REINCARNATION
Sakkie Parsons
Translated from Afrikaans: :Reïnkarnasie"
Translator: Robin Barker
Someone asked me if there is such a thing as 'reincarnation'.
I want to begin my answer with this:
According to my opinion it is absolutely impossible to believe in Jesus Christ as my Redeemer and Saviour and also to believe that reincarnation is a reality.
To begin with you will not find the word reincarnation in any form whatsoever, in the Word of our Lord.
I said that you cannot believe in Jesus Christ as your Redeemer and Saviour if you believe in reincarnation. Firstly because that what you believe, declares that Jesus lied several times and that His Word lied in many places.
Now I can mention a great many quotations, but I will remain by the following, just to show you the absurdity of reincarnation. If you believe in reincarnation, then, according to my opinion, you are saying that which you are about to read, is a bunch of lies. Look at what Jesus says to the man on the cross who is about to die with Him:
LUKE 23:42 Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”
LUKE 23:43 Jesus answered him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”
The murderer did not have another chance to return to earth in another form. When he died, he was immediately with Jesus and you and I will find him there when we open our eyes on the other side of the grave. It is exactly where we will find the beggar from the next example:
LUKE 16:22 “The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham’s side. …”
Certainly, if I have not accepted Jesus Christ as my Redeemer and Saviour, I will meet this next person in our life after death and like him, I will also not have another chance on earth:
LUKE 16:22 “… The rich man also died and was buried.
LUKE 16:23 In Hades, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side.”
Remember what Jesus says, how Abraham answered the man in hell, when he asked that someone from the dead must go back to earth?:
LUKE 16:27-31
27 “He answered, ‘Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my family,
28 for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’
29 “Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.’
30 “‘No, father Abraham,’ he said, ‘but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’
31 “He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’”
This is just to show, when the man opened his eyes in hell, he was there to stay.
Then there is, concerning this matter, the following example of what happened on the mount of transfiguration. Here Moses and Elijah appeared hundreds of years after their deaths, no-one else but Moses and Elijah and nothing or no-one else. Just because there is nothing so absurd as reincarnation in our existence:
MATTHEW 17:1-4
1 After six days Jesus took with him Peter, James and John the brother of James, and led them up a high mountain by themselves.
2 There he was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became as white as the light.
3 Just then there appeared before them Moses and Elijah, talking with Jesus.
4 Peter said to Jesus, “Lord, it is good for us to be here. If you wish, I will put up three shelters—one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah.”
You see – the Word, unlike reincarnation, teaches us that when I depart from here, I either go to Christ, or I go to hell, and this is taught to us, on several occasions, by no-one else but Jesus. I quote our Lord and Redeemer in the following section:
MATT 7:13 “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it.
MATT7:14 But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.”
Anyone that proclaims anything else – like reincarnation, implies that Jesus and also God Almighty is a liar, because remember what the Word testifies about Jesus:
JOHN 1:1 “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”
JOHN 1:14 “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
So, let you and I remain with the truth which our Lord taught us through His Word and that is, that when we depart from here, we go to Christ. Paul says the following concerning this:
PHIL 1:23 “I am torn between the two: I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far;”
Greetings,
Sakkie