> My question here, then, is this: what reason could exist for God to preserve a specimen that has died spiritually? The answer you give, that he has given the forgiveness, I believe to be correct. But, in that case, they are not spiritually dead. God has forgiven them their sins.

Yet there was still a moment of "death," whether
they're dead now or not. They died spiritually,
and THEN God gave them life again.