Copyright © 1998 by Jason Michael Sr.
At this point, some of you are probably still thinking that God hasn't really given us much choice about all of this. If God really loves us, shouldn't He have protected us from all this pain and suffering?
Copyright © 1998 by Jason Michael Sr.
At this point, some of you are probably still thinking that God hasn't really given us much choice about all of this. If God really loves us, shouldn't He have protected us from all this pain and suffering?
In order to answer
this question, we need to consider the matter of 'spirit, soul and body'...
As seen in the following passage, the bible says that man is composed of these
three components...
1 Thessalonians 5:23 "... may your whole spirit, soul and body be preserved blameless ..."
So... now we need to define these components ---
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
We may as well start with the easiest one... the "body" ---
The word 'body' in the verse above comes from the Greek word, "soma" which means "the body as a whole." 3
In other words, 'body' refers to the physical body of flesh, which is basically the vehicle through which the spirit and soul of a person operates.
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Now let's consider the "soul"...
The
first thing to note is that there can be a bit of confusion regarding the soul
and its distinction from the spirit...
Some people fail to see them as separate entities and instead view them as being
interchangeable terms for the same thing.
This confusion seems to stem from the fact that the Greek words for both spirit and soul appear to represent the same thing ---
|
The Greek word for spirit
("pneuma")
can be translated as: "breath" |
The Greek word for soul
("psuche")
can also be translated as: "breath" |
This is made even worse by the fact
that in the Greek language, both can also refer to ---
"...the sentient element in man, that by which he perceives, reflects,
feels, and desires." 4
The subtle, yet distinct difference
between the spirit and the soul only becomes apparent
when one looks at the Hebrew words for spirit and soul
---
|
The Hebrew word for spirit
("ruah")
can be translated as: |
The Hebrew word for soul
("nepes")
can be translated as: |
|
"breath"
|
"breath"
|
|
"'wind"
|
"self"
|
|
"air"
|
"person"
|
|
"heart"
|
As you can see, the Hebrew word
for 'soul' ("nepes") indicates a definite
sense of 'personal identity'...
It can be translated
as meaning "self" and "person".
And actually, this sense of 'personal identity' is likewise present in the Greek word for 'soul'... As seen above, the Greek word for 'soul' can also refer to "...the sentient element in man, that by which he perceives, reflects, feels, and desires." 5 And obviously, "perceptions, thoughts. feelings and desires" are all elements of one's personal identity.
It is worth noticing here, that ---
"perceptions" and "reflections" (or 'thoughts') have to do with the 'mind'.
"feelings" have to do with 'emotions'.
"desires" have to do with 'choices' or 'will'.
In other words, the soul is actually composed of three sub-elements ---
So, when you read the word
'soul', just remember to think
'mind, will & emotions'.
Hopefully, it is apparent at
this point that while the spirit and soul are indeed similar,
they are not the same thing.
This can be seen in the following passage, where the bible makes reference to ---
Hebrews 4:12 "... the division of soul and spirit..."
In the above passage, it can be clearly seen that the soul and spirit are not the same... Although designed to essentially be 'one' in the sense that they are designed to work together, they are two distinctly different entities.
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Now we come to the"spirit" ---
The first step in understanding
the spirit's function, is to recognize that the spirit is
"...related to worship and divine communion." 6
When God initially created mankind, He gave us spirit's and soul's that recognized His authority and boundaries. If it were otherwise, surely God would not have said that things were "good" in Genesis 1:31.
But remember... God also gave us the freedom to choose whether or not to accept what He gave us...
As stated previously, our 'free will' carried with it a certain vulnerability... The vulnerability being that the soul (or 'mind, will & emotions') was potentially free to overrule the spirit which originally desired 'divine communion' with God.
And remember... God
made this vulnerability known to us right from the start...
He told us plainly that both "good and evil"
exist and that the choice was ours ---
Genesis 2:17 "...of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die."
This bring us back to the question
posed at the beginning of this chapter, which was ---
"If God really loves us,
shouldn't He have protected us from all this pain and suffering"?
Here, we have the answer to that question ---
We were offered protection.
We were offered protection in the form of spirit's that originally recognized God's authority and boundaries and desired 'divine communion' with Him.
In a sense then, the spirit can be thought of as having originally represented 'strength'...
Since mankind's 'free will' carried with it a certain vulnerability, and since 'vulnerability' implies a certain sense of 'weakness', it would seem reasonable to say that what mankind really needed (and what God originally provided) was 'strength'.
But again...
in keeping with His desire that mankind be truly free,
God made this spirit (or 'strength') subject to our acceptance
of it.
He does not force anyone to accept
it.
Sure... God could certainly have kept us from choosing Satan's false 'freedom'... He didn't have to allow us the option of rejecting His protection. But that would essentially have made us nothing more than robots, and God does not want a bunch of preprogrammed robots. God desires true companionship... companionship that stems from a freewill desire to be with Him.
Unfortunately though, according to the account given in Genesis, after contemplating Satan's deception in our 'minds', all of us exercised our 'freewill' and chose to set aside the spirit's 'strength'. Thus we are now considered to be "without strength", just as it says in Romans 5:6.
Actually, not only are we described
as being "without
strength"...
Now, the bible refers to us as having actually become
"slaves" of sin.
7
And the really bad news is that our choice has opened the door to what the bible calls "death".
When most people think of the word
'death', they simply think in terms of the physical body ceasing to function.
This is indeed a type of death, but the bible
defines death a bit differently...
In biblical terms ---
'life' basically means... 'being
in relationship with God'.
And thus ---
'death' basically means... 'becoming ever more separated from Him'.
In other words ---
'Death'
literally means 'separation from God'.
And unfortunately, this is man's future.
Because we are now spiritually "without strength", our souls ('mind, will & emotions') are considered to be incapable of consistently resisting sin, and thus 'death' (or 'separation') is inevitable. The close connection between the spirit and soul is now a liability, because the soul is being dragged along with the 'enslaved' spirit, ever further from God.
Thankfully though, God
has a rescue plan in mind...
As you will see, He intends to provide for ---
Hebrews 4:12 "... the division of soul and spirit..."
As we shall see later, this "division" will provide the means to free our souls (or 'mind, will & emotions') from the 'enslaved' spirit which now separates us from God.
In any case, to wrap up this chapter ---
We have now seen that originally, God did in fact offer mankind protection from Satan's deception.
We have also seen that (in spite of what some spiritual philosophies teach) 'spirit' and 'soul' are not two words for the same thing. It is just very difficult to separate the two, because although they are separate components, they were designed from the start to function together, as one.
If you have come to this site
from an external link and are trapped in a "frame",
please click below to enter the main page ---
All material (text & graphics) Copyright
© 1998 by Jason Michael Sr. All rights reserved.
www.roadmapforthesoul.com
