Racheal

Behind the Law stands God, the source of that Law, whose character is reflected in that Law....because God is God He has the right to command whatever He will of His creatures. (515-516)

"The moral Law in man is a copy of the Divine nature, and what God wills in the moral Law is so “consonant to that eternall justice and goodness in Himself,” that any supposed abrogation of that Law would mean that God would “deny
His own justice and goodnesse” [Burgess]. “To find fault with the Law, were to find fault with God” [Venning], for “the original draft is in God himself” [Manton]." 
4. Kevan, The Grace of Law, 63, partially in quotation of Burgess, Venning, and Manton. (516)

Our obligation to obey God is rooted in our creaturehood before our Creator: “O come let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord our Maker” (Ps. 95:6). However, our obligation is intensified, not lessened, by virtue of our redemption in Christ by grace, because “From everyone who has been given much, much will be required” (Lk. 12:48). Having been bought with the price of Christ’s precious blood, we are not our own, therefore we are now to glorify God in the entirety of our lives (1 Cor. 6:20). (517)

The will of God is one, and yet the Bible teaches us to distinguish between the secret things in that will and the things revealed, therefore we speak of the secret will of God and the revealed will of God, always conscious of the fact that we are not speaking of two wills, but of revealed distinctions in God’s will. God’s “revealed
will” is that which prescribes WHAT WE SHOULD DO (Matt. 7:21; 12:50; John 4:34; 7:17; Rom. 12:2); and God’s “secret will” is that which declares WHAT GOD WILL DO, or WHAT GOD HAS DECREED (Ps. 115:3; Dan. 4:17, 25, 32, 35; Rom. 9:18, 19; Eph. 1:5, 9, 11; Rev. 4:11)....This “expressed will” is the moral law of God which is to be our rule of life forever. (517-518)

In no way are God’s secret will and His revealed will working against each other or in opposition to each other. They are two harmonious aspects of the will of God. (518)

Those who are recipients of God’s mercy in Jesus Christ are urged to present [their] bodies a living and holy sacrifice to God. Obedience in behavior means nothing without this presentation of our bodies to God, i.e., everything we are inside and out—the whole person—must be devoted to the God of mercy and to His service. (520)

“It is a body alive from the dead that the believer is to present, alive from the dead because the body of sin has been destroyed.… It is possible that the word “living” also reflects on the permanence of this offering, that it must be a constant dedication.” 8. Murray, The Epistle to the Romans, 2:111. (521)

Our devotion an obedience do not begin with behavior, but with the very center of
our consciousness. (522)

"He has told you, O man, what is good,” i.e., what the Lord requires of you, [Micah] 6:8. (524)

The central point here is that man knows for certain what God requires of Him, he knows the good he is to do and the evil he is to avoid, because God has told him, i.e., He has revealed in His written Word what He requires of man, what is good, and what His will is for us to follow. What has God told us to do?
First, He has told us to “do justice.” The Hebrew word here is mishpat, “to judge.” To judge, or to do justice is an activity of discrimination and vindication. It is the process of discerning between right and wrong, condemning what is wrong and obeying and vindicating what is right. More specifically, since the judgment is God’s
(Deut. 1:17), the standard by which we distinguish between good and evil and identify what is required of us is in what He has revealed, i.e., in the Biblical revelation. ...

Second, He has told us to “love kindness.”...We are not only to be kind, show mercy, and be faithful, but we are to love to be kind, to show mercy and be faithful, so as to take pleasure and delight in it. And it is kindness (chesed) that we are to love. ...

The Hebrew word chesed is one of the most important words in the Old Testament, translated a variety of ways into English: kindness, mercy, love, lovingkindness, loyalty, righteousness, faithfulness, devotion. It denotes “loving covenant-bond loyalty and faithfulness.” ....
Third, He has told us to “walk humbly with [our] God.”...We walk with Him not so that He might be our God, but we walk with Him because He is our God by grace through faith....To walk with God humbly is to walk with Him submissively and obediently, recognizing His glorious majesty and beautiful holiness, and our depravity and wretchedness and need of His Son as our Savior. (524-527)

God-honoring moral conduct is more than correct ceremonial form. It is futile to attempt to rely on rituals and sacrifices when what God requires of us is obedience to His revealed will. (528)

