What does the Bible teach us about when Christians go to heaven to be with Christ?  Having already considered what the Bible tells us about the soul and hell, we note that our Lord Jesus Christ gave us the definitive answer of when Christians would be with him in heaven.  Speaking to his close disciples he told them when they would be with in heaven.   He stated: “I will come again and take you to be with me, so that where I am you may be too.” (Joh. 14:3)  These words carry a great deal of significance in determining when Christians would be with Christ.  How so? 

Grammarian A.T. Robertson observes the following on this text: “[It is a] purpose clause with hina and present active subjunctive of eimi. This the purpose of the departure and the return of Christ. And this is heaven for the believer to be where Jesus is and with him forever.”[1]  The purpose of his coming again and taking them is so that they will be with him.   

Why is this significant?  If his disciples were already with him through their deaths this purpose would be defeated.  When he would come they would already have been there with him!  Jesus certainly knew that the disciples to whom he was speaking would die before his return and so to say this would contradict the notion of them already being in heaven with him.   

The Apostle Paul provided the same view of when Christians would be with Christ.  Speaking on the resurrection, Paul explained his view of being with Christ: “Because the Lord Himself shall come down from Heaven with a commanding shout of an archangel's voice, and with God's trumpet. And the dead in Christ will rise again first.  Then we who remain alive will be caught up together with them in the clouds to a meeting with the Lord in the air. And so we will always be with the Lord.” (1Thes. 4:16-17)  Jesus coming and taking his disciples would allow them to be with him, not death.  It is from this coming that Paul clearly anticipated that he would “be with the Lord.”  What then do we make of the texts used in an effort to prove heavenly life after death? 

2 Corinthians 5
The Apostle Paul set the context of one of the most common passages used to show that Christians go to heaven upon death.  He introduced this passage by a discussion of the resurrection.  He spoke of a time when “what is mortal [will] be swallowed up by life.”  Carrying this discussion forward he spoke of being “absent from the body and at home with the Lord.”  Many have taken this to mean that upon death the Christian is absent from the body as a soul and with Jesus, but is this what Paul is discussing? 

Paul begins by speaking of “the earthly house that is our tent.”  As a tent maker Paul well used the expression this to express that which is a temporary dwelling place.  The mortal, fleshly body is but a temporary dwelling.  He states that if this place “be dissolved, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.”   

Paul continues by stating that in the present body they are groaning and in their groaning they have a desire.  The desire he speaks of is to be given that heavenly house.   Having such, they would no longer have to struggle through fleshly existence with all of the trials and tribulations that are associated with it.  He states that because they will be given a heavenly house they will not be naked, with nakedness serving as a euphemism for death.   

We are next told that they are groaning, but in their groaning they do not want to be “unclothed,” meaning they do not want to die, but rather they want “the mortal [to] be swallowed up by life.”  That is to say they desire the resurrection, where “the mortal will be clothed with immortality.” (1Cor. 15:53)   

The next portion of text is essential to understanding the remaining text.  Paul states: “Now he who has produced us for the same thing is that God who has given to us the pledge of the spirit.”  Paul is stating that he and the Christians in Corinth have been ordained by God for the purpose that he has discussed.  Because of their faith they have been destined to experience the resurrection.  Their being given the Holy Spirit serves as evidence of this fact. 

“Therefore,” or in light of the fact that they have been given the Spirit as evidence of the fact that their “mortality [will] be swallowed up by life,” they are “confident.”  This statement connects the discussion of the resurrection to what proceeds. Many take what we have already discussed to be about the resurrection while understanding what proceeds to be related to death.   Contextually, there is no basis for such a separation.  Paul here interconnects the Spirit serving as a pledge of the resurrection with their confidence, which is them “knowing that being at home in the body [they] are away from home with the Lord.” (2Cor. 5:6) 

We notice that Paul contrasts being “at home” with being “away from home.”  Their being “at home” is being in the body, which parallels the “tent” that Paul spoke of in verse 1.  If they were to become absent from the body, which is their flesh, they were “confident” that they would become “at home with the Lord” by receiving their “house not made with hands.” 

We must recall that Paul explained that they would have a house not made with hands if their current house were “dissolved.”  Paul was certainly not saying that they would be with Jesus while “naked,” for that is what he says they did “not desire.” (2Cor. 5:4)  It would be quite contradictory for Paul to say that they did “not desire” something and then for him to state that they were “well pleased” to experience the same thing, a statement occurring only a few verses later, in verse 8.     

