Question:  What happens when people die?  Do they, if they are Christians, go immediately straight to heaven?

Answer:  I think the best way to answer this question (in a relatively short way) is to say, “They go to be in the presence of Christ.”  There are a couple of different passages that indicate and allude to this.  First, when Jesus was on the cross and he extended his grace to one of the thieves who was dying alongside of him he said, “I assure you, today you will be with me in paradise.” (Luke 23:43)  Second, the Apostle Paul in writing to the church in Philippi said, “I’m torn between two desires: Sometimes I want to live, and sometimes I long to go and be with Christ.”

Now, most theologians call that place Jesus labeled “paradise” as an “intermediate heaven.”  It is a place reserved for those who will spend eternity in the presence of the Father as residents of the New Jerusalem.  It is not the “new heaven” and “new earth,” but it is a place where those who have died in faith reside in the presence of Christ and await the final culmination of eternity in order to be ushered into heaven collectively with all of the saints.

By the way, this concept of an intermediate heaven isn’t the same as the term “purgatory” where those who have died are in a state of limbo.