Because the Law of God originates with a rational God, that Law is rational and reasonable, although fallen man, unaided by revelation, cannot discover or submit to it—because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for “it does not subject itself to the Law of God, for it is not even able to do so” (Rom. 8:7). (531)

Human beings not only stand in accountability before God’s Law, they have an inner moral awareness that they so stand before that Law. This is saying more than the fact that human beings are created self-conscious beings. In addition to self-consciousness and rationality, human beings were created as recipients of the revelation of the moral relation in which they stood. They were given a
conscience.....That Law was “engraved,” “imprinted,” “written,” as an “inscription” on their hearts. (531)

All human beings since Adam possess a conscience that condemns them when they go against it and defends them when they follow it, because the work of the Law [is] written in their hearts. “Man’s inherent sense of right and wrong, [although blurred by sin and suppressed by him in unrighteousness], is due to the fact that
he cannot escape the claims of the Law of God [written in his conscience].” 27. G. I. Williamson, The Westminster Confession of Faith For Study Classes (Philadelphia, PA: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1964), 138. (532)

"There is therefore a two-fold writing in the hearts of men; the first, of knowledge and judgment, whereby they apprehend what is good and bad: the second is in will and affections, by giving a propensity and delight, with some measure of strength, to do this upon good grounds."  29. Anthony Burgess, quoted in Kevan, The Grace of Law, 59. (532)

God revealed His Law to Adam. He spoke the creation mandates to him, and He inscribed His Law on his conscience. If, as Romans 2:14–15 teaches, human beings after the fall have the work of God’s Law written on their consciences, how much more clearly and perfectly would unfallen Adam have that Law written on his
heart. (532-533)

...according to the Confession, the Law God gave Adam was the Law of the Ten Commandments, later published in stone. (533)

This Law given to Adam, in its moral demands, has never been abrogated and stands for all people everywhere as summarized in the Ten Commandments. (534)

     Racheal

The water is hard, can you tell?

     Racheal

     Racheal

The resurrection of Jesus Christ is the guarantee of the Christian hope of resurrection. It was the great event that demonstrated that death really is conquered (1 Thess. 4:14). (465)

Verse 14 also tells us that when Christ returns He will “bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus.”...Christ’s “coming with His saints” is not to be separated from His “coming for His saints.” The Second Coming will be both with and for His redeemed people.
In verse 15, where Paul says that “we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep,” he is saying that those who will be alive at Christ’s Coming will have no advantage over those believers who have died before His Coming. (465)

(1) The one who will come again is no less than “the Lord Himself” incarnate. ...
(2) The Lord’s Second Coming will be one of majesty and honor. ....
(3) The faithful departed will be raised from the dead before those who are alive at the time when Christ returns.
(4) Then, when the believing dead are raised, those believers who are alive at the Second Coming “shall be caught up together with them in the clouds.” ...
(5) When the Lord comes, all believers, resurrected and living, “shall be caught up…in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.” The verb translated “caught up” means “to seize, to carry off by a force that cannot be resisted.”...As John Calvin said, “As a field marshal gathers his armies to battle by the sound of the trumpet, so Christ will
summon all the dead with a voice that rings and resounds throughout the whole world.”186 ...
(6) At the Second Coming of Christ, all believers will “meet the Lord.” The word “meet” denotes “the formal reception of a newly arriving king or governor,” and it implies the “welcome of a great person upon his arrival.” ....
(7) When Christ comes all believers will “meet the Lord in the air.” The significance of the meeting place being in “the air” is that in the New Testament the abode of demons is “the air,” for Satan is “the prince of the powers of the air” (Eph. 2:2). “The
fact that the Lord chooses to meet His saints there, on the demons’ home ground so to speak, shows something of His complete mastery over them.”187
(8) At the Second Coming, all believers will be “caught up… in the clouds” with Christ. Christ’s Ascension and His Return are accompanied with “clouds.”...In both testaments the clouds of heaven are a symbol of God’s presence, judgment and salvation. They point us to the “glory cloud,” the Shekinah glory, the pillar of fire, the radiant visualization of the glory of God, that on occasion filled the Temple, and which was the vivid sign of His favorable presence with His people. ...
(9) “And so we shall always be with the Lord.” ....
(10) We are to “comfort one another with these words.” We are to strengthen one another’s hands with these truths. This good news should move us to seek one another out to strengthen one another in Christ. Death makes no difference to our relationship to God in Christ!
186. Morris, The First and Second Epistles to the Thessalonians, 145; ftnt.
#64.
187. Morris, The First and Second Epistles to the Thessalonians, 146. 
(466-468)

