SOUL AWAKE—DNA SLEEPING

Death has different meanings in Scripture, depending on what part of a person dies. Paul’s prayer in Thessalonians 5:23 (WEB) lists these parts: “May your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” 

 These three components or our human nature are similarly described in the creation of Adam: “And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath [spirit] of life; and man became a living soul.” (Gen 2:7, KJV).

What is the Soul?

The soul seems to begin when that fleshly dust and spiritual breath come together. It connects them as a God-designed mediator. Our soul integrates our visible animal bodies and our invisible angelic spirits, making us body-spirit beings who can interact with both the material and spiritual realms. These three parts of our humanity form a lifelong amalgamation—a human trinity—that images the Creator in special ways, both separately and in union.

The soul has self-awareness and a personal identity that thinks, feels, chooses, and remembers. Other people can perceive an individual’s spiritual character when the soul reveals his or her unique personality via the body. A person’s soul, though not seen directly, is recognized through the bodily activity of thoughts communicated, emotions expressed, and actions taken.

A computer can illustrate this tri-unity of body, soul, and spirit. The body with its brain, nervous system, sense organs and musculature, is like the computer’s motherboard, RAM and ROM memory, hard drive, and input and output devices. The spirit is like the electrical power energizing the whole unit. But the different programs loaded and the personally stored data make up the functional soul of the computer.When the power is turned off or an essential physical component breaks down, the programs and data continue to exist on disk or backed up on a cyberspace memory cloud. When the physical computer (body) is turned on (spirit), it has a functional character (soul). The computer’s body is visible; its electrical spirit is not. While the programs and data are also invisible, they become uniquely recognizable through the running computer. While not perfect, this analogy might be helpful to some.

The “Soul Sleep” Misinterpretation

Because the Bible often speaks of death as “sleep,” some teach that the soul goes nowhere at death but either ceases to exist or unconsciously rests in “the grave” with its disintegrating corpse. The latter scenario becomes a strained interpretation when the grave is the ocean, or when an explosion literally makes a real grave impossible. The former idea fails to explain the martyred souls in heaven described in Revelation. Those “souls” weren’t asleep in their graves but had wide-awake wills actively choosing to express mental thoughts with strong emotional feeling, all in a definite, non-earthly location:

“And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held: And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?” (Revelation 6:9-10, KJV)

If it’s important in our conception of death to know which part of us dies, it’s also important to know which part of humanity is sleeping, when Scripture metaphorically uses “sleep” to indicate death. People can mistake which part is asleep by confusing the metaphor. The appearance of literal sleep provides the metaphorical significance of “sleep” as a description of how a dead body appears. Observers no longer see choices of the will, perceive no more sad or happy feelings, hear no thoughts being communicated. Shake a dead person vigorously. Why is there no response? “The dead know nothing,” says Ecclesiastes 9:5. The corpse is profoundly asleep. The dead body has nothing more to do with the ongoing activities of this physical world, except to disintegrate and be reabsorbed by it.

What Sleeps in the Body’s Death?

Christians believe that bodies, sleeping in death, will awaken at the resurrection. How so? How can a buried corpse absorbed by a tree root, or a drowned body scattered throughout the ocean, or one vaporized by an fiery explosion, be reconstructed into its original state as a resurrected body? In Christ’s resurrection, all the matter in His body was still local. In ours, some molecules from those who died at sea might end up on our table in the next bite of fish. This thought may bring emotional discomfort, but it poses no scientific problem. What sleeps in death is not the body’s array of personal dust but each person’s specific arrangement of DNA.

The material composing the bodies of living creatures is in constant flux. Cellular structures are continuously being built up or repaired with new molecules taken in as food. Old cell material is likewise being broken down and discarded from the body as waste. This process of construction and destruction replaces all the atoms in a human body approximately every seven years. In other words, “we’re not what we used to be.” We’re not living in the material body we had seven years ago. Even the old atoms on each double-helix DNA molecule have been exchanged for new ones. However, the DNA stays the same, except perhaps for some minor mutations.

When reduced to its essence, our personal DNA is a numerical arrangement, much like the computer’s stored programs. If the physical computer is destroyed, the programs can be reloaded on an entirely new unit. But the difference with DNA is that it holds the specific formula for the physical unit’s unique design. This is why I personally believe that the intangible numerical formula of our personal DNA—expressed tangibly in this life through the medium of matter—is registered in the soul and taken with it, along with our entire personal memory, when the soul and spirit leave the body in death. As far as our bodies are concerned, “we’re just a number,” but a number “wonderfully and fearfully made” by creation’s Master Mathematician.

