What happened to Enoch? Would love some input on this.
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How does the above happen seeing that God will destroy this present universe and will create a New Heaven and Earth?
To God Be The Glory
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Think of it this way. If you have your family and everyone has pre-purchased a cemetary plot, or mausoleum
and ann earthquake came through and open the graves and mausoleum covers were dislodged and some how some... not all.. of your family were dislodged and somehow moved elsewhere.... that would mean that some, and not all of your family were moved.
And you having your own space there, BUT ARE STILL ALIVE, could well have tyour future resting place
all messed up.... But you are still alive.
Not everyone that would have been considered one of the saints was dead when Jesus was crucified.
Look at trhe deciples. Look at Mary. Look at John.
Now, if you run down the list of Mathew 27:52 in Bible Hub NOWHERE DOES IT SAY ALL THE TOMBS. Also NOWHERE DOES IT SAY THE TOMBS OF ALL THE SAINTS.
It could be that only some tombs were opened. Those that were going to be raised that day.
Why only some? I have no idea and will not try to second guess God.... omly to say that some of the alleged saints or alledged holy people might not have been such.
EXAMPLE: Mother Teresa ( Did Mother Theresa believe in the gospel of Jesus Christ? | Christian Faith)
Here are some quotes:
If in coming face to face with God we accept Him in our lives, then we are converting. We become a better Hindu, a better Muslim, a better Catholic, a better whatever we are. … What God is in your mind you must accept.
Mother Teresa: Her People and Her Work, by Desmond Doig, (Harper & Row, 1976), p.156. Dated: 1976
I love all religions. … If people become better Hindus, better Muslims, better Buddhists by our acts of love, then there is something else growing there.” She upheld that there are many ways to God': “All is God–Buddists, Hindus, Christians, etc., all have access to the same God.”
Time pp 11, 13. Dated: 4th December 1989
Whether you are a Hindu, a Moslem or a Christian, how you live your life is the proof that you are fully his or not. We must not condemn or judge or pass words that will hurt people. Maybe a person has never heard of Christianity. We do not know what way God is appearing to that soul and what way God is drawing that soul, and therefore who are we to condemn anybody? It matters to the individual what church he belongs to. If that individual thinks and believes that this is the only way to God for her or him, this is the way God comes into their life — his life. If he does not know any other way and if he has no doubt so that he does not need to search then this is his way to salvation. This is the way God comes into his life. Life in the Spirit: Reflections, Meditations and Prayers
Book: by Mother Teresa entitled: Life in the Spirit: Reflections, Meditations and Prayers. p82 Published: July 1983.
AND SHE IS ALREADY A SAINT............. Inspite of Jesus
Jesus said, "I am the Way, the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father, but by me."
(John 14:6)
No one is qualified to correct Jesus on this matter. No one.
But I digress....
As much as I do not really like the NIV, partially because it is seemingly written like a first grade primer, this is their quote on this seems pretty clear.
52and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life.
compared to Strong's KJV
52And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose,
Split Rocks, Open Tombs, Raised Bodies
Jesus’s body was not the first raised and the stone to his tomb was not the first moved on Easter weekend. What happened in the Jerusalem graveyards?
www.desiringgod.org
Split Rocks, Open Tombs, Raised Bodies
What Happened in the Graveyards Outside Jerusalem?
Death Is the Ground of Resurrection
We usually think of the resurrection of Christ, not the death of Christ, as the ground of the resurrection of our bodies. And it is true that if Christ were not raised, we would not be raised. “He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies” (Romans 8:11).But Matthew surprisingly (though not uniquely) puts the emphasis on the death of Jesus as opening the tombs and giving life to our mortal bodies. Not all bodies. But “many.” The resurrection of God’s people is future. But this was a foretaste. A trailer.
To be sure, Paul calls Jesus’s resurrection “the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep” (1 Corinthians 15:20) — meaning that Jesus’s resurrection is part of the final resurrection of all his people. So, ours is as sure to happen as his has surely happened. It is all one harvest.
But Matthew shows something different. Not contradictory, but different. He says that when Jesus died, and before the resurrection of Jesus, tombs were opened, and bodies of saints were raised. That is the most natural way to read the flow of his words:
Even though it sounds very strange, Matthew locates the raising of the bodies of the saints at the death of Jesus, and their coming out of the tombs and entering Jerusalem after the resurrection. The phrase “after his resurrection” (μετὰ τὴν ἔγερσιν αὐτοῦ) does not naturally modify “many bodies of the saints were raised” — as if the bodies of the saints were raised only after Jesus’s body was raised. Rather, it most naturally modifies “having come out of the tombs . . . they entered the holy city” (καὶ ἐξελθόντες ἐκ τῶν μνημείων μετὰ τὴν ἔγερσιν αὐτοῦ εἰσῆλθον εἰς τὴν ἁγίαν πόλιν): “ . . . and having come out of the tombs after his resurrection they went into the holy city.”
