If You Have Just Buried Someone
If you are reading this because someone you love has died, we are so sorry. Nothing here will make it stop hurting, and it is not meant to. Jesus stood at the tomb of a friend He was about to call back to life, and even there, Jesus wept (John 11:35).
Grief does not mean your faith has failed. It means you lost someone who mattered. Paul does not tell believers not to sorrow. He tells us not to sorrow even as others which have no hope (1 Thessalonians 4:13). You can have hope and still cry. God may not take the pain away soon, but He has promised comfort. He is the God of all comfort (2 Corinthians 1:3).
This article will not try to tell you why. There is rarely an answer to that question that helps. It will tell you what God has said about the question you may be asking in the quiet: where are they now? He has told us less than we would like, and more than many people know. We will go as far as Scripture goes, and stop where it stops.
The time between a person's death and the resurrection of his body. He is alive and conscious, apart from his body: the believer with Christ in joy, and the unbeliever in torment, both waiting for the resurrection.
This is the in-between. For the final state, see The Eternal State. For how body and soul fit together, see Body and Soul. For what God will do with the body, see Glorification.
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For Deeper Study
- Someone I Know Is Grieving: Responding with Humility and CompassionAmazon Edward T. WelchA short, practical book by a Reformed biblical counselor at CCEF on how to walk with someone in grief.
- One Minute After You DieAmazon Erwin W. LutzerAn evangelical pastor of the Moody Church in Chicago writes plainly on what the Bible says about death, heaven, and hell.
- Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy: Discovering the Grace of LamentAmazon Mark VroegopA pastor who lost a child teaches believers to grieve with the Psalms. Reformed.
- Body, Soul, and Life EverlastingAmazon John W. CooperA Reformed seminary professor's careful defense of the intermediate state from Scripture. More advanced.
- Foxe's Book of MartyrsAmazon John FoxeThe classic Protestant record of those who died for the faith, from the early church to the English Reformation.
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Body and Soul
God made each person body, soul, and spirit: one person made for embodied life, parted by death for a time, and made whole again in the resurrection.
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