Page 3: Similarly, if a religion does not satisfy the spiritual hunger of its members, should they give up on religion? Or would they be wiser to look for a way to have their spiritual hunger satisfied?
Note: Spiritual hunger can only be satisfied by asking Jesus to sent the Holy Spirit to you.
John 14:16-17 "And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever; the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you."
Page 4: The Bible itself says: "I, Jehovah, am your God, the One teaching you to benefit yourself, the One causing you to tread in the way in which you should walk." - Isaiah 48:17
Note: The Holy Spirit will teach you all spiritual things!
John 14:26 "But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you."
Pages 4-5: This youth showed Bernd from the Bible that his mother was unconscious, asleep in death. Bernd learned of many Bible verses that explain this, such as Ecclesiastes 9:5: "As for the dead, they are conscious of nothing at all."
Note: Dead bodies are conscious of nothing at all.
Note: Theme of Ecclesiastes is this material world is all vanity.
Ecclesiastes 1:2 "Vanity of vanities," says the Preacher; "Vanity of vanities, all is vanity."
Page 5: Although the doctrine of the immortal soul is taught in most religions, Bernd saw in the Bible that a human soul is just a person. When the person dies, the soul dies. "The soul that is sinning - it itself will die." - Ezekiel 18:4.
Correction: The soul leaves the body at death.
Genesis 35:18-19 And so it was, as her soul was departing (for she died), that she called his name Ben-Oni; but his father called him Benjamin. So Rachel died and was buried on the way to Ephrath (that is, Bethlehem).
Page 5: Incidentally, Bernd has reached his goal of working abroad to help others. He works in a foreign country helping others to learn about God's Kingdom, the real solution to their misery.
Correction: The real solution to misery is a relationship with Jesus Christ.
John 4:13-14 Jesus answered and said to her, "Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life."
Page 9: Jehovah God did not create humans to go to heaven after they died.
Correction: Paul disagrees with the Watchtower.
2 Corinthians 5:1 For we know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.
Page 9: On the contrary, the Bible says that earlier, when he was created, Adam "came to be a living soul." (Genesis 2:7) Man was not given a soul; he became a soul, a living person.
Correction: God created first the body and then the soul as the body cannot live without the soul.
Page 10: In substance, the New Catholic Encyclopedia agrees with this. In its article "Soul (in the Bible)," it says: "There is no dichotomy (division into two parts) of body and soul in the OT ("Old Testament," or Hebrew Scriptures)."
Note: Jehovah has a soul!
Leviticus 26:11-12 I will set My tabernacle among you, and My soul shall not abhor you. I will walk among you and be your God, and you shall be My people.
Page 10: It adds that in the Bible, the word "soul" "never means soul as distinct from the body or the individual person."
Correction: The Catholics and the Watchtower are wrong!
1 Thessalonians 5:23 Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you completely; and may your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Page 10: How much concern and fear churchgoers would have been spared if they had known the simple Bible truth: "The soul that is sinning - it itself will die," not suffer in hellfire!
Correction: Jesus Christ disagrees with the Watchtower!
John 15:6 "If anyone does not abide in Me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered; and they gather them and throw them into the fire, and they are burned."
Page 10: While this is very different from what Christendom teaches, it is entirely consistent with what the wise man Solomon said under inspiration: "The living are conscious that they will die; but as for the dead, they are conscious of nothing at all, neither do they anymore have wages (in this life), because the remembrance of them has been forgotten. All that your hands finds to do, do with your very power, for there is no work nor devising nor knowledge nor wisdom in Sheol (mankind's common grave), the place to which you are going." - Ecclesiastes 9:5, 10
Note: Dead bodies surely can't work anymore!
Note: The theme of Eccesiastes is this material world is vanity!
Ecclesiastes 1:14 I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and indeed, all is vanity and grasping for the wind.
Note: Solomon's solution is to live joyfully!
Ecclesiastes 9:9 Live joyfully with the wife whom you love all the days of your vain life which He has given you under the sun, all your days of vanity; for that is your portion in life, and in the labor which you perform under the sun.
Page 11: Christendom's doctrine of the immortality of the soul is derived from Greek philosophy. It was not revealed through God's revelations to Israel or through the first-century congregation of anointed Christians.
Correction: Jesus Christ was not from Greece!
Matthew 22:32 "'I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob'? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living."
Page 11: If there is no immortal soul, what is the real hope for the dead? It is, of course, the resurrection, a central Bible doctrine and truly wonderful divine promise. Jesus held out the resurrection hope when he said to his friend Martha: "I am the resurrection and the life. He that exercises faith in me, even though he dies, will come to life." (John 11:25)
Correction: True Christians place their hope in Jesus Christ.