It seems to me that Matthew is showing us the foundational and essential power of the death of Jesus as the cause of resurrection life in natural bodies, while affirming the Pauline truth that the resurrection of Jesus is also necessary for the full public experience of our physical resurrection — bodies raised at Jesus’s death, bodies out of the tombs and into the city at Jesus’s resurrection.
Many Saints Seen by Many
One last statement in the sequence of seven remains: “. . . and [they] appeared to many” (Matthew 27:53). “Many” raised saints are seen by “many.” In other words, this was not a solitary visionary experience of some dreamer. This was many raised bodies appearing to many living inhabitants of Jerusalem. It was real, physical, and public. That is what it will be in the last day, when we are raised.Every living creature on the earth is a soul. Every soul has both a body and spirit. The only way for a soul to utterly perish is to be altogether without life. That happens when both the body and spirit the soul is comprised of die. There are examples of souls who have physically died being in heaven. You can look them up yourself.
Rev 6 is not reference to living souls in heaven. Because they had not yet ascended to heaven, but after they died in faith they were said to be under the altar. To be under the altar is to believe in the Messiah who was to come. These souls physically died knowing the promised Messiah who was to come would set them free from bondage to the grave (Abraham's bosom) they were captives to. They won't ascend to heaven until Christ descends into the lower parts of the earth (grave/Abraham's bosom) to set them free. This cannot happen before Christ comes and makes atonement for sin, and defeats death. Christ did this after His resurrection, before ascending to heaven.
Ephesians 4:8-10 (KJV) Wherefore he saith, When he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men. (Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth? He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things.)
Now that the dead are raised... Seems something has changed, because the dead who were not raised before are now raised up. Because Christ has come, and made atonement for sin, and defeated death by His cross and resurrection. After His resurrection, as I've repeatedly stated, Christ went into the graves that held these faithful saints to set them free, taking them with Him spiritually alive to heaven, where they NOW are not the dead, but living souls in heaven, a spiritual body of believers. This includes even those saints of Old such as Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. BECAUSE GOD IS THE GOD OF THE LIVING, NOT THE DEAD!
Luke 20:37-38 (KJV) Now that the dead are raised, even Moses shewed at the bush, when he calleth the Lord the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. For he is not a God the dead, but of the living: for all live unto him.
The only part of the souls left in the graves after death is the physical body. Because every spirit returns to God after the physical body dies. (Ecc 12:7) When the spirit in mankind returns to God after physical death, it will either be in silence and darkness OR a living soul belonging to a spiritual body of believers in heaven. Whether ascending to heaven in silence and darkness or a living soul is dependent upon whether or not the Spirit of Christ is within when we die. Because the Spirit of Christ promises to be with believers until the redemption of God's own possession that shall be our immortal & incorruptible living soul, complete again, as we were in the beginning.
Ephesians 1:13-14 (KJV) In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise, Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory.
That's why Christ had to literally, physically come to give His life a ransom for sin and defeat death by His resurrection. As a Lamb slain from the foundation of the world is via promise that which was ordained in heaven before creation would not fail, but would come to pass when Christ, the promised Messiah came.
Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
“But we are of good courage and would prefer to be absent from the body and to make our home with the Lord.”...where is there mention of the soul here? Where is “home” for the elect?
Paul was speaking about the time when Christ would return to take his anointed ones “home”....the place he went to “prepare a place” for them. Flesh and blood cannot exist in the spirit realm where God and his angels reside, so they have to be transformed so as to be given a new body.....one that can exist in the spirit world. That is what it means to be “born again”......
“Your dead ones will live. . . . Awake and cry out joyfully, you residents in the dust! . . . And the earth will let those powerless in death come to life.” (Isaiah 26:19)
Not all Christians are “born again”....only those “chosen from among mankind” (Rev 14:1-5) will have the privilege of ruling with Christ in heaven. (Rev 20:6) Rulers need subjects, and priests need sinners for whom to offer their priestly services.....so who will they rule.....and for whom will they act as priests?
Nowhere does the Bible say that there is any fault with God’s creation itself. There is no reason to destroy the universe for the defection of humans on earth, or even the angels who followed satan into rebellion.
It is those element that will be removed from existence so that God’s original purpose for this earth and mankind upon it can be restored.
Isa 45:18...
“For this is what Jehovah says,
The Creator of the heavens, the true God,
The One who formed the earth, its Maker who firmly established it,
Who did not create it simply for nothing, but formed it to be inhabited:
“I am Jehovah, and there is no one else.”
What God starts...he finishes. (Isa 55:11)
David in NJ
Well-Known Member
“But we are of good courage and would prefer to be absent from the body and to make our home with the Lord.”
Straight-Forward Truth
Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
Since I do not know of any scripture where “living souls” are said to be “in heaven”, you will need to cite the passages that say so.
