Welcome to Apostolic Life in the 21st Century, a podcast dedicated to helping modern day believers live out the teachings of the First Century.

This podcast is part of the teaching ministry of Dr. David K. Bernard.

Dr. Bernard is dedicated his life to studying the Bible and helping believers apply its message to their daily lives.

In Apostolic life in the

21st century, Dr. Bernard answers your questions about what the Bible teaches and how those

teachings apply to everyday life. Thank you for joining us for this broadcast. The Bible has a

lot to say about death, of course. In Luke chapter 16, Jesus tells this parable

of the rich man and a beggar called Lazarus. And in the parable, he indicates that Lazarus

was in a place of peace and rest while the rich man was in hell. In the epistles, 2nd Corinthians

Chapter 5 specifically, Paul states that he would

prefer to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. But then in 1st Thessalonians

chapter 4, he comes back and he indicates that dead believers are in a state of sleep and that

they're going to be resurrected when Jesus returns. So all of this leads to the question,

what exactly happens to us when we die? All right. Let's take this in two parts. The first part is the

story of the rich man in Lazarus that Jesus gave. Now some debate whether it's a parable or an actual

story because unlike other parables,

Lazarus is named.

But really, to me, that's not a crucial point because a parable is a true-to-life story.

So it's meant to represent the reality that we're talking about.

So let's just take that story as it is.

What you find is Lazarus dies as a saved

person as a Jew under the old covenant, and he goes to a place of rest and peace, which is called

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