Billy Graham’s Funeral and the absurd
doctrine of the Immortality of the Soul
Koot van Wyk (DLitt et Phil; ThD)
At the funeral of Billy Graham
repeatedly a speaker would address him as if he is in heaven. This inroad from
Classical Greek via Plato in his Book Republic chapter 12 into Christianity is
a non-biblical stance. Dr. Graham, the son of Billy Graham,
looked at the coffin and addressed his father in heaven. What an absurd
position to take? Why would God take the person who died,
soul, and then let them be stored on the bosom of Abraham [quite a large bosom]
for thousands of years until the Second Coming and then bring the bundle of
souls down to earth again and let them jump into the body to be resurrected and
taken back to where they came from? Do people not think of implications
and compare biblical passages? One daughter spoke and made a
resolution to be an evangelist from now on too. She will preach the gospel. The
interesting part of her speech, is that she took everyone to 1 Thessalonians
4:13-17 and in essence delivered the biblical doctrine of death as a sleep. The
sleep-state of death concept. John Wycliffe and Martin Luther also understood
the biblical position of the sleep-death state but the Protestant George Ioye
in his Daniel commentary on chapter 12 in 1545 only expounded the immortality
of the soul concept with souls on Abraham’s bosom. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJFhcYjY4VU Ann Graham in this tape at 51:31
proposed that God has called Billy Graham home just like Moses was called to
heaven. It is strange that she say this. She made the typology of her father to
be the modern Moses and admitted it is a long shot, but that Joshua was then
given after Moses to lead people into the promised land. Thus, she suggested
that the typology of her father [as Moses] may mean that God is going to bring Joshua =
Jesus to take us to heaven. It is a modern homiletical interpretation of the Bible
creating extra-biblical typology to make it sound right and convincing. It
sounds sweet but it is not biblical. This is important to see. Then in 52:16 she starts reading 1
Thessalonians 4:13-17. The problem part for these
interpreters is that they misunderstood verse 14 the last part: “them also
which sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him”. From above or from below? Wycliffe and Luther, and Seventh-day
Adventists say, from below but George Joye/Ioye and here in this video, Ann and
her brothers and others, are saying: from above. The Bible says that the dead do not
know anything. What is the purpose then to speak to your daddy in heaven when
the dead do not know anything? Why did Jesus do Lazarus a disfavor of
“letting his soul shot back from a happy perfect state in heaven, back to this
miserable world to live again”. What a disfavor then to Lazarus? The scriptural passages just pile up
against this absurd concept of the Greek immortality of the soul. It is time for people to stop
flash-flash with the smartphones, and sit down with the Bible like Seventh-day
Adventists do, and think when you read and compare scripture to scripture. Stop
following this one or that one and even Billy Graham, if he is wrong with his
Sunday keeping instead of Saturday, with the Immortality of the Soul instead of
Sleep-death state biblical doctrine. Dear God Clearly, men and women that are used
by you in the past and seemingly in the present, are called, blessed, gifted
but then get stagnated and fossilized in their understanding not realizing the
Holy Spirit gave them chances to develop to the full truth and not just 75% of
it. The Holy Spirit will lead all people
into the full truth. But not before people open their hearts and minds to a
willingness for it and set aside the bondage of tradition, pastor, mother and
father’s church, mega-church, goldplated church. Truth is what matters. It is
all about truth.
Dear God, Lead them all in the path of
righteousness and truth for Your Name Sake. Amen.