Mike,

Thanks for the information on Paul being willing to leave. I understand that when we are dead, back to dust we go. However, what about our spirit? Where does it go and stay until the judgment or in the meantime?

Thanks so much,

S____

Hi S____,

Thanks for your question. Ask yourself where Adam’s spirit was before he was created. To show Job just how ignorant he really was about who God really is and how God operates in man’s world, God asked Job a very revealing question. The answer to this question is the answer to your question:

Job 38:1 Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind, and said,
Job 38:2 Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without knowledge?
Job 38:3 Gird up now thy loins like a man; for I will demand of thee, and answer thou me.
Job 38:4 Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? declare, if thou hast understanding.
Job 38:5 Who hath laid the measures thereof, if thou knowest? or who hath stretched the line upon it?

The obvious implicit answer to this question is that Job did not yet exist except in God’s foreknowledge. So it is with us.

Here is another way of answering the same question:

Ecc 12:7 Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it.

We did not exist until we were born, even though the spirit that gives us life was in the Father. Likewise we will not exist after death, until we are resurrected and at that time given spiritual bodies.

No one, spiritual or otherwise, has ever ascended to heaven:

Joh 3:13 And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven.

Yes, we “are seated with Christ in the heavens” even now, but when we die we are dead until the resurrection. And without that resurrection then ‘they which are asleep in Christ are perished.”

Eph 2:6 And hath raised us up together, a nd made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus:
Eph 2:7 That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.
1Co 15:17 And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins.
1Co 15:18 Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished.

I hope this is of some value to you.

Mike