The intermediate state

Between death and resurrection

What happens to a Christian at death? The Old Testament speaks of the dead going down to sheol (שְׁאוֹל), the realm of the dead, but says little about it. The New Testament sheds clearer light in Christ. To the dying thief who asked to be remembered, Jesus made a promise.

And Jesus said to him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.”

Luke 23:43

Paul wrote, "I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far better indeed" (Philippians 1:23), and said he "would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord" (2 Corinthians 5:8). Hebrews counts "the spirits of the righteous made perfect" among the worshippers of heaven (Hebrews 12:23). In John's vision the martyrs under the altar receive white robes and are told "to rest a little while longer" (Revelation 6:11).

The state is called intermediate because it is not the end. Paul groans, not wishing to be "unclothed but clothed" (2 Corinthians 5:4). The Christian's final hope is not a soul in heaven without its body, but the resurrection of the body. John Wesley glossed paradise as "The place where the souls of the righteous remain from death till the resurrection" Wesley, and said of 2 Corinthians 5:8, "This demonstrates that the happiness of the saints is not deferred till the resurrection" Wesley.

What the church confesses

The church has held both parts of this hope together. The Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 57, takes comfort that the soul is taken up at once to Christ its Head, and that the body too will be raised and united with it again Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 57. The Westminster Shorter Catechism answers simply:

The souls of believers are at their death made perfect in holiness, and do immediately pass into glory; and their bodies, being still united to Christ, do rest in their graves till the resurrection.

Westminster Shorter Catechism, Q. 37

At the Reformation John Calvin wrote a treatise of its own against the teaching that the soul sleeps until the resurrection.

Where Christians differ

The Catholic and Orthodox churches and most Protestant churches teach that the dead are conscious as they await the resurrection. Some sixteenth-century Anabaptists, the Seventh-day Adventists and some others understand death as an unconscious sleep until the resurrection. They stress that a human being is one living whole, note how often the New Testament calls death sleep ("Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep", John 11:11), and cite the Preacher's word that "the dead know nothing" (Ecclesiastes 9:5). Most Christians answer that sleep is a gentle picture of death as the living see it, and that Paul would hardly call unconsciousness "far better" (Philippians 1:23). Both sides agree that the final hope is the resurrection of the body.

The Catholic Church teaches that those who die in God's grace but are not yet fully purified pass through purgatory. The Orthodox churches pray for the departed but have not defined purgatory. Protestants reject it; the Westminster Confession, having described heaven for the souls of the righteous and hell for the souls of the wicked, adds: "Besides these two places for souls separated from their bodies, the Scripture acknowledgeth none" Westminster Confession 32.1. See also the lesson Death and the intermediate state and What happens after death?