"And He will put the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on the left (Matt. 25:33)."
The royal and multiracial race of the redeemed in Christ will on that day be eternally and totally segregated from the depraved and multiracial race of the damned in Adam. The redeemed shall forever live under the reign of grace, and the damned shall forever live under the reign of sin and death, for all who are in Adam die and all who are in Christ live. ...
To be seated at the right hand of Christ is to be given the highest place of honor and privilege a human being is capable of having conferred upon him. (469)

Jesus was not ashamed to identify Himself with His people, when He condescended in His incarnation to take their human nature upon Himself: “He is not ashamed to call them brethren” (Heb. 2:11). And on the Last Day He shall acknowledge them openly and publicly in the presence of the human race and the entire universe, as the people whom He has chosen, redeemed and sanctified for Himself, and in whom the work of salvation has been brought to perfection. (470)

He who openly and bravely acknowledges Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior “before men,” Christ Himself will openly acknowledge as His beloved disciple on Judgment Day “before My Father who is in heaven.” But he who refuses to confess Christ publicly and who disowns Him, Christ will publicly and contemptuously disown and repudiate on Judgment Day. (472)

“Saints”, i.e., those who are consecrated to God in Christ by faith, “judge the world” now, whenever we assess the world’s thoughts, actions and creations in the light of the Word of God. They will rule, manage and judge the world when both Jews and
Gentiles are converted and the earth is Christianized (Rom. 11; 1 Cor. 15:24–28; Isa. 2, 4, 11). And in the Final Judgment at the very end of history, the saints shall be Christ’s “associate judges” (under Him) in the judging of “the world” and of “angels,” presumably fallen, as a function of their royal rule as crowned kings in Christ (1
Pet. 2:9), as those “seated… with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (Eph. 2:6). (473)

[Matt. 25:34, 46]
(1) Those to whom He says these words are His “sheep,” which is a common word in the Bible for God’s elect. ...
(2) Those to whom Christ says these words are called by Him “the blessed of the Father,” because they are the ones God the Father chose to bless. ...
(3) In verse 46, these blessed sheep are called “the righteous,” not because they have a righteousness which they have earned and produced on their own, but because they are clothed with the righteousness of Jesus their Lord and Savior, the
righteousness of Christ’s perfect obedience credited to them by the eternal mercy of God.
(4) Christ calls His sheep to “inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world”...This invitation by Christ to enter His kingdom is rooted in the sovereign and eternal good pleasure of God. ...
(5) Christ calls His sheep to “inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” Their eternal and gracious reward is everlasting fellowship with the triune God in their inheritance of the Kingdom of God. (474-475)

Sin and misery are inseparably connected, in that the first brings the second. In heaven the child of God is delivered from both forever....His will is made perfectly and immutably free to do good alone (Eph. 4:13; Heb. 12:23). (477-478)

According to Jesus, entering heaven is entering the inconceivable “joy of thy Lord” (Matt. 25:21, 23), when the redeemed are made to “stand in the presence of His glory.”...Total joy is the inevitable result of perfect blessedness and sinlessness. (478)

Our will will be perfectly free from all sinful desires and preferences, it will chose nothing but what is good and holy, and in conformity to the will of God....And we will be physically and socially, as well as spiritually, divinely fitted for eternal perfection, perfectly adapted to participate in “that glory which the whole man shall be possessed of, and sanctified to be a temple of the Holy Ghost for ever.” 212. Ridgeley, Commentary on the Larger Catechism, 2:290. (480)

In this life, by faith, we “come” to the Temple and House of God, i.e., “Mount Zion”, and enter fellowship with God and His people, i.e., “the city of the living God,” the center of covenant blessing, i.e., “the heavenly Jerusalem,” which fellowship also includes fellowship with “myriads of angels” and the entire “general assembly and church of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven”, including “the spirits of
righteous men made perfect.”...But in the next life with resurrection we enjoy all this fully and completely beyond anything we could receive by faith. (481)

The greatest happiness of the resurrected people of God in Heaven is the immediate vision and fruition of God the Father, of our Lord Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit, to all eternity. (WLC, Q. 90) ...

