Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
Good morning.
That was weak.
Are you tired already? - Nooooo
We still have a long day, you know.
It`s nice to be here, I`m trying to get caught up on my sleep.
I went to sleep at 3 O'clock in the morning
which is my regular Fresno time.
Because it`s seven hours earlier there, but I eventually did get some sleep.
So... God is good and it`s nice to be here with so many people who love the Lord
and love His word. Amen
Before we begin this moring we want to have a word of prayer
So I invite you to bow your heads with me as we pray
Father in Heaven we thank You for the awesome opportunity of being here in this place
to open Your word and to hear Your voice speaking through the ministration of Your Holy Spirit.
We ask Father that you will give us clearity of thought
that you will give us tender hearts
that You will give us the ability of sharing what we learn here today.
We ask for Your guidance
for in ourselves we can do nothing.
We thank You for hearing and answering our prayer for we ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.
The presentation I'm going make is found in your syllabus.
Under Adventist apologetics you will find the title three inseparable distinctive doctrines
and I have been asked to deal with the state of the dead.
But we are going to notice that there are two other doctriens
that must be studied together with the doctrine of the state of the dead.
And those two doctrines are:
the second coming and the judgment.
Now, ...you were able to find that in your syllabus? Yeaaah
Ok, are now going to follow it very carefully so you will be able to follow along, erm...
I`m basically going to do just what is in that material.
As you see at the beginning of your material
there are three Bible doctrines that are inseperably linked, or connected.
And they must be studied together.
If you get one of them wrong,
you will probably get the others wrong as well.
Those three doctrines are: the state of the dead, the judgment, and the second coming of Jesus.
Now... When as admentism and evangelism we speak about the state of the dead
we always begin with Genesis chapter 2 and verse 7.
So let`s begin there in our study Genesis chapter 2 and verse 7.
And notice several very important points of that verse.
It says there: "And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground..."
So man's physical nature is composed of dust.
But then we are told that in order for that body to function
in order for that material body to function
it was necessary to have a power-source. An energizing source.
And so it continues saying:
"and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul [being]."
So you will notice here that man is materially composed of dust
and then God energize that body of dust so that it could function
so that the lungs could breathe, the heart could pump
and all of the functions could be performed by that body.
Now, in our heads God placed a brain.
And the brain is the center of operations of the human nature.
It processes everything.
It makes decisions, it thinks, it calculates, it reasons.
In other words everything that comes into our brains is processed there and is recorded there.
You will notice that therefore as a person lives
what comes to the five senses
is indelibly recorded in our brains.
Now, we have studied what the Bible has to say about the origin of man
now let's ask another question:
What happens when a person dies?
Go with me to Ecclesiastes chapter 12 and verse 7.
Ecclesiastes chapter 12 and verse 7.
And you are going to notice that the phenomenon of death is the opposite of life.
It says there in this verse that we usually read when we talk about the state of the dead:
"Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was"
See the physical nature of man return to the dust as it was.
"and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it."
Now, I`d (would) like to dwell for a significant period of time in our study today
on what the Bible means by "the spirit".
Generally when we talk about the spirit we think that the spirit is just basically the breath of life.
When a person dies the breath goes out and returns to God.
But in our study we are going to notice that
the spirit is far deeper than what perhaps even adventists have seen before.
Let me frame it this way:
do you think that adam was a different person when he died at 930 years of age, than the day that he was created?
Very, very different.
What made the differnece?
The difference was that he had 930 years of experience
or personal identity, I choose to call it that way.
Personal identity.
In other words he was a collection of thoughts, and feelings,
and actions, and emotions - that he had during those 930 years.
He wrote his personal self-identity during those 930 years.
Now when a person dies, and we will talk spesifically about Adam as our example,
When Adam died his body along with the brain disintegrated into the dust.
His vital force left him, in other words he no longer had the energizing force
and therefore he died.
But the question is: what happened to the 930 years of personal identity,
personal self-identity that Adam formed while he was alive?
Now, this might be a strange question to you.
You know, maybe nobody has ever asked that question as you have noticed before.
What happened to the 930 years of accumulated self-identity of Adam when he died?
Well, the fact is that the Bible has an answert to that.
You see the Bible tells us that as we live
every single word, every single action, every single emotion,
every single feeling, every single aspect of our lives
is recorded in what the Bible calls 'the books'.
Now, let's read several biblical passages that speak about the books
I want you to notice is that the books contain the record of our lives.
Without missing absolutely anyting. Everything is there.
Every breath that we have taken is there, every action, every word,
every though, every feeling, every emotion inside and out
is recorded there in the books.
Notice 2 Corinthians chapter 5 and verse 10.
2 Corinthians chapter 5 and verse 10.
We will come back to this a little bit later.
For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ;
that every one may receive the things done in his body, that means while we're alive
the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad."
Question: Are we all going to have to face, some day,
what we did in the body wheter it was good or bad?
According to 2 Corinithians 5 verse 10. Yes.
So does God keep a record of our works that we did within the body?
Absolutely.
Also our words, notice Matthew chapter 12 verse 36 and 37.
Matthew chapter 12 verse 36 and 37.
By the wall all of these texts are printed out in your material.
I knew that we would have to go quickly
so I wasn't going to take the time to look for the text in the Bible
but they are all written here.
Notice what Jesus said:
"But I say unto you, That for every..