QRUEL

thanks that's more of what I was looking for, although I'll need to find specific passages

Mythra

Luke 23:43
Jesus answered him, "I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise."

Of course, the apostle's creed states that "he descended into hell" first.

Like everything in christianity, you gotta navigate through the contradictions.

Mythra

Then, for an opposing viewpoint to the "immediately with the Lord" idea - we have this:

1 Thessalonians 4:16 For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first.

QRUEL

thank you Mythra

perhaps I should have stated my question as a statement such as

Heaven is open for business, right now as we speak. you die, go straight to heaven, do not collect $200

maybe that would have illicited more response from the community

Atheos

As others have mentioned, this subject is one that is understood in vastly different ways among believers in the Yahweh/Allah traditions. The bible is of little help in settling the issue because of conflicting information contained in it.

First question, how many heavens are there? Paul would give us to believe that there are at least 3.Bill Haley would have you believe there are seven of them. I tend to find Haley more credible, but that's just me.

But seriously, there are a wide variety of schools of thought on this issue. Each opinion has some support in the bible.

• Soul sleep: This doctrine, inspired by Revelation 20:1-5, holds that most people who die are "asleep" and unaware of the passage of time until they are resurrected. They are actually dead. One notable exception to this is that those who are killed for being a christian get a free express ticket to heaven and get to reign with Christ for 1000 years.
• Purgatory: This doctrine was actually formalized well after the canonical bible books were written but may have its roots in the passage from Luke 12:48 where Jesus is claimed to have said,
  Quote:

  But he that knew not, and did commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few [stripes]. For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required: and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more.

  The idea with purgatory is that it is a temporary holding place where folks are "purged" (by being mildly punished) for a period of time for their sins. They get to go to heaven later, after they've served their sentence. Some believe that purgatory lasts until judgment day for everyone and the punishment is less or more severe depending on how wicked the individual was. Others believe that it only lasts for a predetermined period of time, after which the soul is released to go to heaven.
• Hades/Abraham's Bosom: Popularized by the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus (Luke 16:19-31), this line of thought holds that there is an immediate pre-judgment at the moment of death. Bad people go to hades and get an early start on getting punished. Good people go to a place not too far away (because it's close enough that folks can see each other and carry on a conversation) but separated by some kind of "gulf" that keeps folks from going from one side to the other. This place is called "Abraham's Bosom". Abraham has a really big bosom, the kind that would make Candy Samples look like a lightweight. Either that or there aren't but a couple of good people, because evidently everyone who goes to that side gets to rest their head in Abraham's bosom. Let's hope he showers regularly.

I'm sure there are other ideas, but these are a few I could think of off the top of my head.

Gamera

The Christian texts say virtually nothing about heaven and what is said is clearly metaphorical. It's fair to assume there was a reason for that, and that is that living a Christian life was the goal of Christianity, not achieving some blissful afterlife.

Paul emphasizes this by suggesting the heaven is now -- it is a spiritual state that we enter into (however tentatively and imperfectly) upon accepting the gospels. Thus, he says Christians are in a sense already in heaven, which suggests it is a condition, not a place:

Ephesians 2:6 - Among these we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of body and mind, and so we were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. 4 But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved) and raised us up with him, and made us sit with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.

Thus it is only naive, cultural Christianity that views heaven as some place with lots of marble, pillars, and gentle mist.

Dark Virtue

If you're not familiar with religioustolerance.org, I suggest you look into it. It's been an invaluable, objective resource for me.

http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_deat.htm

This is a page entitled, "What happens at the time of our death" and covers Roman Catholic beliefs, Eastern Orthodox beliefs, Conservative Protestant beliefs, Liberal Christian beliefs and Skeptical, post-Christian beliefs.

It also answers your questions about purgatory.