<p>16:23<i> And in Hades- </i>As noted on :22, the Lord used ideas current amongst the Jews for reward, i.e. &quot;Abraham's breast&quot;, and here He likewise uses their ideas of what happened as punishment. But this doesn't mean He approved their ideas as true. Job 21:13 clearly explains what happens to the rich on death: &quot;They spend their days in wealth, and in a moment go down to the grave&quot;.</p><p><i>He lifted up his eyes, being in torments, and saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his breast</i>-Forget, for one moment, that 'the rich man and Lazarus' is a 'difficult passage'. Focus on how Lazarus is &ldquo;in&quot; Abraham's 'bosom' or chest. This doesn't mean literally inside it. He was 'in' Abraham's arms, on his chest; and this is explained to us in :25 as meaning that Lazarus was receiving &quot;comfort&quot; at the same time as the rich man was experiencing torment. Mic. 7:5 uses the same figure of being &ldquo;in&quot; a man's bosom to describe how a wife is held by her husband. And Lam. 2:12 uses it again to mean 'receiving comfort'. This is what the Kingdom will be like, especially immediately after our reward. For this is what the parable is about- the rich man will not be eternally tormented, his torment will be on knowing the reality of the fact that he stands there rejected. But while he is temporarily tormented, some poor beggar brother is getting comforted by Abraham. Both of them with Divine nature. Abraham holding the other brother to his chest and comforting him. And, in passing, this would interpret for us John's words in Jn. 1:18: &quot;The&hellip; son, who is in the bosom of the Father&quot; (after His ascension). After His ordeal, Jesus was as it were receiving comfort from His Father. There was and is an emotional bond between them. And so there will be between us all in the Kingdom. The parable of Lk. 16 goes on to say that there will be those who will want to cross over from rejection to acceptance, and <i>also</i>- and note this- there will be some who will want to go the other way to save those in the group of the rejected- weeping, screaming, gnashing their teeth as they will be. But it won't be possible for them. Even in Divine nature, some of us will have the desire to do the impossible- to save those rejected. It will be rather like the Angels in the time of Ahab suggesting their plans of action to God, but they were all turned down except for one. To have Divine nature, as Angels do, doesn't preclude having emotional thoughts. Nor does it mean we will have 100% understanding of God's ways beamed into us.</p>