I was at a funeral for a departed Christian friend, listening to a number of different speakers giving their reflections upon her life and what her experience would be after her death. One speaker declared that, even though she was dead, we know that right now she is dancing in the streets of heaven. Another speaker declared that, after her death, the next thing she will be aware of is waking up to the resurrection when Jesus comes again. No one commented on the fact that these two speakers had articulated two very different understandings of the Christain hope of eternal life, two understandings which directly contradict one another.
According to the first speaker’s view, Christian hope is spatial; it has to do with our souls leaving this world and going to a different world: heaven. According to the second speaker’s view, Christian hope is temporal; it has to do with awaiting the future resurrection, when our bodies will be raised from the dead to live forever in this world, when God makes all things new. Which of these understandings of Christian hope is correct? Answering this question is not merely an exercise in theological speculation; it has very practical implications for how Christians live out their Christian identity in the here and now.
Afterlife in the Old Testament
In most of the Old Testament, there is no real concept of an afterlife. This statement may come as a surprise to many people who assume that the central idea of Christianity, or even of “religion” in general, is going to heaven when you die. Yet a careful reading of the Old Testament will show that this statement is true. The Old Testament has no concept of people’s “souls” going to heaven or hell when they die. Instead, the Old Testament speaks of people who die entering into Sheol, a somewhat fuzzy term that can mean either “the realm of the dead,” or simply the grave. Sheol is, properly speaking, not an “afterlife”; its inhabitants, though continuing to have some sort of shadowy pseudo-existence, are dead.
It is important not to confuse the concept of Sheol with the concept of Hell. Sheol is not a place of punishment. In fact, the Old Testament is clear that both the righteous and the wicked enter Sheol when they die, without any differentiation. Many Christians assume that the souls of righteous people have always gone to heaven to be in God’s presence when they die, but this is contrary to what the Old Testament says. According to a number of Old Testament passages, those who are dead are not in the presence of God, and are unable to know and praise Him (Eccl 9: 5-10; Ps 6:5, 30: 8-9; Isa 38:18). Sheol is a place away from the presence of God, and God forbids His people from attempting to have contact with the dead who are there (Lev 19:31, 20: 6-7; Deut 18:10-11).
Old Testament religion was not focused on an afterlife, but on God’s relationship with His covenant people Israel in this world. The Old Testament speaks numerous times about God saving people from Sheol (Ps 16:10, 30:3, 49:15, 86:13), but these are references to God saving someone from the threat of dying, not to God taking someone’s soul out of Sheol into heaven. There are a few clear references to eternal life in the Old Testament (Isa 26: 19, Dan 12:2), but they are references to a future bodily resurrection, not to people’s souls going to heaven when they die.
It should be stressed that the Old Testament hope of the resurrection is grounded and centered in God’s covenant relationship with His people Israel. God’s faithful people who have suffered and died for Him will one day be raised from the dead so that they can enjoy the blessings God has promised to His covenant people in this world; in this way, God’s righteousness and faithfulness will be vindicated. The Old Testament hope of the resurrection is very much this-worldly; it is not about going to heaven when you die, but about a blessed life in this world in the future.
Afterlife in the New Testament
The idea of resurrection, a relatively late and minor theme in the Old Testament, becomes absolutely central in the New Testament. Jesus’s death and resurrection are the center and foundation of all of New Testament theology, and the Christian hope that those who believe in Jesus are raised with Him and will experience their own resurrection is central for the New Testament’s teaching about Christian identity. In the New Testament, the afterlife thus takes center stage. However, as in the Old Testament, it is a concept of afterlife that is very much this-worldly: a blessed, embodied life in this world in the future.
Many Christians assume that the New Testament is about how to get your soul to go to heaven when you die. But if we study the Gospels, we see that Jesus did not go around preaching about such things. Instead, He went around telling people to repent because God’s Kingdom was near; it was about to be established on earth as in heaven. Jesus certainly speaks of eternal life, but it is an eternal life of resurrected existence in this world, not of eternal life of souls in heaven. The rest of the New Testament is right in line with Jesus’s teachings, focusing on God’s righteousness, the establishment of His Kingdom in this world, and the hope of bodily resurrection, rather than an eternal life of disembodied souls in heaven.
Building on the prophet Isaiah’s vision of God making a new heavens and a new earth, in which all nations will worship Him (Isa 66: 22-23), the New Testament teaches a message of hope not just for human beings, but for all of creation. According to the apostle Paul, when Jesus comes again, “The creation itself will also be set free from the bondage of corruption into the glorious freedom of God’s children” (Rom 8:20). The book of Revelation presents a vision, not of the church leaving earth to go to heaven, but of God bringing about a new heaven and a new earth (Rev 21:1-4), and of the church dwelling on this earth in God’s presence forever (Rev 21:9-22:5). God will one day make all things new, freeing His creation from every trace of sin, suffering, decay, death, and evil, and humanity will be able to carry out its role as divine image-bearers in God’s creation. Heaven and earth will be joined, and God’s glory will infuse all of creation. This is the Christian hope.
Conclusion
A careful reading of Scripture shows that Christian hope is not spatial; it is not about our souls leaving this world and going to heaven. Christian hope is temporal; it is about awaiting a future resurrection to a blessed, embodied life in this world. But if Christian hope is about our future resurrection, what happens to us or to our souls in between our death and resurrection?
On this question, the New Testament is somewhat vague. Some Christians have believed our souls “sleep” in the realm of the dead until we wake up at the resurrection. Other Christians have believed that the souls of dead Christians reside in heaven, in God’s presence, awaiting the resurrection. It is difficult to be certain. It could be the case that, although the souls of Old Testament saints went to Sheol when they died, the union that Christians have with Christ causes their souls to instead reside in heaven in between their death and resurrection. In any case, even if the souls of Christians do go to heaven when they die, this is merely an intermediate step on the way to a future bodily resurrection, which is the true Christian hope. It makes no sense to say that a dead Christian is currently dancing in the streets of heaven, when we can see her dead body lying right there. Disembodied souls cannot dance. We are embodied beings, and we require both soul and body to be fully alive and fully ourselves. Our real Christian hope is not going to heaven when we die; it is our future bodily resurrection.
There are important practical implications of this understanding of Christian hope. If Christian hope is about our souls escaping from this world and going to heaven, then this world ultimately does not matter. This would mean that we should only care about “saving souls,” and dispense with all attempts to make this world a better place.
But if Christian hope is about God renewing all of creation and our participation in that through bodily resurrection, then this world does truly matter. This means that working to make this world a better place in the here and now is not a distraction from the Christian vocation, but is absolutely central to that vocation. It means that evangelizing, “saving souls,” caring for God’s creation, and working to further justice in the present cannot be pitted against each other; rather, they are inextricably interconnected aspects of a holistic Christian vocation of being agents of God’s New Creation. Genuine, Biblical Christian hope does not lead us to complacency regarding present-day problems; instead, it energizes us to work to advance God’s Kingdom in the present, knowing that the victory is ultimately assured.