This weekly feature is dedicated to Adventists who are looking for biblical insights into the topics discussed in the Sabbath School lesson quarterly. We post articles which address each lesson as presented in the Sabbath School Bible Study Guide, including biblical commentary on them. We hope you find this material helpful and that you will come to know Jesus and His revelation of Himself in His word in profound biblical ways.
QUARTER FOUR—ON DEATH AND DYING AND THE FUTURE HOPE
Lesson 3: “Understanding Human Nature”
[COLLEEN TINKER]
Problems With This Lesson:
- This classic Adventist apologetic for the physicality of man omits the New Testament texts that state that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord—a state which is “very much better” than remaining in the body.
- This lesson uses straw-man arguments to lead the reader to the author’s conclusion.
- The lesson creates the Adventist argument for the nature of man almost entirely from the Old Testament.
The Adventist view of humans being purely physical, that their mind and worship and identity reside somewhere in their brains, is the foundation that shapes all their doctrines. The Adventist views of Jesus-as-example, of Jesus being able to sin and fail at His mission, of inherited sin, of Sabbath-keeping being the mark of the saved, of an eternal law—all of these ideas require an understanding of people being only physical bodies that breathe.
In fact, this physicality underlies Adventism’s unrelenting marriage to their “health message”. In 2009, Richard Rice, then a professor at the school of religion at Loma Linda University, clarified this position in an interview for the documentary The Adventists produced by Journey Films. Rice had been speaking about Adventism’s commitment to vegetarianism and its “health message” and then said this:
“Doctrinally it’s kind of interesting. I think it [the focus on diet and health] may be related to another aspect of Adventist belief, and that is the fact that human beings are essentially physical—that is to say, there is no part of us—like a soul or a spirit—that lives independently of the body, so we are physical beings from beginning to end. And the future beyond death is a resurrection of the body. It is not an immortal soul that keeps on living. So, once you’ve emphasized the body to that degree, then you begin to realize that taking care of the body is an extremely important thing to do” (https://youtu.be/S_RYq577be0).
The lesson creates straw-man arguments to lead the reader to the Adventist conclusion. For example, on page 33 we find this reasoning:
The second concept is that the physical death of a person implies the cessation of his or her existence as a living soul (Hebrew nephesh). In Genesis 2:16, 17, God had warned Adam and Eve that if they should ever sin, by eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they would die.
Echoing this warning, the Lord reinforced the point in Ezekiel 18:4, 20: “ ‘The soul who sins shall die’ ” (NKJV). This statement has two main implications. One is that since all human beings are sinners, all of us are under the unavoidable process of aging and dying (Rom. 3:9–18, 23). Another implication is that this biblical concept makes void the popular notion of a supposed natural immortality of the soul. If the soul is immortal and exists alive in another realm after death, then we don’t really die after all, do we?
That last sentence—“If the soul is immortal and exists alive in another realm after death, then we don’t really die after all, do we?”—assumes an understanding of death that is contrary to the Bible. The Greek word “thanatos” is the word underlying the New Testament term for “death”. I quote below the definition of “thanatos” from biblestudytools.com. This definition is derived from the Greek lexicon:
- the death of the body
- that separation (whether natural or violent) of the soul and the body by which the life on earth is ended
- with the implied idea of future misery in hell
- the power of death
- since the nether world, the abode of the dead, was conceived as being very dark, it is equivalent to the region of thickest darkness i.e. figuratively, a region enveloped in the darkness of ignorance and sin
- metaph., the loss of that life which alone is worthy of the name,
- the misery of the soul arising from sin, which begins on earth but lasts and increases after the death of the body in hell
- the miserable state of the wicked dead in hell
- in the widest sense, death comprising all the miseries arising from sin, as well physical death as the loss of a life consecrated to God and blessed in him on earth, to be followed by wretchedness in hell (https://www.biblestudytools.com/lexicons/greek/kjv/thanatos.html)
Notice that the definition of the word “death” is not “ceasing to exist” as we were taught in Adventism. Rather, the definition includes the idea of “separation”, the separation of body and soul or spirit. This understanding explains Luke 23:43:
And he said to him, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.”
No, the comma is not in the wrong place. Jesus was saying the truth: His spirit—the immaterial part of Himself that is His identity—would separate from His mortal body that very day, as would the thief’s to whom He made this statement, and because of the thief’s belief in Him, they would be together that very day in Paradise!
When we read Scripture with the correct understanding of the word “death”—not a cessation of existence but a separation of body and soul/spirit—all the verses begin to make sense.
Finally, although this quarterly will address the “difficult” New Testament texts later, the author uses none of them (in keeping with classic Adventist reasoning) to establish the nature of man. To be sure, even the Old Testament suggests that man has a spirit separate from the body, but the New Testament clearly establishes this fact, and those texts are omitted.
Importantly, 2 Timothy 1:8–12 says this:
Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God, who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel, for which I was appointed a preacher and apostle and teacher, which is why I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that day what has been entrusted to me (2 Timothy 1:8–12).
In other words, the reality of the existence of our spirits after death was not revealed clearly before Jesus broke the curse of death by the completed atonement for our sin. This reality could not have been revealed before Jesus’ blood inaugurated the new covenant and brought eternal life to each one of us the moment we believe.
Eternal life is spiritual life, the miracle that occurs when we trust Jesus and the Father transfers us out of the domain of darkness into the kingdom of the Beloved Son (Col 1:3). We are born spiritually dead in sin, “by nature children of wrath” (Eph 2:1–3), and only trusting in Jesus’ finished work can cause us naturally-dead humans to become alive.
Spiritual death is our natural state. It is our legacy from Adam (1 Cor. 15:20–22), yet that spiritual death does not equal physical death. Rather, every person born, is born spiritually dead.
Salvation occurs when the Lord reveals Himself causes us to believe in Jesus. When that miracle occurs, we are born again and made spiritually alive.
John 5:24 states that when we believe, we “pass from death to life”. We receive eternal life at that moment—not figuratively but literally. The death of our bodies cannot remove our spiritual life. When we are made alive in Christ, we are never removed from Christ (Rom. 8:35–39). We—our essential identity and the part of us that knows and worships the Lord—cannot ever be separated from Him.
This lesson refuses to treat Scripture literally, as meaning what the words say. Instead, it rationalizes and uses philosophy and human reason to explain away what God has plainly revealed.
For a fuller study on what the Bible says about the nature of man, please refer to the articles below:
- May 4–10, 2024 - May 2, 2024
- We Got Mail - May 2, 2024
- April 27–May 3, 2024 - April 25, 2024