Paradise vs. Heaven

What do you guys think about this subject? I heard a man speak the other day and he was quoting verses to back up his belief that:

We're in this earthly realm. The evil spirits are a realm above us and they can travel between the earthly and evil realm.

When we die, we go to Hades, which is a realm above the evil doers and it consists of Paradise and Torment. Good, Christ-loving spirits in Paradise, evil ones go to Torment.

Heaven is yet another realm above Hades, where God and Jesus are with the Angels.

He said only after Jesus returns to earth for His Bride will we be in God's presence for our individual judgments.

Well, Christians tend to think that the makeup of these realms changed after Jesus rose from the dead. Any scriptural reference from before that time would then be obsolete.

Also, there's not too much about this in the Bible. It wasn't written as a map of the spirit realms, but as a guide to find God. People who do astral traveling have attempted to chart all of the different realms; but I don't know just how much I'd trust them. Things get very subjective when you do stuff like that.

I myself have traveled to a realm of Hades where people seemed to be locked into a mindset of torturing themselves. I'm not sure if there were any demons helping them with the torture, but they seemed to believe that they deserved it. This of course is just a personal experience, not one that can be supported by scripture. And it is also highly subjective, as I don't really know where I was or what it is that I "saw".

Whenever I question what transpired in this experience, God reminds me that "The gates of hell will not prevail" against His Church. Who's to say that doesn't mean that they must let us in if we have business there?

As to your question though, I don't think the Bible actually says what all the realms of the spirit world are. Some are mentioned in the Bible for sure, but it wasn't written for that purpose so I don't think you'd get a complete picture from just there. Kind of like drawing up a map of Israel from only what is mentioned in the Bible. If you studied real hard you might get a bunch of cities placed close to where they should be, but it would be far from complete. Why? Because the Bible simply wasn't written so that we can draw up maps from it.

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For the eyes of the LORD run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him. 2 Chronicles 16:9

What do you guys think about this subject? I heard a man speak the other day and he was quoting verses to back up his belief that:

We're in this earthly realm. The evil spirits are a realm above us and they can travel between the earthly and evil realm.
The demons are only a finger-touch away, as they are there in “dry places seeking rest”.

When we die, we go to Hades, which is a realm above the evil doers and it consists of Paradise and Torment. Good, Christ-loving spirits in Paradise, evil ones go to Torment.
When we die we go to the Judgement Seat, unbelievers as well.

Heaven is yet another realm above Hades, where God and Jesus are with the Angels.
Hades is hell, and heaven is heaven.

He said only after Jesus returns to earth for His Bride will we be in God's presence for our individual judgments.

I think people usually use paradise and heaven as synonyms.

Here is how I think of it: Paradise/Heaven is God's space. Heaven/Paradise and earth intersect and interact in many ways. Hell/Hades/Gehenna is a "place" of shame and running away from God. The word "place" is mispleading since that implies some location where I could point and say "there it is".

I would say Heaven/Paradise/God's Temple and Hell/Hades/Gehenna have a wide range of meaning also. God's Temple on earth for example could accurately be said to be a part of (or intersect with) Heaven. Someone who has rejected God could also be accurately said to be dwelling in Hell/Hades/Gehenna already, though their dwelling in Hell/Hades would certainly become intensified after their physical death.

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Jimmie
USN

semper reformada

I asked someone about the Paradise/Heaven subj: here's what he said:

Hades is not the same as hell. The best way to explain is to compare verses concerning Jesus.

1) It was prophesied that Jesus would go to Hades, but not remain
there (Acts 2:25-32)
2) Jesus said that when He died at the crucifixion He would be in
Paradise (Lk 23:43)

The only way to reconcile these two verses is if Paradise is a place
in Hades. The other thing to consider is that Hades (which means 'the
unseen place' in Greek) is the Greek word for 'Sheol' (Sheol is a
Hebrew Word used in the Old Testament). In fact, when the Greeks
translated the Old Testament into the Greek language (The Greek Old
Testament is called the Septuagint) they used the word Hades in place
of the word Sheol.

The reason this is important is because it is VERY clear that Sheol means the place of all the dead. Jacob said he would go to Sheol as he mourned the loss of his son (Gen. 37:35). Jacob was a godly man and it wouldn't make sense for him to say that he would go to hell in mourning. Sheol just means 'the place of the dead' -
exactly like 'Hades'.

We will go to Paradise or torments directly at death, but there we,
and even the angels, will wait for the great day of Judgment (Jude 6).