be taken into the "new covenant".
Actually, the Bible tells us that Mary Magdalene was the first saved believer to be in Christ. She's the first to see Him and believe His resurrection from the dead, and bear witness of it to the others that still did not believe.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. (1 Peter 1)
Paul the apostle certainly wasn't one of the first to be in Christ.
I don't find any mention of the devil being in "hell" but I suppose that depends on which translation of the Bible you favor.
How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!
I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High. Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit. (Isaiah 14)
The bottomless pit is the descent into hell. All the angels that sinned are in chains of hell, but the devil was loosed to tempt the nations and souls of men.
The "lake of fire" mentioned in Revelation is the place "reserved for the devil and his angels", but they will not go there until after God has finished with them.
The lake of fire is not hell. Hell is cast into the lake of fire.
They will be put into an abyss where they will be unable to mislead humankind for the full thousand years of Christ's reign. (Rev 20:1-3) At the end of that time, after one final test, the devil and all who fall for his old tricks will be eliminated from existence...never to be seen again. That is what the "lake of fire" is for...its a symbolic place...what goes in there, never comes out. Even death and hades (the grave) are eliminated by being thrown into this lake. (Rev 20:13-14)
I don't believe in extinctionist. We can speculate on the nature of torment forever, but it is torment forever, not extinction. Extinction of any hope sure, but not extinction of the angel nor soul.
I have read no scripture confirming that a spiritual entity separate from our body, dwells within us and is released at death to go somewhere else.
I gave you the verses that say so. It's not debatable to me. We either believe the words of the Bible or we don't.
Human beings do not "have" a "soul"....all living, breathing creatures on this planet are called "souls" in the Bible.
No they aren't. Only man is called a living soul. Only men have souls created in the image of God.
So a soul can die. (Ezekiel 18:4; Eccl 3:19-20)
Spiritually, not physically, since a soul spiritual, and is not flesh and blood.
There are no "souls" in heaven......
And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held. (Rev 6)
only "spirits". Somewhere along the way Christendom confused the two terms, but they have very different meanings.
Animals only have spirits. Men have souls and spirits.
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. (1 Thess 5)
Yes, but I don't believe that it is the way Christendom believes it. Each conception is not God's doing....what God gave all flesh is the ability to reproduce their "kind". To suggest that God made us all individually in the womb and gave us a soul, (as some believe)
I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well. (Psalms 139)
is to forget about the way some humans were conceived in violent rapes and other degraded practices...definitely not from God.
Blaming the baby is definitely not from God.
....The breath of life is what all living souls gasp for upon exiting the womb or egg where they were formed..
The air of the world is not the Spirit of God. The earth is not the goddess Gaia, and God is not the air for trees to breathe. Pagan spiritism is false.
..it is the soul (the whole living organism) that is sustained by breathing...
The natural body needs the air, and the spirit. The soul needs the Spirit of God to breathe for everlasting life, rather than everlasting shame.
.when breathing stops, the soul dies.
Already showed the Bible saying otherwise. Not debatable.
Yet some souls expire before they even take that first breath...again, not God's doing.
Still born, is the bodies not breathing the air.
I believe that the concept of an immortal soul is grafted over verses like this. Paul was not speaking about his soul as a separate part of himself here,
The soul is not part of himself, but himself. Absent from the body, we are present with the Lord. It is the body that is spoken of as part of us, not our soul. Our souls are we present with the Lord.
but about the resurrection that all Jews were taught from their scripture. Jesus clarified that belief for those who were chosen as his elect. When anointed by holy spirit, these ones were given an inordinate desire to go to heaven to be with their Lord. This anointing had to override their natural desire to remain on earth where God designed the human race to live forever.
The Jewish belief in the resurrection was a return to life, not a continuation of it...
A return of the dead body to immortality. The soul continues in or out of the body.
...Jesus demonstrated what a resurrection was several times by awakening those who had died, and returning them to their families. No mention is made about where those souls were whilst they were dead.
And the rich man in hell, with the poor Lazarus in the bosom of Abraham.
Jesus said his friend Lazarus was "sleeping" (John 11:11-14)
Howbeit Jesus spake of his death: but they thought that he had spoken of taking of rest in sleep.
His body was dead, not his soul. The dead bodies only sleep, because there will be a resurrection of the body.
Yes.....again the elect knew that they must leave their fleshly bodies (their tabernacle or tent) behind in order to be "born again" as spirit beings to dwell in heaven in the presence of God.
Being born again is now while still in mortal flesh. Dwelling in heaven is after death of the body. No man is born again after death of the body.
They have a special assignment to be "Kings and Priests" for us here on earth. (Rev 20:6)
We are kings and priests of Christ here on earth.
And from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, and the first begotten of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth. Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood,
And hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen. (Rev 1)
We will be kings and priests with immortal bodies on earth with Christ, during His millennial reign.
They will be the best rulers that we humans have ever had!
He and they will be the best rulers on earth over all the earth ever.
If we're not one of them now, then we have no hope of being one of them in the first resurrection to rule with Christ on earth.