The Emanation of the Human Spirit. "And breathed into his nostrils the breath of life." The divine Potter formed the human frame and then breathed into it the breath of life. This life principle which came as a direct emanation from God became the human spirit. Some one has aptly said, "Man is dust inbreathed by Deity."
God Himself defines the human spirit in these words, "The spirit of man is the lamp of Jehovah, searching all the innermost parts." The spirit is the crowning part of man's being. It is God's masterpiece in human creation. It is the part of man which has relationship to the unseen, spiritual world, which has fellowship with God. Through the spirit man apprehends, loves and worships God. Dr. A. T. Pierson says, "The spirit receives impressions of outward and material things through the soul and the body, but it belongs itself to a higher level and realm, and is capable of a direct knowledge of God by relation to its own higher senses and faculties. In an unfallen state it was like a lofty observatory with an outlook upon a celestial firmament." The spirit is the capital city of the human personality.
The Creation of the Human Soul. "And man became a living soul." Above the body and beneath the spirit stands the soul, the medium between the two. It has been said that in its relationship to the body and bodily senses it might be likened to the photographer's dark room. The impressions regarding the external world received through the senses are gathered up and conveyed to this dark room where they are developed into distinct expressions of thought, emotion or will.
In its relationship to the spirit and the spiritual world the soul might be likened to the judge's bench. The evidence regarding God and spiritual realities which the spirit finds in its research in the spiritual realm is brought to the bar of the soul and there either accepted or rejected.
Man, then, is a trinity; spirit, soul, and body are the integral parts of his triune being. In the constitution of God's first man two independent elements were used; the corporeal and the spiritual; the material and the immaterial. Each was essential because man was to be related to two worlds; the seen and the unseen; the material and the spiritual. He was made primarily for God and in order to have communication with God he must have a spirit capable of communion and fellowship with the Divine Spirit. But man was to be placed in God's material universe that he might have tangible relationship with the external world of people and things. So he must have a body capable of such contact and communication. Man was to be in close, continuous touch with both heaven and earth; with the external and the temporal; with the spiritual and the material.
When God placed the spirit within the body its home on earth, the union of these two produced a third part and man became a living soul. The soul uniting spirit and body gave man individuality, it was the cause of his existence as a distinct being. The soul, consisting of intellect, emotion and will became the central part, the seat, as it were, of man's being.
The soul acted as the middleman between the spirit and the body; it was the bond which united them and the channel through which they acted upon each other. The soul stood thus midway between two worlds: through the body it was linked to the visible, material and earthly; through the spirit it was linked with the unseen, spiritual and heavenly. To it was given the power to determine which world should dominate man.
The very great importance of this theme in its relationship to succeeding lessons and the intense desire that each reader may have a clear understanding of it leads me to quote at length from Andrew Murray's book, "The Spirit of Christ":
"The Spirit quickening the body made man a living soul, a living person with the consciousness of himself. The soul was the meeting place, the point of union between body and spirit. Through the body, man, the living soul, stood related to the external world of sense; could influence it, or be influenced by it. Through the spirit he stood related to the spiritual world and the Spirit of God, whence he had his origin; could be the recipient and the minister of its life and power. Standing thus midway between two worlds, belonging to both, the soul had the power of determining itself, of choosing or refusing the objects by which it was surrounded, and to which it stood related.
"In the constitution of these three parts of man's nature the spirit, as linking him with the Divine, was the highest; the body, connecting him with the sensible and the animal, the lowest; intermediate stood the soul, partaker of the nature of the others, the bond that united them, and through which they could act on each other. Its work as the central power was to maintain them in due relation; to keep the body, as the lowest, in subjection to the spirit; itself to receive through the spirit, as the higher, from the Divine Spirit what was waiting for its perfection; and so pass down even to the body, that by which it might be the partaker of the Spirit's perfection, and become a spiritual body.
"The wondrous gifts with which the soul was endowed, specially those of consciousness and self-determination, or mind and will,were but the mold or vessel into which the life of the Spirit, the real substance and truth of the Divine life, was to be received and assimilated. They were a God-given capacity for making the knowledge and will of God its own. In doing this the personal life of the soul would have become filled and possessed with the life of the Spirit, the whole man would have become spiritual.
"To gather up what has been said, the spirit is the seat of our God-consciousness; the soul of our self-consciousness; the body of our world-consciousness. In the spirit God dwells: in the soul "self", in the body "sense."
It is clear from all this that God's original intention was that the human spirit through which alone man can be related to the Spirit of God and to the spiritual world should be the dominant element in the human personality. The spirit was to be sovereign and as long as it remained so the whole being would be kept spiritual.
But while the human spirit was to be sovereign in the realm of the human personality with both soul and body yielded to its dominance, yet it was to be subject in turn to a higher power. Dr. A. T. Pierson says, "One obvious lesson in this Biblical psychology is that God evidently designed that the human spirit, indwelt and ruled by the Holy Spirit, should keep man in constant touch with Himself, and maintain in everything its proper preeminence, ruling soul and body."
~Ruth Paxson~
(continued with # 7)
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