CONCIOUSNESS

Unlike most Christians, we do not believe that the soul is immortal. We do not believe that a person retains consciousness in his or her soul after death. When a person dies, he simply ceases to exist as a conscious being. His identity is retained by God. Each individual will be resurrected when Christ returns — either in physical or spiritual form. Only then will he regain consciousness

The January 29, 2007, issue of TIME magazine had a lengthy and very interesting section on the brain. It included much of the latest research being done and the conclusions being reached as a result. One of the conclusions that neuroscientists find least controversial and agree on is one that is likely to be most controversial and disputed by many Christians, but not by us. It is the following: “Consciousness does not reside in an ethereal soul that uses the brain like a PDA; consciousness is the activity of the brain.”

A person undergoing electrical stimulation of the brain during surgery can have hallucinations that the individual cannot distinguish from reality. Certain chemicals can affect the brain in the same way. Prozac, LSD, alcohol, and even caffeine can profoundly alter how a person thinks, feels, and even sees. It seems that consciousness can be “pushed around” by physical or chemical manipulation. Some surgery on the brain (like that sometimes done for epilepsy) has separated the two hemispheres of the brain. The result has been two consciousnesses within the same skull

TIME goes on to report that, “...when the physiological activity of the brain ceases, as far as anyone can tell, the person’s consciousness goes out of existence.” This scientific conclusion certainly agrees with our Biblical understanding of what the soul is. The soul can and does die. A person’s consciousness ceases to exist.

What about end-of-life and out-of-body experiences? TIME reports the research on these also: “Attempts to contact the souls of the dead (a pursuit of serious scientists a century ago) turned up only cheap magic tricks, and near death experiences are not the eyewitness reports of a soul parting company from the body, but symptoms of oxygen starvation in the eyes and brain. In September, a team of Swiss neuroscientists reported that they could turn out-of-body experiences on and off by stimulating the part of the brain in which vision and bodily sensations converge.”

It’s nice to know that scientists studying the human brain are now catching up to what we have always believed the Bible really teaches about the soul and consciousness. The New Testament emphasizes the importance of the resurrection of the dead. It does not teach the doctrine of an immortal soul. We look forward to the return of our Lord when the “dead in Christ” will be the first resurrected and to regain consciousness.

L. Urbaniak

Resurrection

As surely as Pontius Pilate was a real historical figure, so was Jesus of Nazareth. As surely as the cross really happened, so did the resurrection become its joyous outcome. We who believe must regain the lost imperative of lifting up the resurrection as central to Christian teaching. In contrasting the importance of the cross and the resurrection, we need to remind ourselves that Christ was dead for only three days, but He has been alive for two thousand years. We need to recall to consciousness that His return from the grave is the all-important victory that has kept Christianity out of the graveyard of other lofty philosophies and religions.

The Risen Christ, made alive again by His Father’s power, is the only reason we have for remembering the cross. Therefore, we must forget the “Messiah of the media,” who takes so much film to die and so little to rise again. The resurrection is too important to be shelved as an “incidental” area of Jesus’ existence and teaching.

…We will have none wink at us and tell us His resurrection is “sky pie.” The earth quaked, the rocks split, and Jesus walked out of the tomb. His very footfalls shook the cosmos. So, when the unborn sun of any Easter morning shoots its shafts of promise through the east, let us remember that God is ever there to restore our crushed hopes and our lifeless existence. How marvelously God knows how to spell “triumph” for every morning.

…The resurrection offers all of us in every generation the same assurance: Jesus is alive! and, “Because I live, you shall live also” (John 14:19).

Calvin Miller