Putting together all that we have said we come to the conclusion that our growth in Christ does not stop when we die. Thank God for this! It is evident that most believers in Christ die without being completely delivered from worldliness, lust, or self-will. If there is no change after death there are going to be very few who govern with Christ.

We know deliverance from sin is being emphasized today and there is power to be delivered when we confess our sins and turn away from them.

We know we have spiritual knowledge today about the Body of Christ and the Kingdom of God that has not been in the possession of believers previously.

We believe the great tribulation period will result in a separation of the godly remnant from the babylonish confusion of the churches and will purify the believers until they are free from self-will and come up out of the wilderness leaning on their Beloved.

If this is true, then how are those saints who have been dead for thousands of years going to be brought to perfection together with us?

Consider this: we know Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are part of the Kingdom of God. Yet no person can enter or see the Kingdom of God until he is born again. But no individual was born again until the Lord Jesus rose from the dead, because He is the Firstborn of the new creation!

How, then, can Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob be part of the Kingdom of God? It is obvious they could not be born again until the Lord Jesus rose from the dead. Therefore Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob must have been born again after they died physically, after the Lord Jesus rose from the dead. Also, Peter tells us both the living and the dead are judged. Not only are we judged while living on the earth but those who have died are also judged. That judgment, according to the fourth chapter of the Book of First Peter, includes fiery sufferings by which we are saved from sin.

It is my point of view that we Christians profit from the things God did with the patriarchs, and now the patriarchs, as a great cloud of witnesses, are profiting from the things God is doing with us. I believe further that no revelation of God's Kingdom purposes comes forth in Heaven among the deceased, only from the vessels of earth as we are being refined in the fire. Even the angels desire to know what God is doing among us.

All this being evident, I would suggest we do not go to recline in a mansion in Paradise when we die. While there might be a great sea of people that mill around in various areas of the spirit realm, waiting for the Day of Judgment and for the new world to appear, the members of the royal priesthood, those stationed at the right hand of the Father, are growing together with us who yet are on the earth. It may be true that the entire Body of Christ continues to be built up by that which every joint supplies, independently of physical life or death.

To be continued.