Another important question concerning man, one, which has been asked by every person that ever lived long, enough to think at all upon the subject, is, ‘When a man dies, where does he go? What is his condition?’ etc., etc. This question the Bible asks: "Man dies, and wastes away; yea, man gives up the ghost, and where is he?" (Job 14:10).
Of course, there have been many answers given to this question; and there are yet many, even in this land where Bibles are scattered everywhere. Some say that if he die wicked, he is in hell; if he die righteous, he is in heaven. Others say that he is in neither hell nor heaven, but in purgatory; and yet others, that he is in none of these, but has passed to the "spheres," and still associates and communicates with those who still live. Of course all these answers cannot be the right ones; and, as a matter of fact, not one of them is the right one. The Bible alone is that which gives the right answer to this, its own question. And as it is alone the Bible answers to Bible questions that we are now studying, that alone shall be what we shall seek on this question of where is man when he has died.
"Man dies, and wastes away; yea, man gives up the ghost, and where is he?" Answer: "The heart of the sons of men is full of evil, and madness is in their heart while they live, and after that they go to the dead" (Eccl. 9:3). To good King Josiah God said, "Thou shalt be gathered into thy grave in peace" (2 Kings 22:20). Of the wicked He also says, "Yet shall he be brought to the grave, and shall remain in the tomb" (Job 21:32). Jacob said, "I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning" (Gen. 37:35). We shall not multiply texts on this point, but simply show that this is confirmed by the Word of Christ. When He comes to give reward to His people, and when He calls for them, they, all that are dead, are found in the grave: "The hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation" (John 5:28, 29). Therefore the Bible answer to this question is plainly that he is in the grave.
But what is his condition there? Let us read a verse from Job again: "Man gives up the ghost, and where is he? As the waters fail from the sea, and the flood decays and dries up; so man lies down, and rises not; till the heavens be no more, they shall not awake, nor be raised out of their sleep" (Job 14:10-120). This shows that man, when he dies, is asleep. Again, Job says that if he had died when he was an infant, "now should I have lain still and been quiet, I should have slept; then had I been at rest, with kings and counselors of the earth.… There the wicked cease from troubling; and there the weary be at rest. There the prisoners rest together; they hear not the voice of the oppressor. The small and great are there; and the servant is free from his master" (Job 3:13-19).
In the history of the kings of Israel and Judah, twenty-five times is the record made of their deaths, "He slept with his fathers."