Then what?

I had a discussion with a relative some years ago which brought back something I had wondered about since childhood. I hear bereaved people say things like "I know he's in a better place now", or "I'm not worried because I know she's in Heaven now" and I used to wonder why they thought that. My relative was saying how she does believe there are such things as ghosts but she doesn't believe that everyone who dies becomes a ghost because otherwise her father (who passed when she was a teenager) would have intervened in her life in some way and prevented past misfortunes from befalling her.

Before we had this discussion, I thought of ghosts as a useless topic. I never thought of a ghost as something that could actually offer comfort to someone. My relative would have felt better knowing that her father's ghost was with her, looking out for her. She made me realise that people don't always see ghosts as scary. At the same time, I realised how focused human beings, even Christians, can become on the here and now.

How do you know what happens to people when they die? The Bible really is sufficient and as I grew up and fell a little more in love with searching the scriptures, the answer became so clear.

According to the Lord's own word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left till the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will come down from heaven...and the dead in Christ will rise first...And so we will be with the Lord forever (1 Thessalonians 4:15-17)

So if I'm reading this right, when people die, they don't go anywhere. They neither go to heaven nor hell, that's for sure. Like the living, they must first face Judgement Day. We may know this but choose to comfort ourselves with the thought of our loved ones sitting up in heaven already, smiling down at us. But so then what happens to our spirits while we wait for Judgement Day?

Is it possible that we become ghosts then? No, because the author of Hebrews says that "man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgement"(9:27). We're not doing anything. We're not watching over our loved ones or protecting them because we don't become angels when we die. We're only waiting. It figures because for God, a day is like a 1000 years and a 1000 years like a day (2 Peter 3:8) so we're probably not waiting very long.

It's important that Christians are realistic about physical death and what happens after because it's inevitable; and by realistic, I mean Bible-informed. One thing we know for sure is that whether our bodies are alive or dead, our spirits and souls are conscious and we can find true comfort in knowing that "Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints"(Ps. 116:15). Dead or alive, God cherishes His children.