We are told that death is:
For to be carnally minded is death… Romans 8:6
An example of death:
Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart: Ephesians 4:18
Notice, in the above that death is not what a person did; but where a person is!
Death has a king:
And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth. Revelation 6:8
Death also has a key:
I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death. Revelation 1:18
This key of death is to open the gates to the PLACE of death:
Have the gates of death been opened unto thee? or hast thou seen the doors of the shadow of death? Job 38:17
But he knoweth not that the dead are there; and that her guests are in the depths of hell. Proverbs 9:18
For her house inclineth unto death, and her paths unto the dead. Proverbs 2:18
Her house is the way to hell, going down to the chambers of death. Proverbs 7:27
They are dead, they shall not live; they are deceased, they shall not rise: therefore hast thou visited and destroyed them, and made all their memory to perish. Isaiah 26:14
This place is also known as a place called, ” the land of forgetfulness”:
Shall thy wonders be known in the dark? and thy righteousness in the land of forgetfulness? Psalms 88:12
I am forgotten as a dead man out of mind: I am like a broken vessel. Psalms 31:12
And therefore the above is the correct interpretation to the following:
This is an evil among all things that are done under the sun, that there is one event unto all: yea, also 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. For to him that is joined to all the living there is hope: for a living dog is better than a dead lion. For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten. Also their love, and their hatred, and their envy, is now perished; neither have they any more a portion for ever in any thing that is done under the sun. Ecclesiastes 93-:6
Notice, very carefully that those in the place of the dead will have all their memory of them ever being alive forgotten in “the land of the living”. This is way we find that many try to write a book or do something before they go to the place of the dead and are forgotten.
God shall likewise destroy thee for ever, he shall take thee away, and pluck thee out of thy dwelling place, and root thee out of the land of the living. Selah. Psalms 52:5
I said, I shall not see the LORD, even the LORD, in the land of the living: I shall behold man no more with the inhabitants of the world. Isaiah 38:11
He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare his generation? for he was cut off out of the land of the living: for the transgression of my people was he stricken. Isaiah 53:8
But I was like a lamb or an ox that is brought to the slaughter; and I knew not that they had devised devices against me, saying, Let us destroy the tree with the fruit thereof, and let us cut him off from the land of the living, that his name may be no more remembered. Jeremiah 11:19
Thus they are members of the “congregation of the dead”:
Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart: Ephesians 4:18
The man that wandereth out of the way of understanding shall remain in the congregation of the dead. Proverbs 21:16
They are dead, they shall not live; they are deceased, they shall not rise: therefore hast thou visited and destroyed them, and made all their memory to perish. Isaiah 26:14
Because ye have said, We have made a covenant with death, and with hell are we at agreement; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, it shall not come unto us: for we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehood have we hid ourselves: Isaiah 28:15
So, if you are thinking that death will be the end of it all; you will have a rude surprise when you wake up “ in the congregation of the dead”.