Only because of the Fall, but it was not a part of the original Creation.
You even admitted that plants dies before Adam's fall. So death did exist for some of creation before the Fall.
You are adding the "spiritual" to limit it to "spiritual death" but the normal reading is physical death. It includes spiritual death just as eternal life also includes the resurrected body.
I am not limiting it to spiritual death per se, so much as making emphasis that spiritual death is much more eternally consequential than physical death. And I think that is the intent of this scripture as well.
Look at this section of the Bible in context. Paul says in Romans 6:19-23
Romans 6:19 writes:
I am using an example from everyday life because of your human limitations. Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness leading to holiness. When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death!
What kind of death is he talking about? A spiritual death, a spiritual separation from God. Everyone dies a physical death, so it is evident he is not talking about a physical death here. Paul is saying that we need to die to our sins, so that we may live eternally with God without being spiritually separated from Him.
But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life.
Eternal life after our physical bodies have died a physical death.
For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
The wages of sin is eternal separation from God aka spiritual death. The gift of God for those in Christ is eternal life of our souls/heavenly body.
Even Charles Spurgeon who you recognize as a respected theologian discusses spiritual death in his Novermber 1, 1885 sermon in relation to the Romans 6:23 passage.
Charles Spurgeon in "Death and Life The Wage and the Gift" http://www.spurgeongems.org/vols31-33/chs1868.pdf writes:
To set forth this terrible fact, I shall make a few observations. First, death is the natural result of all sin. When man acts according to God’s order, he lives, but when he breaks his Maker’s laws, he wrecks himself and does that which
causes death. The Lord warned Adam thusIn the day that you eat thereof you shall surely die. Dying does not mean ceasing to exist, for Adam did not cease to exist, nor do those who die. The term, death, conveys to me no such idea as that of ceasing to exist, or how could I understand that word in 1 John 3:14He that loves not his brother abides in death? How could a man abide in annihilation? A grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, but it does not cease to be! No, rather, it brings forth much fruit.
That Adam did die in the day when he ate of that fruit is certain, or else the
Lord spoke not the truth. His nature was wrecked and ruined by separation from God and by a fall from that condition which constitutes the true life of man.
When any man commits sin, he dies to holiness and purity. No transgression is
venial, but every sin is mortal and genders death...
All desire after God and all delight in Him die out where sin reigns. Death is the separation of the soul from God.
Alas, this death has passed upon all men!
...
Since sin as naturally brings spiritual death upon men as fire brings burning, death is spoken of as the wages of sin
Here is a good link that explains the context of Romans 6:23 in relation to spiritual and physical death:
http://carm.org/romans6-23-spiritual-physical-death
. In context it is WE who are putting to death our deeds through the Spirit, not Christ.
I concur and believe we are saying the same thing here.
We will be CHANGED, scripture says, not that we will "lose" our bodies but that they will be glorified and perfected.
Ok, "lose" is probably not the most ideal word to use here. Transformed or changed is a better word.
The only point is that they WILL be bodies, we will not be disembodied spirits, like angels or demons and ghosts. Jesus made a point of emphasizing that.
I concur they will bodies but not flawed physical, mortal bodies.Also, angels and demons had bodies as well, though not physical, mortal ones.
So we agree on that much. What we disagree about is that Christ's death redeemed our physical bodies from death which came upon us because of sin at the Fall,
He redeemed our immortal souls not our physical mortal bodies per se.
I don't see where you conclude that Jesus redeemed our physical mortal bodies.
Our physical bodies will decay into the ground will it not? Unless your body is mummified or somehow preserved, a human body even in a casket will decompose to bones within a matter of years and bones will decompose to dust in several hundred years in a casket. So it will be a miraculous occurrence by God to raise our physical bodies from the dead , since many of these physical bodies no longer exist in physical bodily form. I am not saying God is not going to transform our bodies, I believe he will, but I don't see this as entirely the redemption being talked about. The emphasis of salvation is on the state of our immortal soul in our glorified bodies in heaven.
Further, those who are in Christ who have died a physical death are in heaven as we speak, are they not.
Luke 23:43 writes:
Jesus answered him, "Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise."
Just some things to think about and contemplate.
BTW, I know this is off-subject. I am willing to move this to another thread if desired.
Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.
Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.
"It is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring." - Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World
"In coming to understand anything we are rejecting the facts as they are for us in favour of the facts as they are. - C.S. Lewis, An Experiment in Criticism
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