This heavenly vision of God is “the most perfect and clear knowledge of God and of divine things, such as can belong to a finite creature, opposed to the imperfect and obscure knowledge which is possessed here by faith.” 217. Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, 3:610. (482)

In this life, God communicates Himself to us by means of grace, such as, the Word of God and the Sacraments; but in Heaven He will communicate Himself to His people directly and immediately, i.e., without means. “God may be all in all” (1 Cor. 15:28), inasmuch as He will pour immediately upon the saints His light, love, holiness, joy,
glory, life and a fulness of all blessings and will dwell in them forever (Rev. 21:3). (485)

Our heavenly sight of God comes inseparably with love and joy, all three of which together make our happiness in heaven complete. The vision is accompanied by fruition, i.e., enjoyment derived from the vision of God along with the perfection of the image of God in the resurrected Christian. (485)

In Heaven, we will behold the face of God (Q. 86), the Father, of our Lord Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit (Q. 90). (488)

This perfect happiness of heaven that centers on the vision and fruition of God shall be for all eternity. (492)

"First, they are those that have had the principle or seed of the same love that reigns in heaven implanted in their hearts, in this world, in the work of regeneration…Second, they are those who have freely chosen the happiness that flows from the exercise and enjoyment of such love as is in heaven above
all other conceivable happiness… Third, they are those who, from the love that is in them, are, in heart and life, in principle and practice, struggling after holiness. Holy love makes them long for holiness." 234. Edwards, Heaven: A World of Love, 48–49. (495)

(1) This glorious eternity in Heaven awaits all true believers in Jesus Christ, and only true believers in Jesus Christ. ...
(2) If you are a true believer in Jesus Christ, who longs for this glorious eternity with Him, His Father and their Spirit, live everyday as an “heir of God and joint-heir with Christ” of these realities. ...
(3) Filled with this hope of glory, live every day as one who is looking “not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal” (2 Cor. 4:18). ...
(4) Believer, live as one whose “citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ” (Phil. 3:20). ...
The point Paul is making is this: Christians are servants of “another king, Jesus” (Acts 17:7)....Here on earth they are to live as his ambassadors and representatives, as citizens faithful and loyal to Him although they are for a time residing in the
territory of the enemy. They are to advance His crown rights, to obey His laws, and to do His will, recognizing that although they live “in” this world, they are not “of” this world. Furthermore, they are to wait patiently and hopefully for His triumphant Arrival to rescue them and history, to defeat His enemies, and to recover the territory His enemies illegally claimed, restoring His people to the place and glory promised them. ...
(5) Christ makes heaven heaven for Christians...
(495-502)

Where is Heaven?...This is not a vitally important question for us to answer now for heaven is wherever Christ is. However, the Bible does teach us to believe that this earth and universe in which we presently live, reconstructed and rejuvenated by the conflagration of the universe, will become the eternal home of redeemed people with Christ, in their resurrected bodies. (504)

First, the conflagration of the universe with fire described in 2 Peter 3:7,10 is not the annihilation of the universe...
God annihilates nothing He has created. (504)

Rather than being annihilated by the events described in 2 Peter 3, the universe will be purified by fire from all the effects of sin and restored to its original purity, beauty and glory...The Greek word for “new” denotes “renewal” and not
creation ex nihilo! (505-506)

Second, we know this to be the case because of the corroborating testimony of other passages of the Bible such as Romans 8:19–23 that speaks of “the anxious longing of the creation”, i.e., the entire created universe. It was “subjected to futility”, but at the return of Christ “the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. (506)

“Through Christ and his cross the universe is brought back or restored to its proper
relationship to God.” 253. William Hendriksen, New Testament Commentary: Exposition of Colossians
and Philemon (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House), 82. (507)

Third, many texts of Scripture speak of this earth as a permanent structure, and as given to man by God for his permanent home....The point is that God’s “sanctuary,” i.e., the Church and God’s “earth” will both last forever! (509)

Fourth, the analogy between the resurrection of the believer’s body and the renovation of the universe with fire supports this view....The new heavens and new earth will be vastly changed, altered, transformed and glorified, but they will be the same universe that we live in now. (509)

