Body, Soul and ‘spirit’ of Man
Marilyn Monroe said, “Hollywood is a place where they’ll pay you a thousand dollars for a kiss and fifty cents for your soul. I know, because I turned down the first offer enough and held out for the fifty cents.”
The Senior Citizens today wonder if the world around us has a soul. The nightly local and national news makes one wonder if anyone values life and what is right ethically and morally anymore.
The following is a study on the three parts of man, hoping to shed a little light upon why we need to ‘guard’ our soul from being wrongly influenced.
We are living in a hurting world with a lot of oppressed, bruised and hurting souls. Trauma of the soul causes a lot of heartache for the traumatized soul and for those around him/her.
Healing can happen for the soul, but not in the same way that it happens for the body. To heal the soul, one must bare it. Finding someone to bare it to with trust, and understanding is very difficult indeed. The result is that most bury the pain deep inside, putting on a ‘face’ showing those around us that we are just fine and dandy.
As Marilyn, we too must realize that we have sold our soul for a pittance by accepting that which appeases the flesh. We need to seriously take a look at what these three parts of man are, and how they interact and inter-relate to each other.
Three Parts:
The Bible says that we are body, soul, and spirit. We all have at least an elementary understanding of these three parts of our selves. The body is a machine of wonder with all of its intricate workings, and ability to heal itself under the right conditions.
The Spirit of man is the true ‘body’ of the soul. It is the spirit of man that God’s Holy Spirit indwells with the New Birth experience.
The body is the cloak of the spirit. The spirit is the cloak of the soul. The soul is the true personality.
The body is comprised of the brain, nerves, organs, cells, proteins, the nervous, endocrine, & immune systems, as well as the five senses of touch, smell, taste, hearing, and sight.
The soul is comprised of the conscience, the will with its power of choice, the emotions of feeling and beliefs, and the mind, both subconscious and conscious, thinking, reasoning, and memories.
The spirit is comprised of the meaning and purpose of it all.
Many think that man is a physical being only. It is all about satisfying the desires of the body.
Others think that man is composed of two elements, the body and spirit. When man dies his spirit floats around in an invisible world around us.
Some cults believe that soul does not exist. The body lives and dies and the end result is nine pounds of ashes, or a coffin of dust. But most religions teach that the principal part of man is the soul.
As stated before, C.S. Lewis stated, “You don’t have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body.”
Paul said, “I pray that your whole body, and soul, and spirit be preserved blameless unto the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.” I Thessalonians 5:23
Hebrews 4:12 says, “For the word of God is quick and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and the marrow (body), and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”
The body touches the material world with its five senses of smell, touch, sight, hearing, and taste. These in turn influence the soul.
The gates of the soul are Imagination, Reason, Memory, and Affection. These in turn influence the spirit and the body.
The gates to the spirit are Faith, Hope, Reverence, Prayer, and Worship. These in turn influence the soul and in turn the body.
There have always been those who believe that the health of the mind influences the body, and the health of the body influences the mind. The same holds true for the spirit being influenced by the soul and the body.
In the Garden of Eden, the spirits of Adam and of Eve were untarnished. In this pure state, they were able to have direct communion with God, and were not afraid, nor were they ashamed of their nakedness. They were as innocent children unaware of anything impure.
Jesus said “Unless you are converted and become like ‘children’ you will not enter the kingdom of Heaven.” Matthew 18:3
Paul said, “For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the thoughts of God no one knows except the Spirit of God.” I Corinthians 2:9-11)
John said, “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” John 3:6
The Bible clearly speaks of three parts of a person. Body, which will age and die and return to dust, Soul, which is the eternal personality of a person, and Spirit which is the part that becomes the temple of God’s Holy Spirit. The Soul and the Spirit of man will never separate, but will be connected for all eternity.
If you read about the Near Death Experiences, you will find a common denominator. Each person retains their personality beyond the body. They know those who have died before them when they see them in the ‘spirit world’. They remember all their earthly experiences. They all experience some form of ‘Light’ and ‘Love’, with feelings of contentment beyond anything human words can express.
My Mom saw my Dad two years before she died. Dad passed in 1999. Mom passed in 2006. Mom was lying in her bed, praying as her habit was, and she opened her eyes, and there above her bed was Dad, and he was smiling at her. Mom said it was as if he was trying to reassure her that everything was going to be all right. He faded from her sight, and she went back to praying. Mom had a stroke soon afterward and had to go to a Nursing Home. After two years, she had another stroke which took her life.
When I was Assistant Pastor for a church in Mt. Vernon, Ohio, I worked a full time job to help support the family. I worked as a custodian for a Jr. High School. There had been a special event held at the school, and it was my turn to cover the event and clean up afterwards, and locking the doors. Everyone had gone home. I had my work done. I decided to walk the building just to make sure I had not missed anything. While I was walking the second floor hallway, I saw a ghost!
The building was shaped in the letter ‘H’. I was walking down the hall of the right side of the ‘H’. The ghost I saw was ‘floating’ down the hall of the middle of the ‘H’.
I immediately stopped and stared as he, yes it was a ‘he’, floated away from me and turned right to float down the hall of the left side of the ‘H’. I walked down the middle and turned right and walked down the left hall and ‘he’ was gone. I checked every room, opening and closing the doors, and even checked the rest of the building. There was no ‘he’ anywhere.
The next day, I shared my experience with the rest of the custodial staff. They laughed, saying, “Oh, yeah, we forgot to tell you about George!” I said, “What about George, what do you mean?”
They then informed me that George had been a custodian at this school many years before, and had died in an accident at the school involving the boiler system. George’s ‘spirit’ stayed around, and I got to see his ghost float around the building on my shift!
Now you have to remember, that I was a young preacher back then, and I spent many hours in prayer and the study of the Bible. I had a boldness about me that came from my strong faith and all those hours of prayer and study. When I saw the ghost of George, I was not in the least bit afraid. I was intrigued, and I did not hesitate to follow his ethereal wanderings. Only he did not want to play the game and went into hiding. Lol
My point is, the ‘spirit’ world is real, and you and I have a ‘spirit’ and we need to understand more about it and our eternal soul.
Tomorrow we will delve into these three parts of man in more depth.