3. God has a different view of death.
The Lord told Kenneth E. Hagin one time, I don’t look at death the way people do. In fact, I never see My children dying, because they don’t die.

“Well, what do they do, Gloria?” They leave! They just go home.

To God, what we call dying is just our spirits changing addresses—moving from earth to heaven.

Death is separation.

For example, when Adam sinned in the Garden of Eden, he died spiritually, and that spiritual death caused him to be separated from God. He lost his glory and the supernatural protection of the life of God. His body became vulnerable and physical death followed.

If Adam had never been separated from God—if he’d never sinned and become spiritually dead—he would not have died physically because he was created righteous and death was not in him. He was made in God’s image, and there is no sin or death in God. But when Adam sinned, his union with God was broken and his source—his eternal life source—was gone. He died spiritually. The battery went dead. The light went out. Sin brought him short of the glory and the life of God.

Jesus had to come, pay the penalty for Adam’s sin, shed blood to eradicate that sin from man and bring him back to life—eternal life. Glory to God and to our Savior Jesus, the Anointed One! The spirit—the part of you that makes you who you are—will go to heaven. It will live forever.

Now, when I say live forever, I don’t mean as some “Casper, the Friendly Ghost-type” character, floating around somewhere. When Jesus rose from the dead, He did not become a ghost. He no longer had a physical body as we know it, but He did have form.

After the resurrection, Jesus appeared to the disciples:

Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have. And when he had thus spoken, he showed them his hands and his feet. And while they yet believed not for joy, and wondered, he said unto them, Have ye here any meat? And they gave him a piece of a broiled fish, and of an honeycomb. And he took it, and did eat before them.
(Luke 24:39-43)

Jesus was real. He could be felt. He was firm to the touch in the natural world, and that’s how our immortal bodies will be.

When you learn how God thinks about dying, the fear of death will lose its grip on you. The more real the spirit realm becomes to you, the less of a threat death will be. Death is an enemy.

4. When you’re ready, just go!
Now, some people aren’t just afraid of dying—they’re especially afraid of dying young. In a society where schoolchildren are killing each other, this can be very real to young people—and their parents. But everyone, both young and old, needs to know that God wants His people to live long, full lives.

As a believer, His will is for you to live out the full number of your days and to be satisfied. Psalms 91:15-16 says, “He shall call upon me, and I will answer him: I will be with him in trouble; I will deliver him, and honour him. With long life will I satisfy him, and show him my salvation.”

Go ahead and live until a good old age, and if you’re not satisfied, live a while longer. Then when you’re ready, just go. You don’t have to get sick to die. Go healed. Go whole. Go with a shout. Your earth suit won’t have life anymore because you are gone. You will be enjoying more life than you’ve ever experienced.

That’s what Abraham did. He didn’t go sick. The Bible says in Genesis 25:8, his “spirit was released, and he died at a good (ample, full) old age, an old man, satisfied and satiated, and was gathered to his people” (AMP).

That’s one of the ways you need to think of your home going—as simply being released. When you leave this earth, you will be released from a totally natural body that you’ve had to crucify, mortify and make obey all the days you’ve been here. Abraham was released, and he died at a good old age, satisfied. He was totally full and gathered to his people. All of his family that had gone before him were there waiting for him. That’s how it will be with you. There will be quite a reception when you arrive—of loved ones and those you ministered to while in the earth.

Abraham’s son Isaac had a similar home going: “And Isaac’s spirit departed; he died and was gathered to his people, being an old man, satisfied and satiated with days; his sons Esau and Jacob buried him” (Gen. 35:29 AMP). His body died, but his spirit just left. So what did Esau and Jacob bury? They buried his body—his earth suit.

God looks at the death of His people as a departure. It’s a leaving from one place and an arriving in His presence, which is far better.

The Apostle Paul said in 2 Timothy 4:6-7, “For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.” Paul saw his leaving this earth as a departure, not an end of life. He knew God and he knew the Spirit of God. He had no dread of going to heaven, for he knew it was a much better place.

The Bible says death is an enemy. It is right to resist it until we have finished our work and lived out the full number of our days. But we don’t have to live in fear of death because we’ve been redeemed!