Fifth, the prophecies of the New Testament confirm this viewpoint. Just as Peter was “looking for a new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells” (2 Pet. 3:13), so John “saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away” (Rev. 21:1). As we have pointed out, the Greek word
for “new” in this description is not the word that denotes something brand new that has never been in existence before, but the Greek word that denotes the renewal of that which was previously in existence. (509)

Sixth, if the present universe is annihilated at the return of Christ, then
"Satan would have won a great victory by so corrupting the present cosmos that God could do nothing with it but blot it out of existence..." 256. Smith, Systematic Theology, 2:813 (509)

      Racheal

The point Paul emphasizes here is that belief in a physical resurrection of both the righteous and the wicked is a part of Old Testament orthodoxy which most Jews of his day believed, and which all believers in the divine authority of the Old Testament should believe. This resurrection for which Paul hopes is one, general, singular resurrection of both the righteous and the wicked. Paul could have quoted Daniel 12:2: “And many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt”—to make his case. (413-414)

Jesus made this point about a single and general judgment of all people—both of the just and the unjust, on the last day in John 5:28–29: “Do not marvel at this; for an hour is coming, in which all who are in the tombs will hear His voice, and will come forth; those who did the good deeds, to a resurrection of life, those who committed the evil deeds to a resurrection of judgment.”...The point is that at a specific time, all those who are dead, whether Christians or non-Christians,
will hear the voice of Christ and be raised from the dead. No indication is given that this “resurrection of life” is separated by time from the “resurrection of judgment.” (414)

Those who are alive at the time of the Second Coming shall in a moment be changed. (416)

No one, not even those who are alive at Christ’s Second Coming, can in this present body, enter the perfection of heavenly life in the consummate kingdom of God—“flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable” (1 Cor. 15:50). (417)

At the sound of “the last trumpet” announcing the coming of Christ and the end of the world, the dead will be raised imperishable and those alive at the time will be transformed completely into the spiritual, Heavenly image of the resurrected and
glorified Christ, along with the total transformation of the rest of the universe. (418)

In physical resurrection the self-same bodies of the dead which were laid in the grave [are] then again united to their souls forever. Our resurrection bodies will be the bodies we have now, only glorified, perfected and “eternalized.” (418)

This doctrine of the resurrection of our present bodies is a terror to the unbelieving and ungodly 
"for the very body, which they now cherish so much, and for which they slave so much to satisfy and beautify it, will eternally bear unbearable pain in hell. Those eyes which you now misuse so greatly to stir up filthy lust… will behold with terror
the Lord Jesus, the righteous Judge, and will never see light any more. Those ears which are now ready to receive vanities… immoral language, foolishness, and backbiting will hear with terror the sentence of the Judge: “Depart from Me, you cursed,” and to all eternity your ears will be filled with the howling of those who are damned together with you… That mouth and tongue which you now misuse to
curse, lie… carouse, [and] drink… will then howl and scream, and in grief you will chew on that tongue.… Those hands which…you now misuse in unrighteousness.., you will then wring in pain. Yes, all those members [of your body] which you are now using as weapons of unrighteousness…will eternally be in the flames.… May the terror of the Lord persuade you to believe!" 115. Brakel, The Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:336. (421)

The indwelling of the Holy Spirit in the believer is a pledge from God that the believer’s body will be raised from the dead, “because it would be unseemly
that any thing thus honored by the Spirit should remain under the dominion of death.”118 Hodge, A Commentary on Romans (London: The Banner of Truth Trust,
[1835] 1972), 260. (423)

Not only does the Catechism bring out the role of the Spirit of Christ in our physical resurrection, but it also emphasizes the relation of Christ’s resurrection and the resurrection of believers. The bodies of believers shall be raised from the dead by virtue of His resurrection as their Head. (424)

Because of the believer’s union with Christ in His life, death and resurrection, whatever happened to Christ happens to him, whatever was true of Christ is true of him, whatever Christ did, he experiences the consequences of. (425)

On the last day the bodies of believers will be raised in power, spiritual, incorruptible, and made like to his glorious body. (426)

The bodies of the wicked raised from the dead on the last day will be raised up in dishonor. Their “dust… will awake… to disgrace and everlasting contempt, [i.e., eternal abhorrence by God]” (Dan. 12:2). (428)

