Brethren, beware of the occult paganism of the Canaanites. They have some very ancient teachings that are still around today, and they go against God's Word.
One of their beliefs about death is that our 'spirit' while in our flesh body is like a drop of water separated from the Great Ocean (their label, not mine). While in a flesh body it manifests as an individual, having all the awareness and consciousness of its self. Then at death that drop of water goes back into the Great Ocean and no longer has any individual conscious existence. It becomes "one with the Cosmic" they might say. As a matter of fact, they teach the idea of becoming 'one' with the universe, or cosmic, a lot, even while alive in a flesh body (definitely an eastern religious idea from ancient Sumer, the earliest seat of idol Baal devil worship on earth).
How is that belief of the old Canaanites very much like the false belief some today have with thinking our spirit/soul dies with our flesh body at flesh death? It is the same... idea. If our spirit dissolves back into the Great Ocean at flesh death, then one might as well say we are gone, no more individual existence.
Early on in God's Word, in Eccl.12:5-7, we are shown what happens at flesh death. A "silver cord" is severed and our flesh goes back to the earthly elements where it came from. But our 'spirit' goes back to God Who gave it. What do you think those Canaanites think that 'spirit' is? They think it is just some animating principle that all living things have, even plants and animals. In other words, 'you' literally no longer exist at flesh death, that is what they believe, and that... is their idea I mentioned before about the individual being like a drop of water out of the Great Ocean while alive in a flesh body, but is dissolved back into the Great Ocean at death of the flesh. Yet that is NOT what God's Word reveals what happens, thankfully. That may be what Satan wants God's people to believe, simply because Satan already knows he is destined to perish and be no more, but that is not what our Heavenly Father and His Son want us to believe, and His Word shows us.
Even with this Scripture they cannot see that the 'soul' is a separate existing thing apart from flesh, even after flesh death:
Acts 2:30-31
30 Therefore being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him, that of the fruit of his loins, according to the flesh, he would raise up Christ to sit on his throne;
31 He seeing this before spake of the resurrection of Christ, that His soul was not left in hell, neither His flesh did see corruption.
KJV
The word "hell" there is Greek haides, put for the place of the dead in that other dimension that exists behind a veil, i.e., the heavenly dimension. It uses that word because that's the only concept in the Greek language that existed to explain the idea of an underworld of the dead in the heavenly dimension.
In 1 Peter 3 we are told Jesus at His resurrection went to that place, and preached to the "spirits in prison". The Isaiah 42:7 prophecy was that He would lead out prisoners from the prison house, which is about Satan's pit prison in haides.
The idea that Jesus' flesh body would not see corruption means it would not be left in the tomb to decay.
So right there in Acts 2 we are given 2 separate concepts about flesh death, even using our Lord Jesus' resurrection as an example with the difference that His flesh body was not allowed to decay in a hole in the ground (or tomb if you like), whereas, our flesh body will be subject to decay when our flesh body dies. The operation His 'soul' was subject to is shown as a totally different working than a flesh body.
Even Apostle Paul let it slip just a little as to what is actually saved in the future world to come...
1 Cor 5:4-5
4 In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ,
5 To deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.
KJV
Paul was rebuking those at Corinth because they had allowed one to dwell among them that was having sexual intercourse with his mother. So Paul gave a judgment to that one. That "spirit" is Greek pneuma (current of air; the rational soul - no.4154). That "day of the Lord Jesus" is another title for the "day of the Lord", which begins with the day of Jesus' return and continues for a thousand years per Revelation 20. What that is showing is individual existence apart... from the flesh, and more importantly, just what it is that is saved by our Lord Jesus unto eternal Life, i.e., our spirit/soul, not our flesh.