Michelangelo's "Resurrection of the Dead"

On Resurrection Day, what’s the point of having our bodies restored from the same material our DNA was borrowing for the last seven years of our lives? Any nearby dust will do. What about the undesirable results of a believer’s DNA defects, caused by sin in a fallen world? Surely each of our DNA programming will be restored to the perfection of the Creator’s original design. Jesus said He “came to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10), and not only the soul and spirit were lost in the Fall. Christ’s glorious physical resurrection is the prototype of our own. He will reconstruct our bodies to be “like His glorious body” (Philippians 3:21). Sadly, this hope for “the redemption of our bodies” is a part of the Gospel not emphasized in modern evangelism. Yet bodily resurrection is so important that Paul declares, “in this hope you were saved” (Romans 8:23b,24a, ESV).

Putting the Soul Sleep Doctrine to Sleep

But this resurrection hope doesn’t include the unconsciousness of the soul in death. Widespread belief in “soul sleep” or in the soul’s annihilation at death is relatively recent. Various versions of this concept have been held by Seventh-day Adventists and Jehovah’s Witnesses since the late 1800s. However, this doctrine is absent from the teachings of the primitive church, although one critic reports that “according to historian Philip Schaff, soul sleep fomented in the mind of a specious fourth century pantheist named Arnobius.”

In modern times, the growing number of those bold enough to share their personal testimonies of near-death experiences have confirmed the early church’s teaching. Even though these episodes are usually only “near-death,” some of those describing NDEs were professionally evaluated as clinically “dead.” In other words, God let them miraculously come back from death to tell their stories. While their descriptions may vary, these people unanimously report a continuing consciousness, sometimes seeing the bodies they left behind. They talk about still experiencing their soul’s ability to think, feel, choose and remember. It might take only one NDE to convince teachers of “soul sleep” that their doctrine was erroneous. If not, their final death certainly will.

In discussions with Jehovah’s Witnesses, I sometimes show them Genesis 49:33 in their New World Translation: “Thus Jacob finished giving these instructions to his sons. Then he drew his feet up onto the bed and breathed his last and was gathered to his people.” I explain how this verse mentions first body, then spirit, and finally soul. If they say, “Oh, but to be ‘gathered to his people’ means to go to the grave,” I show them the next verse, Genesis 50:1, “Joseph then threw himself on his father and wept over him and kissed him.” Then I point out, “You forgot something. Jacob wasn’t buried yet. His body was still there, but a special part of him had just been ‘gathered to his people.’ Don’t you find that theologically embarrassing?” No, they don't. A footnote in the Watchtower translation tells them to ignore the clear implications of this phrase by insisting it to be merely “a poetic expression for death” rather than a divine revelation of what actually happened. This is the kind of stubbornness that could benefit from an NDE.

I had a Seventh-day Adventist friend who was similarly adamant in her belief about the soul’s unconsciousness in death. When she died, I envisioned her immediately regretting her insistence on that doctrine. I even wrote a poem to be read at her graveside service, believing that someday in the afterlife she will thank me for doing so.

That poem is probably the best conclusion I can make for this article.

SOUL SLEEP

For eighteen hundred years was taught

That only corpses went to graves,

That souls went on, awake in thought,

While bodies slept ’neath dust or waves.

I choose to keep the older creed

That says our flesh must rest from toil,

Awaiting, like the planted seed,

That Day of Rising from the soil.

If later teachers’ words are right—

That souls must sleep before they rise—

Then when I hear that Trumpet bright,

I’ll wake up and apologize.

But if they’re wrong, then their mistake

Was known the moment that they died,

For even now they’re wide awake

Repenting for what they denied.

I’d rather be aroused from sleep

To find that I was duped by lies

Than be awake in death to weep

Till God decides to dry my eyes.

— David L. Hatton, 3/12/2013

(to be in Poems Between Here and Beyond)

POEMS BETWEEN HEAVEN AND HELL - Introduction

(My books are available on Amazon at this link.)

(Before becoming a preacher, a nurse, an amateur artist, or a massage therapist, I was a poet. I still am. Getting my poetry published in more than homemade binders had been a dream for years. Health challenges and the rise of modern book-publishing technology merged to motivate me to make the effort. This and my other books are published through Kindle Direct Publishing in both paperback and Kindle editions.

I wanted to put the introductory essays for each poetry collection on my blog. If you want to know what makes me tick, my poems tell it better than a biography.

This "Introduction" and the concluding poem are from my 1st book of poems. To read the posts from my others, click on these links:

Poems Between Darkness and Light;

Poems Between Death and Life;

Poems Between Birth and Resurrection;

Poems Between Here and Beyond;

Poems Between Fear and Faith;

Poems Between the Beginning and the End.)