The Larger Catechism makes the point with reference to the wicked reprobate that they shall be raised up in dishonour BY HIM, [Christ], as an offended Judge (emphasis added)....By resurrection Christ summons them to His tribunal that He may render to everyone of them what their evil lives deserve. (429)

Christ commands the resurrection of both the righteous and the wicked, but in different relations and for different purposes. The righteous are raised in Christ by Christ; and the wicked are raised by Christ but not in Christ. (429-430_

Judgment Day immediately follows the general resurrection of all people. (431)

The exact time of the Day of Judgment and the Coming of Christ is so secret that neither the angels in the very presence of God, nor the Son of God incarnate, i.e., in His humanity, know the time. (432)

Immediately after the resurrection shall follow the general and final judgment of angels and men. It is called general because all fallen angels (2 Pet. 2:4; Jude 6, 7), along with all human beings without exception (Jude 14, 15), will stand before that judgment bar of Christ.   ....
It is called final judgment because Judgment Day is the day of final judgment after a history of the human race full of interventions of God to judge sinners with temporal judgments. Judgment Day is not the beginning of judgment it is the completion and consummation of judgment. (4343-434)

With these words [Matt. 15:32,33] the stage is set for the final Judgment Day,
and the first act of the Judge on that Day will be the final and complete separation of the goats from the sheep and the tares from the wheat (Matt. 13:24–30, 36–43)....After that day the sheep and the goats, the wheat and the tares, will never mix or intermingle again in all of eternity. (437)

The reprobate on Christ’s left hand on Judgment Day will be sentenced by Him to leave His favorable presence and to go to hell forever, having been cursed by Him for their sins. (438)

The standard by which all people will be judged on that day will be the will of God revealed to them in Biblical Law, the gospel, and in the human conscience (Rom. 2:12; John 12:48; Luke 12:47; John 15:22). (439)

 The consciences of the wicked will fully, completely and inescapably condemn them and convict them of the evil of their sins and the justice of God in condemning them, although they will continue to try to suppress this truth in unrighteousness. (440)

The Larger Catechism says that upon sentence of condemnation pronounced against them by Christ, they thereupon shall be cast out from the favourable presence of God, and the glorious fellowship with Christ, his saints, and all his holy angels, into hell… (441)

First, Christ casts out the wicked reprobate from His presence and from fellowship with Him, and in being cast out of His presence they are totally cast out of God’s favor, goodness, mercy, common grace, longsuffering, and kindness; and are excluded from the glorious fellowship of perfected believers and all the holy angels. (442)

“The solemnity of this thought should not be minimized. Those who oppose
the things of God here and now are not engaged in some minor error which can easily be put right in the hereafter. They are engaging in that defiance of the will of God which has eternal consequences.”146 Morris, The First and Second Epistles to the Thessalonians, 206. (442-443)

"A breath of relief is usually heard when someone declares, “Hell is a symbol for separation from God.” To be separated from God for eternity is no great threat to the impenitent person. The ungodly want nothing more than to be separated
from God. Their problem in hell will not be separation from God, it will be the presence of God that will torment them. In hell, God will be present in the fullness of His divine wrath. He will be there to exercise His just punishment of the damned.
They will know Him as an all-consuming fire." 148. R. C. Sproul, Essential Truths of the Christian Faith (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.), 286. (443)

Second, they are designated and treated as those “accursed” by God, for “cursed is every one who does not abide by all things written in the book of the law to perform them” (Gal. 3:10). (445)

Third, Christ casts them into the eternal fires of hell with Satan and the demons from which there is no escape forever.  (446)

Since the torments of hell involve the body and the soul, Jesus is presupposing the resurrection of the body. “Destroy” does not mean annihilate; rather it means ruin. (447)

“[T]he moral character of sinners will in itself, and in its effects, constitute much of their misery in the future world. It ought to be observed, that the text, literally rendered is They shall be utterly corrupted in their own corruption.”164 How so?
First, sinful desires in those in hell will be exceedingly powerful, wholly unrestrained and completely ungovernable. ...
Second, sinful desires in those in hell will be forever ungratified and unfulfilled. ...
Third, sin in hell will be seen for what it really is. Their consciences will pronounce them guilty more sharply than ever before, but that pronouncement in the damned is an odious thing to them, they hate it and suppress it and harden themselves in their impenitency. ...
Fourth, the impenitent in hell will be the subjects of extreme and eternal remorse of conscience. ...
Fifth, the impenitent in hell become the instruments of extreme suffering to each other. In this present world sinners often care for each other. ...
Sixth, there can be no security in hell. The wretched inhabitants of hell will be surrounded by only enemies and deceivers out to do them harm. In the multitude of the damned not a single individual will be found who possesses a shred of natural affection, benevolence or sincerity.
164. Timothy Dwight, Theology: Explained and Defended in a Series of Sermons, 5 vols. (Middletown, CT: Clark & Lyman, 1819), 5:493.
(454-456)

