Hi James.....He never really gave me anything pertaining to WHY they smell like smoke, but then again I didn't ask, either. The smelling of smoke where there is no smoke is one "tip off" that there is an unholy presence.
The other smell associated with them really stumped me, until someone else told me they smelled it too; when they had to go to the morgue for a relative. When she asked the undertaker what it was, he told her it was the smell of death. I recognized the smell finally as something I had smelled in my childhood.....ether; what dentists used to use. It is sickeningly sweet. I had no idea why they would smell of that, then I read that (pardon me for the graphic explanations) decomposing matter in it's break down process, produces ether. They ARE death.
I have never smelled it, but I have read of people that claim that the Lord's presence to them sometimes had a smell, the smell of roses. Clearly, both of these manifestations, the good and the bad, are spiritually discerned as they are above the abilities our natural senses.
As for Sheol, I shared some of it before. I want to make it plain is NOT like other's descriptions of the "hell" they saw. The soul is trapped in whatever it did not overcome in life in the body, but the spirit returns to the One who sent it. This is the realm that Jesus went to when He was "dead" those 3 days.
If you understand that that too is a pattern of what He is STILL doing, then it follows that He would be interceding in that fashion now also. He said He would do cures and cast out devils for 2 days. Doing "cures" is not just a physical healing manifestation. Healing means at it's essence, to be MADE WHOLE, ie. two parts united, soul and spirit in agreement or covenant.
As He gave me, the RE-union of the soul and spirit IS the first resurrection and the reason why many arose with Him and were seen by many witnesses as it is recorded. When my relative died that I experienced this over, I kept asking the Lord for months, to tell me what happened when we die, no fairy tales. I could not, would not, rest until I had an explanation of something that was shown to me prior to their death. I had no idea the explanation was going to be a "show and tell" type of revelation and involve me being taken in the spirit with Him.
What occurred is that the things that had kept the soul from ascending, like malice, for instance, after repentance came apparently, He used those present to remove the chains that bound. If any have ever read a book by a Dr. Eby who said he was taken into "hell" he said it had stone like walls like a cave. Well, the Lord showed me that what happens is, we descend into our own STONY hearts, and are confronted with what we have given life to, ie. out of the HEART OF MAN proceeds murders, lusts, ect. The Word says we are judged with OUR OWN wickedness, and this is that.
He had mercy on me in that I did not have to see this person's condition in that state, as the shock of it and the grief of seeing it, even for a moment would probably have seriously messed me up. But I descended with Him into it, was aware of that person's thoughts of their heart thru His Spirit and also what had them bound as HE delivered them up out of it.
This happened less than a year after the person died, and I have to wonder if the Jews practice of saying prayers for the dead for up to one year, doesn't have some spiritual significance. At any rate, it is not eternal, but rather a sanctification process that apparently never ends until ALL are brought back into Him. Blessings....