Clearly the opening context of 2 Corinthians 5 is that of the resurrection.  The context does not change, but clearly it continues and so to read into this passage life after death would be to disregard what Paul wrote.  Being absent from the body is being absent from our mortal home, which is our flesh upon the earth.  Paul wrote not simply that he would be “present with the Lord,” as many will quote the passage, but that he would be “at home with the Lord.”   In doing this, his “home” would become “the house not made with hands.”    

Philippians 1
The epistle to the Philippians presents another Pauline text where some have argued for heavenly existence immediately upon death.  The passage begins with the following text.

“Therefore, for me to live is Christ and to die is gain.”

How these words are true is shown by the text that precedes it.  Looking to verse 20 we see Paul states: “Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by Life or by Death.”  If Paul were to continue living, he would preach of Jesus and so his life was dedicate to Christ. How was death gain?  Many commentators have taken the passage to refer to Paul’s personal gain, but the context that leads up to this text demands a very different meaning to Paul’s view of “gain.”  It was not personal gain, but his focus was on Christ being “magnified in [his] body.”  Looking back to verse 13 we find that the Roman guards and many others knew of his imprisonment and the reasons for it.  If he died Jesus would be “magnified” because as a martyr he would have been dying for the cause of Christ.   

“But if I live in the flesh, this is to me a fruit of labor.”

The gain that Paul would receive for Christ if he lived would be by his working to spread the Gospel.  It would be “the fruit of labor,” not something that was simply handed to him.   

“And what I shall choose I do not know.”

Paul does not know what he prefers.  Does he want to die and have Christ gain by his martyr’s death, or does he want Christ to be magnified by his labors?   

“But I am hard pressed by the two, having the desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far better…”

Whereas “to live” or “to die” were his options with respects to the magnification of Jesus, Paul now speaks of his personal desire.  The Greek word translated as “desire” literally denotes a lusting.  This statement of his desire or lust is his personal desire, not a consideration of what would greater magnify Christ. 

Was Paul here teaching doctrine?  That certainly would not find itself within the context of the passage.  Paul is simply weighing options on what would greater magnify Christ.  Would there be a greater magnification of Christ if he were to live on and continue preaching, or would it be better for him to die a martyr’s death, thus serving as a witness to all who knew of his imprisonment?  He is hard pressed between those two options, having his personal desire of being with Christ, this being what was “far better” than the “two.”   

We must observe that if Paul were speaking of death when he spoke of desiring to depart he would be asking for the very thing that he said elsewhere that he did not desire! In 2 Corinthians 5, speaking about the resurrection body, he specifically says, “we do no want to be unclothed [that is, he did not want to die] but to be clothed, so that which is mortal will be swallowed up by life.” (2 Cor. 5:4).  To take “depart” as death would mean that Paul “longed” to die, while he had specifically stated elsewhere that he does not want to be unclothed, meaning that he did not desire death!   Certainly Paul was not contradicting himself by stating in one place that he did not wish to die, while in the other stating that he did.   Indeed, if Paul did contemplate being with Christ immediately upon death, he certainly would have desired to be unclothed, as we all then should.  Clearly this was not a thought of Paul's. 

Interesting enough we observe that Paul states what he did desire, which was for his mortal body to be “swallowed up by life,” (2Cor. 5:4) an event to occur at the resurrection.  At that time, his mortal body, his flesh, would be consumed in the “change” that he anticipated (Phil. 3:21-22).  While Philippians 1 does not address how Paul planned to “depart and be with the Lord,” it was not the intent of the passage as the context demonstrates.   

“But to remain in the flesh is more necessary on your account.”

Paul personally desired to be with Christ, yet at the same time he did not know whether Christ would find greater magnification through his labor while alive or through his suffering a martyr’s death.  If he was resurrected, he would no longer be “flesh” because his body would be “changed” (Phil. 3:22), yet at the same time if he died he would not be such either.  It was necessary for him to remain flesh to aid the Christians in Philippi. 

Paul was not here teaching doctrine, he was simply putting his personal thoughts on paper and these involved how he could best glorify Christ.  Paul’s doctrine, as we already noted, was that at the resurrection he would be with Christ.  This is explicitly stated in 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17.  We cannot disregard what we observed of Jesus’ teaching either, noting that he comes back for the purpose of bringing his disciples to where he is at, which is heaven. 

In this text, as with many others, those who believe in a dualism in which people exist in bodies and then consciously as departed souls are forced to read these things into the text on practically every occasion. At no time does Paul refer to departing as an immaterial soul.  If we simply let the Scriptures speak for themselves without adding words such as “soul” and “body” where they were not divinely inspired to be, many of the false conclusions that individuals reach would be avoided.

Therefore, it is our reasonable conclusion that people do not go to heaven at their death.   Jesus never taught this doctrine and such a view is actually contradictory to what he taught.