From these comments two exhortations must be drawn. (1) See how great an evil sin is!...(2) Since these things are true, everyone who reads these words should immediately flee from the wrath to come and lay hold on eternal life through repentance of sin and faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. (457)

Its [Hell's] torments are without intermission and its punishments are without relaxation forever: “the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever” (Rev. 14:11). The wicked reprobate will “go away into eternal punishment,” just as the righteous will go “into eternal life” (Matt. 25:46). (458)

Those who deny the endlessness of the torments of hell can be divided into three groups: Annihilationists, Restorationists, and Universalists. (1) Annihilationists, as we have seen, believe that the punishment of the wicked is simple annihilation, while only the redeemed are raised from the dead to eternal life....(2) Restorationists believe that there are future punishments in the hereafter in some measure, according to what people deserve, but these punishments are meritorious and when they lead to repentance, even after a long interval, the sufferer will be delivered from his punishment. Some who hold this view believe
that even Satan and the demons will someday be saved....(3) Universalists believe that the only “hell” a person experiences are the sufferings of this life, which satisfy all the essential demands of God’s justice. Therefore, there are no
punishments and no hell after death. At death every human being will be saved and enter the bliss of heaven. (458-459)

     Racheal

Shorty was the ball turret gunner on a B-25 that went down in the English Channel due to engine failure. The rest of the crew managed to escape the plane. Shorty was unable to get out of the ball turret because the hydraulics which allowed the turret to rotate were damaged and dysfunctional. He went down with the plane. 

     Racheal

     Racheal

This is a very typical expression and calls to mind tons of photos from my younger days when I nearly always managed to mess up the group shots...

Extra room!

This is 'Grumpy'. She skirls at me whenever I go to remove her from the eggs--and sometimes when I only have looked at her.

What *I* looked like once I got done with the DE. I declare, I got more on me than I did on the chickens! (Which, seeing as I killed a mite on me twice today, I didn't mind over much.)

This wasn't supposed to be an extreme close up, but I thought it came out kinda cool--blurry and all.

     Racheal

At death, the soul of the believer is then made perfect in holiness, when the life-long process of sanctification is completed. When the soul of the believer leaves this world, it arrives at perfection immediately. (382)

The believer’s physical body is glorified with the resurrection of the body at the Return of Christ (Rom. 8:18, 23). His soul is glorified with his physical death and entrance into the glory of Heaven, where he will be “present with the Lord.” (382-383)

Since the believer is perfected in holiness at death, several applications follow.
First, the believer should shake off any spiritual sluggishness knowing that “he does not win the prize unless he competes according to the rules” (2 Tim. 2:5)....The completion of the work of sanctification implies that sanctification has begun and is
gradually progressing. If nothing is begun, it is absurd to speak of a finishing stroke. ....
Second, the believer should be encouraged in his race and warfare in this life by remembering that he is not destined to run or to fight forever. ...
Third, knowing that God will eventually complete and perfect the work of sanctification, the believer ought never be discouraged or despairing about the final outcome of his life. (386-387)

Free access to the presence of God and to the Heaven of God is now open to all believers because of the reconciling death of Jesus Christ in our behalf. Believers’ prayers and worship enter the very Throne room of God. At death their spirits enter that Holy of Holies; and at the resurrection, with their renewed physical bodies reunited with their perfected spirits, they will live in the Holy of Holies with God
throughout all eternity, when Heaven and earth will be one (Rev. 21:1–3). (388)

The very moment a believer dies he enters the Holy of Holies, Paradise, the heavenly Home of God, the third heaven, the highest heavens, the immediate and glorious presence of God, for “to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord” (2 Cor. 5:8). (390)