“Introduction” to

 Poems Between Heaven and Hell

I was born half way through the most noisy, confused, and dangerous century this world has known, yet also in the century that has seen the greatest advances in science, medicine and global education. As a Christian, I realize that no century has seen a more rapid spread of the Christian faith throughout the world, yet I am saddened by the fact that no century has seen such devastation of human life through famine, war and willful infanticide. It is appropriate that I call this collection Poems Between Heaven and Hell, for that is where they were written. That is where this planet spins. That is where this world struggles to survive. Each day I am more acutely aware that our world basks in a shower of Divine Grace keeping it sprinkled with reminders of Heaven. But at the same time we totter on the hellish brink of damnation and destruction. We are not in Heaven, nor do we experience the utter doom of an eternal Hell. We are somewhere in between.

I used to believe that Heaven and Hell were totally future states, and that people who said, “Hell is right now!” were just reacting emotionally to unfortunate circumstances. The older I grow, the closer I believe such people are to the truth. Aging does something to you. Youth focuses zealously on the hopeful prospects of the present and an unknown future. Years tend to thin out the thick tangibility of the present and render the future more transparent and realistic. At least for me, and for many who are older and wiser than I, maturity brings greater insight into the spiritual realities of this life. The material world of humanity once held so much promise, but the traumas of change, illness, and accident bring in a new understanding of our mortality. The “ultimate” questions gain new significance. How the spiritual world touches this world becomes so relevant and meaningful to daily life. The future is built on the present, and the seeds of Hell and Heaven started sprouting yesterday.

These are poems from the earth, where we waver between good and evil in the choices we make day in and day out. Here the populations of the afterlife are being created in the wills of individuals. Today's earthly inhabitants are the future citizens of a divided eternity. Much of my poetry is an appeal to the reader to open up to the Divine Grace mentioned above. I have an evangelistic intent in some of my poetry, because I believe the acts of God's love toward humanity are “good news” for this planet. The responsibility of human freewill is awesome. The consequences of human choices are ultimately final. But there is still time for anyone “between Heaven and Hell” to choose differently, to choose more in line with the Divine Grace that God has caused “to fall upon the just and the unjust.”

I experienced that Divine Grace early in my life. These poems form a chronological sketch of my reflections and musings since age thirteen. My encounter with God has patterned my view of life in this world. It has focused my meditation on the spiritual and ultimate realities behind what our world considers common business. It has sharpened my appreciation of the beauty and value of God's gracious acts toward humanity. My poems deal with love, human and Divine, with Christ and His work, with philosophy and philosophers, with worship, with sexuality, with sickness and healing, with life and death. I wrestle with ideologies old and new. I touch on the dilemmas and trials of God's people. I confess my own failings and my aspirations in the Christian life. I comment on the problems of a society alienated from God and from itself. I do have a lighter side, and you will find a few poems of humor and satire. But for the most part, poetry has been my channel of expressing the insights and wisdom gained by trying to seek the mind of God throughout my own pilgrimage on a planet that hangs between Heaven and Hell.

I want to thank all the friends who over the years have encouraged me to publish my poetry. I thank my precious wife Rosemary for her patience with me. I often neglected other important duties when inspiration for a poem came and all else was set aside until it was written. I believe poetry is like any other creative skill, a gift of God to those who write it. But more often with me, it has been like what the Old Testament prophets have described as the massa (burden, or word) of the Lord, which they felt internally when a prophecy was to be proclaimed. That is what it is like for me when I feel compelled to put down on paper a message in poetry: a burden. Peace from the burden is found only in its proclamation. I can say with the prophet Amos, “A lion has roared! Who will not fear? The Lord GOD has spoken! Who can but prophesy?” (Amos 3:8, NASB). So, I thank God for the gift, though it comes as a burden. And finally, thank you for taking the time to read me. The Lord be with you.

— David L. Hatton

*    *    *    *    *    *    *

                    THE ANSWERING

Is there any meaning, a purpose why we’re here,
A reason for our living and dying day by day?
Could there be a message that comes from the beginning,
Outside our world of striving? Is someone there to say?

If it is all illusion, if we are just machines,
How can we measure value? Are we worth more or less?
If we are merely atoms that clumped by time and chance,
Why deem ourselves so precious upon vague hope and guess!

If only Someone’s out there to speak His love by word,
To tell us who we are; if only Someone came,
Then we’d have an answer. (Religion gave too many—
Science forgot our souls), but He’d have to leave His name.

Science said, “Keep searching.” Religion said, “Try harder.”
Some said, “Do your own thing.” And others said, “Be brave!”
But tell me how to listen. The voice of pain is loud!
The wounded scream around us. We face an open grave. . . .

But One came speaking purpose  and wept at pain and death
And healed the brokenhearted. “A lunatic,” said some.
But He said Someone sent Him named Father God and Love.
He claimed to seek the lost ones; that One who came said,
                                      “Come.”

                          — David L. Hatton, 8/23/1978

            (Poems Between Heaven and Hell,  © 1991, 2014)

For more single poems from this volume, visit my website's “Poetry Page.”