Life and Death

What is Life?
Physiological definitions
• Life is defined as any system capable of performing
functions such as eating, metabolizing, excreting,
breathing, moving, growing, reproducing, and responding
to external stimuli.
What is Life?
Philosophical definitions
• Life is the aspect of existence that processes, acts,
reacts, evaluates, and evolves through growth
(reproduction and metabolism). The crucial difference
between life and non-life (or non-living things) is that
life uses energy for physical and conscious
development. Life is anything that grows and
eventually dies.
 What is Life?
Scriptures definition-

• According to the Bible, knowing God is the meaning

of life because He is the “author of life” (John 17:3).

• The meaning of life is not based on things we see in

the world “for life is more than food, and the body
more than clothing” (Luke 12:23).
 A. The Primary and Ultimate Value of Life
From the beginning to the end of the Sacred Scriptures, and
through the continuous revelation of God in the church, the one
visible value shared by God and the human person is life.

The Living God is the God revealed to Israel, He is the author

and giver of life. The very act of living is a participation in His
lite (ct. Pss 42:2: 84:2). To not participate in His life is to be
dead.
The constant value of human life can be
understood in three instances:
1. The relationship between God and His people are confined to
this understanding of life. The dead do not and cannot worship
God; in the same way, the living God has nothing to do with the
dead. ("Please, God, in your own interests as well as mine, keep
me alive as long as possible.“)This is the voice of Psalm
The constant value of human life can be
understood in three instances:
2. Have l any pleasure in the death of the wicked, says the Lord
GOD, and not rather that they should turn from their ways and
live?" (Ezekiel 18:23).

And later, "For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone, says

the Lord GOD. Turn, then, and live". (Ezekiel 18:32).
The constant value of human life can be
understood in three instances:
3. But when Jesus in the Gospel says, "he is not God of the dead
but of the living," the inference he draws from this is absolutely
clear; that the dead human person shall rise again (Mk 12:26-27).
Contrary to the negative inference of the psalmist and Hezekiah,
we may conclude that because He is God of the living and not of
the dead-the dead are not dead. Ezekiel's conviction becomes an
invitation to turn away from our wickedness and live. And so that
is why the Son came into the world-that they may live and have
life more abundantly (Jn 10:10).
B. Resurrection of the Dead
The new testaments speaks about three kinds of
resurrection:
1. The resurrection of Jesus Christ
2. The resurrection of the just in the last day
3. The resurrection of the wicked
 B. Resurrection of the Dead
1. The resurrection of Jesus Christ
The Resurrection of Christ, a central doctrine of Christianity,
is based on the belief that Jesus Christ was raised from the dead
on the third day after his Crucifixion and that through his
conquering of death all believers will subsequently share in his
victory over “sin, death, and the Devil.
 B. Resurrection of the Dead
2. The resurrection of the just in the last day
On the last day, all the dead will be resurrected. Their souls will
then be reunited with the same bodies they had before dying. The
bodies will then be changed, those of the wicked to a state of
everlasting shame and torment, those of the righteous to an
everlasting state of celestial glory.
B. Resurrection of the Dead
3. The resurrection of the wicked.
And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God [the
wicked are then raised for judgement]; and the books were
opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life:
and the dead were judged out of those things which were written
in the books, according to their works.
C. Death
Since we need to die in order to be resurrected, we
might as well talk about death. Scriptures attach certain
values to death by evaluations death in various ways.
Since we started with life, we are also interested with
the evaluation of death... in what death is; or rather in
what the human soul becomes after it ceases to animate
the body, which has become a corpse.
 Facts about Death
1. Death is understood as a natural event
2. Death is a punishment
3. If there was no sin, there would have been no
death
4. Death and sin have an intrinsic affinity with each
other
Life after Death
Within the Christian church there are different
explanations of what happens to people after their
death, but there is agreement that Jesus’ promise is
true. The Bible book of John tells us that before he
died, he told his followers: ‘I am going there to
prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a
place for you, I will come back and take you to be
with me that you also may be where I am’.
Mini Task: using the Venn Diagram compare and
contrast resuscitation and resurrection.

Resuscitation Resurrection.

The rising from

The action or the dead of a
process of Both are
focusing on divine being who
reviving someone life or still retains his
from existence. own personhood,
unconsciousness or individuality,
or apparent through the body
death. my or may not be.
A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND
WORDS