Checkpoint wrote:
PinSeeker wrote:3. Second Death -- many will experience this at the day of Christ, the Judgment, resulting in spiritual death extending into eternity -- the age to come); this is the inevitable consequence for those who fail in this life to repent of sin and believe and accept Christ as Lord and Savior
myth-one wrote:You say the Second Death results in "spiritual death" extending eternally.
And you state that "spiritual death" is the natural state of all people born into this world in the present age.
So those experiencing your "Second Death" will simply continue the life they are living now, except that it will continue for all eternity.
Presumably you do not agree this is Christianity 101.
How do you connect "spiritually dead" with what comes later to the spiritually dead, The Second Death?
There is a physical body and a spiritual body, and they are never mixed together.
Physical bodies are born of other flesh and bone physical bodies.
Spiritual bodies are born of the Spirit. God is the Father Spirit.
Physical bodies require physical feedback to survive in the physical world -- pain, hunger, thirst, sight, touch, love, lust, etc.
Severe denial of feedback will drive most physical bodies to commit sins. A starving person may steal food, for example. So mankind is designed with tendencies to sin.
Physical bodies will perish and spiritual bodies will live forever.
Death only applies to physical beings. And it applies to all physical beings.
Death: the act of dying; the end of life; the total and permanent cessation of all the vital functions of an animal or plant.
It is appointed to all mankind once to die.
But all mankind will be resurrected again to life.
Therefore, our first physical death is not truly a death as it is not permanent.
Consequently, our first "death" is often described in the scriptures as sleep, slumber, or rest.
Once a spiritual bodied being is born, it lives forever.
So there is no such "thing" as a dead spirit. For example, God cannot "kill" the devil because God created the devil as a spirit.
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But the word spirit or its derivatives are often used in other connotations to confuse, mystify, mislead, and help seal the scriptures from our understanding.
One example of this is the use of the term "spiritual death."
Since spirits are immortal, there is no such thing as the death of a spiritual body.
The definition of spiritual death is generally given as being the "total separation from the presence of God."
But God is everywhere, so once again this is quickly determined to be a foolish contradiction.
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The real question is why was the term "spiritual death" ever created.
Man fears the unknown. One obvious fear is death. Death cannot be tried out on a test basis. You are either dead or alive.
We see dead bodies and know we will end up likewise. The part we do not understand is our personalities, our thinking processes, our emotions, our non-physical processes. These are the processes which many believe separates us from the other animals. We even give it a name, calling it our "soul" or "spirit" and assigning to each soul or spirit eternal life.
So we allay our fear of death by denying it -- claiming that we live forever.
Thus we are the perfect victim for the lie of Satan that "Ye shall not surely die."
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So in fact, there is no such thing as being "spiritually dead."
I suppose that one can come in and out of Christianity -- by gaining or losing faith.
So "spiritually alive" or "spiritually dead" might be used in that context.
But these terms are totally unnecessary otherwise.
Since spirits live forever, there is no such thing as a dead spirit.
Since spirits live forever, there is no reason to ever specify that they are alive.
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The "Second Death" is the physical death of nonbelievers cast into the lake of fire.
It happens quickly and is everlasting.
Actually, this is their first and only death as their "first" death was not death at all, because it was not permanent.
There is no connection of "spiritually dead" to the second death.
The dead are dead to everything -- knowing and having awareness of absolutely nothing.
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Nice to meet you, Checkpoint!