At death the souls of believers, when they enter the highest heavens, will behold the face of God in light and glory, and after their resurrection on Judgment Day, when they, body and soul, shall be received into heaven, where they shall be… especially in the immediate vision and fruition of God the Father, of our Lord Jesus Christ,
and of the Holy Spirit, to all eternity (WLC, Q. 90). (392)

"One does not theorize about this from the sidelines: the beatific vision affects our life in the here and now every day.” 73. Berkouwer, The Return of Christ, 368. (394)

God’s face is seen by faith in the Word of God in this life and by perfected vision
in the next. (397)

Although the spirits of the believers go to be “at home with the Lord” upon death in perfect bliss beholding God, nevertheless, as the Catechism says, they are waiting for the full redemption of their bodies. (398)

In 2 Corinthians 5, the apostle Paul tells us that death is not the consummation and goal of salvation; rather it is resurrection and life. Even after death and before resurrection, believers, although perfected spiritually in holiness, still long for the goal and completion of the salvation Christ purchased for them and the Holy Spirit
began in them in regeneration. He says that as wonderful as life after death will be for the believer, it is still incomplete, and being without a resurrected physical body, it is a condition of “nakedness.” The human spirit without the body is unnatural. (401)

The whole person of the believer—body and soul—is united to Christ. Death itself cannot break that union with Christ either of the soul or the dead physical body. (402)

Believers will be raised from the dead because they are united to Christ, body and soul; and because He arose, so will they. (403)

Paul makes this case as follows:
First, Paul is rejoicing in the complete victory over sin and death Jesus Christ has won in history for His people. Christ’s resurrection from the dead was the great historical event that demonstrated that death was really conquered. It is the basis of the believer’s hope in his own resurrection and victory over the grave (1 Cor. 15:17–19). 
Second, it is “through Jesus,” which is a more accurate translation than “in Jesus” in 1 Thess. 4:14, that is, through what Jesus has done, that Christians have peace and rest (“sleep” used metaphorically) in death and do not undergo the horrors of death.
Third, those who have died in Jesus before His Second Coming will have their share in the events of that great day. ...
Fourth, the one coming back on the Last day is none other than “the Lord Himself.”
Fifth, the Lord’s Second Coming will be one of majesty and glory.
Sixth, those dead bodies of believers will be raised from the dead before those who will be living on earth at the time of the Second Coming of Christ. (404)

The bodies of believers rest in their graves as in their beds, but the bodies of unbelievers are kept in their graves, as in their prisons, till the resurrection
and judgment of the great day (WLC, Q. 86). (405)

However at various times in history the false doctrine of “soulsleeping” has made an appearance. It is the viewpoint, based on a literal interpretation of verses like those above, that after death the soul sleeps in unconsciousness until the resurrection. However, the verses we have mentioned, along with many others, do not teach that the soul falls asleep at death, but that the person who dies physically
falls asleep. Death can be described metaphorically in these words because of the similarity between a dead body “resting” in a grave and a living body asleep on a bed. Death for the believer is a break with this evil world around us, and therefore is a rest in peace from it. This language describing death as restful sleep could also
be used to remind us of the comforting hope of physical resurrection. (405-406)

On the last day, when Jesus returns and believers experience physical resurrection, the physical bodies of believers will be again united to their souls. (407)

Immediately upon death the souls of the wicked are cast into hell in continued conscious existence. (408)

According to the false doctrine of Annihilationism, there is no existence at all after death, conscious or unconscious....However, when the Bible speaks of the wicked dead being “destroyed” or as “perishing,” these words do not imply a reduction to nonexistence. (408)

Furthermore, (1) the Bible teaches that the wicked as well as the righteous continue to exist forever (Eccl. 12:7; Matt. 25:46; Rom. 2:8–10; Rev. 14:11; 20:10); (2) the wicked will suffer eternal punishment, which involves eternal consciousness of eternal pain which they receive as the just wage for their rebellion against God;
and (3) there will be degrees of punishment in hell for the wicked, while extinction of being or consciousness admits of no degrees (Luke 12:47, 48; Rom. 2:12). (409)

First, God does not annihilate anything He has created, howeverHe may change its form. ...

Second, wicked people often consider the extinction of being and consciousness a very desirable thing, when they grow weary of life. (409)



Immediately upon death the souls of the impenitently wicked are cast into hell fully conscious and alive, where they remain in torments and utter darkness. (409)

     Racheal