1 Timothy 1:1 Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ, by the commandment of God our Savior and the Lord Jesus Christ, our hope,
Page 11: Jesus had earlier spoken of the resurrection when he said to some Jews: "Do not marvel at this, because the hour is coming in which all those in the memorial tombs will hear his voice and come out." (John 5:28, 29) What Jesus here describes is very different from an immortal soul surviving the death of the body and going straight to heaven. It is a future 'coming out' of people who have been in the grave, many for centuries or even for thousands of years. It is dead souls coming back to life.
Correction: A Christians' soul departs at death to be with Jesus.
2 Corinthians 5:6-8 So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord. For we walk by faith, not by sight. We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord.
Note: The resurrection refers to dead bodies coming back to life.
1 Corinthians 15:35-37 But someone will say, "How are the dead raised up? And with what body do they come?" Foolish one, what you sow is not made alive unless it dies. And what you sow, you do not sow that body that shall be, but mere grain; perhaps wheat or some other grain.
Page 14: However, Jesus told his disciples: "Have no fear, little flock, because your Father has approved of giving you the kingdom." (Luke 12:32) God's Kingdom is heavenly. Hence, this promise means that a "little flock" would have to be with Jesus in heavenly as spirit creatures. (John 14:2, 3; 1 Peter 1:3, 4)
Correction: The "little flock" refers to just a few disciples following Jesus at this time.
John 6:66-68 From that time many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more. Then Jesus said to the twelve, "Do you also want to go away?" But Simon Peter answered Him, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."
Page 14: What a glorious prospect! Jesus further revealed to the apostle John that this "little flock" would number just 144,000. - Revelation 14:1
Note: The 144,000 will be sealed for protection against God's wrath being poured out on earth.
Revelation 7:2-4 Then I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God. And he cried with a loud voice to the four angels to whom it was granted to harm the earth and the sea, saying, "Do not harm the earth, the sea, or the trees till we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads." And I heard the number of those who were sealed. One hundred and forty-four thousand of all the tribes of the children of Israel were sealed:
Page 14: How, though, would the 144,000 enter heavenly glory? Jesus "shed light upon life and incorruption through the good news." By means of his blood, he inaugurated "a new and living way" into the heavens. (2 Timothy 1:10; Hebrews 10:19, 20)
Correction: The "new and living way" into the heavens is for everyone who trusts Jesus.
Hebrews 2:9 But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone.
Page 14: Jesus was not raised as a human though. He said: "The bread that I shall give is my flesh in behalf of the life of the world." (John 6:51) Taking his flesh back would nullify that sacrifice.
Correction: Taking back the blood would have nullified the sacrifice
Hebrews 9:22 And according to the law almost all things are purified with blood, and without shedding of blood there is no remission.
Colossians 1:13-14 He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.
1 Peter 1:18-19 knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.
1 John 1:7 But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin.
Note: Jesus Christ now has a glorified body of flesh and bones.
Luke 24:39 "Behold My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself. Handle Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have."
Page 14: Jesus thus "obtained an everlasting deliverance for us," meaning the "little flock."
Correction: Everlasting deliverance is for everyone to places their trust in Jesus Christ.
John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life."
Page 17: Clearly, not all anointed ones sleep in the grave awaiting a resurrection. Those who die during Christ's presence are transformed instantaneously. - Revelation 14:13.
Note: Clearly, true Christians' souls are transported instantaneously to heaven.
Revelation 6:9-10 When He opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the testimony which they held. And they cried with a loud voice, saying, "How long, O Lord, holy and true, until You judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?"
Page 19: If the soul survives death, what is the point of a resurrection?
Note: Disembodied souls can't eat with Jesus in the Kingdom!
Matthew 8:11 "And I say to you that many will come from east and west, and sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven."
Luke 14:15 Now when one of those who sat at the table with Him heard these things, he said to Him, "Blessed is he who shall eat bread in the kingdom of God!"
Page 20: Similarly, anointed Christians first die as humans. Then, at God's appointed time, he brings them back to life in entirely new bodies. As Paul told the Philippians, "Jesus Christ...will fashion our humiliated body to be conformed to his glorified body." (Philippians 3:20, 21; 2 Corinthians 5:1, 2) They are resurrected in spirit bodies and live in the spirit realm. - 1 John 3:2.
Correction: Jesus Christ ate food with His resurrected body.
Luke 24:42-43 So they gave Him a piece of a broiled fish and some honeycomb. And He took it and ate in their presence.