Page 149 - Apologetics Student Textbook

your lot through each lifetime. Finally, you have the possibility of arriving at an eternal state of
conscientiousness and pleasure for eternity. Some faiths teach that when you die, your soul goes to
sleep until the time of a future judgment. Job asked this question. “Man born of woman is of few days
and full of trouble. He springs up like a flower and withers away; like a fleeting shadow, he does not
endure....If a man dies, will he live again?” (Job 14:1-2, 14). We all seek to answer these questions:
Exactly what happens to us after we die? Do we simply cease to exist? Is life a revolving door of
departing and returning to earth in order to eventually achieve personal greatness? Does everyone go to
the same place, or do we go to different places? Is there really a heaven and hell?

Although there are many testimonies of people who have died, then returned to life again, no one
knows for certain what happens after a person dies. They only one who could possibly know is the One
who is eternal and not bound by time: God. And He has declared in His Word exactly what will happen
to everyone after death.

The Bible says that every man is an eternal being and has eternal life once he is born. The Bible declares
that every person will enjoy presence with God in heaven or he will be isolated from God in eternal hell.
It all depends on how He responds to Jesus Christ and what He has done for him on the cross.

God desires no person to be condemned in Hell. In fact, God desires every man to repent and be saved.
I Timothy 2:4 says that Christ “would have all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.”
Jesus Christ left eternity to provide a means for all to be saved. “But he was pierced for our
transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him,
and by his wounds we are healed” (Isaiah 53:5). Jesus took on the punishment that all of us deserve and
sacrificed His life to pay the penalty for our sin. Three days later, He proved Himself victorious over
death by rising from the grave. He remained on the earth for forty days and was witnessed by hundreds
before ascending to heaven. Romans 4:25 says, “He was delivered over to death for our sins and was
raised to life for our justification.”

The Bible declares that every person will die and following that event comes a time of judgment.
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Hebrews 9:27-28 says, “ And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes
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judgment, so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not
to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.

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When Jesus Christ went to the cross, the sins of every man were laid upon him. I John 2 says, He is the
propitiation (satisfaction) for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.
Jesus Christ became our substitutionary sacrifice for our sins. He shed His blood that we might be saved.
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II Corinthians 5:21 clarifies what He did for us: “ For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin,
so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

The Bible clearly lays out the fate of every man. John 3:16 says that a
person who exercises faith in what Christ accomplished on the cross will be
eternally saved from judgment. Those who have been made righteous by
faith in Christ will go into eternal life in heaven, but those who reject Christ
as Savior will be sent to eternal punishment in hell (Matthew 25:46). Hell,
like heaven, is not simply a state of existence, but a literal place. It is a place
where the unrighteous will experience never-ending, eternal wrath from
God. Hell is described as a bottomless pit (Luke 8:31; Revelation 9:1) and a
lake of fire, burning with sulfur, where the inhabitants will be tormented

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