Dividing Soul And Spirit

Biblegems #77

Question: What is the difference in Scripture between “soul” and “spirit,” and does the “soul” die?

Technically, the word “soul” in the Bible refers to the self-aware life force that allows the physical nature of man to function. Genesis 2:7 describes how God formed Adam from the same elements that were in the soil, but that Adam was nothing more than an intricate clay model—until God breathed life into him. That action turned the clay model into a conscious being (“soul”) in physical form. The soul is what makes the body come to life.

Gen. 2:7 …the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being (“soul”—KJV).

It would even be somewhat inaccurate to describe man as a body with a soul in it, because the soul and body were designed for each other permanently. They were designed to function together and never be separated. When the two are separated, the body dies:

         Matt. 10:28 Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

Therfore, “death” is not a ceasing to exist, but rather a change in condition. Both the body and the soul can be “destroyed” in hell, where the word “destroyed” (Gk. “apolesai”) means to be “lost,” not annihilated. The idea is that both body and soul have entered a form of existence from which there is no return.

In the same way, when a believer dies the body and soul are separated until the resurrection, at which time the body is raised imperishable:

         1 Cor. 15:42 So will it be with the resurrection of the dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable

The “soul” gives us self-awareness and emotional responses, such as Jesus experienced in Gethsemane:

John 12:27  “Now my heart (Gk. “psuche”—“soul”) is troubled, and what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, it was for this very reason I came to this hour.

Human beings (souls) are spirit as well as body and soul, however. “Spirit” (Heb. “ruach;” Gk. “pneuma”) is what distinguishes humanity from the rest of the huge varieties of created, conscious, earthly life. Dogs and birds and fish are all forms of conscious life, and all are capable of varying levels of emotional responses, such as fear or desire. But only humanity has spirit.

Mankind is fashioned for existence in the spiritual realm. We are designed to live with God and to have interchange with other spirit-beings, such as angels and, of course, God Himself:

         John 4:24 God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth.

Jesus, as a sinless man, functioned in this spiritual capacity with perfection:

         Mark 2:8 Immediately Jesus knew in his spirit that this was what they were thinking in their hearts, and he said to them, “Why are you thinking these things?

As with the soul, when the spirit and body are separated death occurs. When Jesus raised Jairus’ daughter from death, her restored spirit re-animated her body and soul:

         Luke 8:55 Her spirit returned, and at once she stood up. Then Jesus told them to give her something to eat.

Death is the result of sin and not part of God’s original design for man. Death is being cut off from God, our source of life, because of sin, and results in an un-natural separation of body, soul and spirit. Jesus came to restore us to God, and to a life that is imperishable:

1 Th. 5:23 May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Did God Create Sin?

Biblegems #25

Does the fact that God created everything mean that He also created sin?

While on the surface the answer seems obvious, the question does pose a legitimate problem. Isaiah 4:24 says, “This is what the LORD says—our Redeemer, who formed you in the womb: I am the LORD, who has made all things, who alone stretched out the heavens, who spread out the earth by myself…” And the Gospel of John also testifies that through Jesus, the Word of God, “…all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made” (Jn. 1:3).

However, the context for both of these verses, as well as similar uses of the phrase “all things,” clearly indicates that the universe is in view, not the realm of morality. Yet that still leaves the question, where did sin come from, if not created by God? To answer that, we need to understand something about the nature of sin and the nature of God.

Fist, in relation to God, the Bible states unequivocally, Your eyes are too pure to look on evil; you cannot tolerate wrong (Hab. 1:13). By His very nature, God exists in eternal opposition to sin. Sin, therefore, cannot have originated with God. Secondly, sin is described in the Bible as human nature (originally created in God’s image) that has been corrupted and ruined by the choice of Adam and Eve to disobey God (Gen 2:16-17), which resulted in contaminating the entire human race with a sinful nature (Rom. 5:19; Ps. 51:5). But sin is also a choice. It is a choice to ignore God (Rom. 1:21) and to surrender ourselves to desires that are in opposition to what God’s will for us (Ja. 1:14-15).

Since, therefore, sin originates in the corrupted human heart and not in God, it is no more possible for a person to shed his sinful nature than it is for a butterfly to revert back to a caterpillar! That’s both bad new and good news. The bad news is obvious: we cannot help ourselves become sin-free. The good news is that what we cannot do for ourselves, God has done for us because He loves us and created us to love Him.

This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins (1 John 4:10).

So, in answer to the original question, No, sin does not originate in God. The defeat of sin, however — and its power, and its consequences — this does originate in God. “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (Jn. 3:16).

And that is the most beautiful of all Bible gems!

How Did Lions Become Carnivores?

Biblegems #8

Question: How did lions become carnivores?

This is a great question from one of our Friendship kids!

What makes it such a great question is that it reveals an understanding that man and animals were not always carnivorous (Gen. 1:29-30). If they were, then death would have been part of the original creation, as evolutionary science teaches, not the later result of man’s sin (Rom. 6:23). And if evolutionary science were correct on that point, then Jesus’ death on the cross would be meaningless. As Paul writes in Romans, “so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Rom. 5:12).

So, what does the Bible have to say about how (and when) lions and other animals became carnivores?

First, we know that lions were strictly plant-eating animals when God first created them. Genesis 1:30 says, “And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food. And it was so.” This was true of the first human beings as well. Verse 29 reads, “Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food.”

Secondly, we know that man was given permission by God to eat meat following the Great Flood: “Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything” (Gen. 9:3). We also know that animals were already eating meat by that time (Gen. 9:5-6).

It seems clear then that lions and other carnivorous animals began eating meat sometime between Adam and Eve’s expulsion from Eden and the worldwide Flood. Does that mean that a physical change took place in lions—the development of fangs and talons, for example—that made them capable of killing and eating other animals? It’s certainly possible, even as God caused thorns and thistles to grow where once only beautiful, healthful vegetation had grown (Gen. 3:18).

But it is equally, if not more, likely that animals such as lions were originally created with that carnivorous capability. God knew that Adam and Eve’s sin would radically change the balance of life across the planet, and that the struggle for survival would come to play a key role in the animal realm as well as the human realm. Although God’s command to man to rule over wildlife had never been rescinded, man’s ability to do so without force came to an end after the Fall. Man’s disobedience to God turned the garden-like earth into a dangerous place; and God probably prepared the animal realm in advance for surviving in that deadly new world.