Adam and Eve sinned by eating from the forbidden tree in the Garden. This means that Adam and Eve were in danger of becoming permanently separated from their Creator. This delighted the serpent but greatly saddened the Father and all of Heaven. God, then did something unexpected! “The LORD God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and clothed them (Genesis 3:21). God used the animal skins to clothe Adam and Eve physically and He established the substitution principle in the Garden, the blood of the innocent in exchange for the blood of the guilty. Because the soul that sins will die, the only chance Adam and Eve had at escaping the permanent spiritual death is through the substitution principle that God established.
What is Spiritual Death?
How bad is spiritual death? The older I grow the more convinced I become that our lives on earth are living parables and that everything we go through in life is a physical / temporary shadow of a spiritual /permanent reality. This includes death. 💀Death is the result of sin. We understand, from our human experience, that physical death is a terrible thing, and often involves an untold amount of suffering! We mourn when people die! It separates us from our loved ones, from the earth and from everything that is living. Death is lonely and depressing! Need we say more?
If physical death is this bad, and it is but a shadow of “the real death”, then that death must be so bad it cannot even be fully comprehended.
Earth is a mixture of darkness and light. God’s presence is pure light, pure love, pure joy. Where God’s presence resides, there resides everything that is Good. Where His presence departs, there resides everything that is evil. God’s presence is still on the earth. Even atheists, who have no idea that there is a Creator, benefit from God’s presence on the earth. Although evil is present on the earth, God’s Presence RESTRAINS evil. In the place that we call “hell”, which is really a permanent death, separation from our Creator, evil will be unrestrained FOREVER.
Hell, eternal separation from the Creator, is a pretty dark destination, and not one that any of us would knowingly choose. But Satan (the adversary) has already chosen it because he thought that he could defeat Almighty God, the One who created him. The devil KNOWINGLY betrayed his Creator and will be thrown into outer darkness for eternity. He doesn’t want to go there alone. He already convinced 1/3 of Heaven’s Angels to rebel against God with him. It is their hope, the devil and the fallen angels, to trick, deceive, and fool enough of God’s children, those who were originally created in God’s Image (human beings) to go there with them. Their goal is to bring as many of us into outer darkness with them as they can.
