Dave, what is sad is that your church has re-defined so many words in the Bible as to make it useless. I don't even know if you and I are praying to the same God. I exist here in Missouri and nowhere else. I will live here on planet earth all of my days and will be resurrected. Since Christ, it is appointed that all men die once. Christ died a sinless death to spare those who will believe in Him from the second death. If you go straight to heaven after you die, then why even have a resurrection?
Existing in different dimensions makes for great TV (SG-1 to be specific), but it is simply not what the Bible indicates as reality. Adam and Eve sinned and thus death entered the world. Enoch walked with God and was spared the first death and presummably the second. Many were resurrected when Christ died and I assume they ascended (I could be wrong, the Bible doesn't say what happened to them). In your theology, death is merely the gateway to another dimension. Have you ever hear of the Jim Jones folks who committed suicide with poisoned Kool-Aide so they could hop on the tail of Haley's comet?
When you read in the Word about Aaron's vestments, the tabernacle, the sacrafices, the Ark, etc what do you take it to mean if anything? When you run across a verse with a name of a place that doesn't exist anymore, do you just skip it? There is a internal spiritual sense to the Bible which is why it's called the HOLY Bible.
For more on this, see De Verbo (Rogers) n. 5