“The lower parts of the earth” is a reference to what? Not “Abraham’s bosom”. That is not a place but a position of favour with God. It has reference to reclining at a meal where the one closest to the “bosom” (chest) of the one next to him was in a position of favour....a more intimate position for conversation with a close companion. The “bosom of Abraham” indicates such a position of favour with God.
If you read Eph 4:4-10 in context, you will see what Paul meant....He is speaking of those with the “calling” (Heb 3:1)
“4 There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling;
5 One Lord, one faith, one baptism,
6 One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.
7 But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ.
8 Wherefore he saith, When he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men.
9 (Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth?
10 He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things.)” (KJV)
Jesus came from heaven to “the lower parts of the earth” and then, after his mission was completed, he “ascended up far above” our physical heavens, to return to his Father. The “captives” were those taken from the devil’s clutches....snatched away from the corrupted Jewish religious system.
Jesus died in exactly the same manner as any other mortal human.
He was confined in that grave for three days and nights just as Jonah was confined in the belly of the fish. (Matt 16:4; Matt 12:40) He did not go anywhere because he was not resurrected until the three days had elapsed. He was not resurrected bodily because that body had been sacrificed. He was raised as a spirit, ready to return to heaven in the spirit body he had before his human birth. ( 1 Peter 3:18)
The scriptures tell us that he “appeared” to many during that time in physical form, but not always in the same body, which could appear and disappear at will. (Luke 24:31)
I’m sorry, but where does it say that? Since a “soul” is a living, breathing earth bound creature, there are no “souls” in heaven. Those who inhabit the spirit realm are spirits.
The faithful ones of old are still in their graves awaiting their promised resurrection to an earth restored by the rule of God’s kingdom. They had no expectation of going to heaven. That possibility was opened up only when Messiah came and chose those who would form its very foundation...his 12 apostles. (Rev 21:14)
No human goes to heaven unless they are chosen for a role in God’s Kingdom......as “kings and priests” (Rev 20:12) Obviously not every Christian can fill those positions because we would have “all chiefs and no Indians”. Kings need subjects and priests need sinner in order to perform their duties. There are no sinners in heaven.
Nowhere does the Bible say that a spiritual part of man is distinct from his body and can live consciously without it. (Eccl 9:5-6, 10) The whole person dies...not even love survives death.
A “soul” is a whole being. Nothing conscious lives on.....no scripture says that.
The “spirit” that returns to God is the ability of the Creator to again give life and breath to a dead soul in the resurrection. All your ideas count on the existence of an immortal soul that survives death. Anything apart from the fact that death ends life, (except for a chosen few) is unscriptural nonsense.
Again this is a failure to render scripture as it was written....God did not foreordain anything “from before creation”. Everything God made was pronounced “very good” and it would have stayed that way if only humans had obeyed God’s command.
The wording of that scripture is a reference to the foundation of the “cosmos”...which is not the physical earth or universe, but has the meaning of “laying down seed”....the beginning of the human race descended from the now defective human progenitors of all of us. God never intended for any of the events in Eden to take place, but because he gave all his intelligent creatures free will, he allowed them to make their choices after fully informing them of the dire consequences of disobedience. He then showed them what those consequence would mean in real life.....a slow and often painful descent into old age and death....and being at the mercy of those whose evil will was stronger than their own. (Eccl 8:9)
The angel who made himself “satan the devil” by his own rebellion, succeeded in tempting the woman to sin....she in turn tempted her husband who had the ability by his choice to change the course of what is now human history...but he chose badly and threw all of his children under the bus. We have to put the blame where it lies.....none of what happened is God’s fault. Free will was a gift to be properly exercised, but these three rebels turned it into a curse. God’s allowing humans to reap what they have sown is a powerful lesson for those who want to learn the importance of strict obedience to God.
Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
Is it? In context it doesn’t say what you want it to. Read the whole passage. To whom was this addressed? Not to all Christians, but to those of “the heavenly calling”. (Heb 3:1)
Why would Paul have to distinguish these ones if all had that “calling”?
1 Cor 1:2-3...Paul, in his first letter to the Corinthians addressed two groups of Christians....
“to the congregation of God that is in Corinth, to you who have been sanctified in union with Christ Jesus, called to be holy ones, together with all those everywhere who are calling on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord and ours:
3 May you have undeserved kindness and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.”
Anyone unaware of the distinction would read right over that introduction...straight forward truth...
Some are not “called to be holy ones” but are “together with” others who call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is “their Lord and ours”.....it’s right there in plain sight.
David in NJ
Well-Known Member
The direct unambiguous context says:
For we know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven, if indeed, having been clothed, we shall not be found naked. For we who are in this tent groan, being burdened, not because we want to be unclothed, but further clothed, that mortality may be swallowed up by life.
Now He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who also has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.
So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord.
For we walk by faith, not by sight.
We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord.
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