Concerning the creation of man, Genesis 2:7 says, “Jehovah God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul.” In this verse three things are mentioned. First, God formed man from the dust of the ground; this was the forming of man’s body. Second, God breathed into this body the breath of life, and third, man became a living soul. In this account of the creation of man, man’s body and man’s soul are clearly identified; however, it is not clear what the breath of life is that was breathed into man’s body.
First Thessalonians 5:23 says, “The God of peace Himself sanctify you wholly, and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” This verse portrays man as having three parts: spirit, soul, and body. The body is the outermost part of man’s being, the spirit is the innermost part, and the soul is the medium between the body and the spirit. In this verse the breath of life mentioned in Genesis 2:7 is clearly identified as the human spirit. This is confirmed by Job 32:8, which identifies man’s spirit with God’s breath.
The three parts of man correspond to the three realms in the universe: the physical realm, the spiritual realm, and the psychological realm. In the physical realm there are the material things, which we can contact through the body with its five senses of hearing, seeing, smelling, tasting, and touching. In the spiritual realm there is God, who is a Spirit (John 4:24). There are also the angels of God, who are spirits (Heb. 1:13-14); the enemy, Satan the devil, and the rebellious angels of Satan (Matt. 25:41), who are evil spirits; and the demons, who are unclean spirits (12:22, 24, 43). We can contact the spiritual world, in particular God as the Spirit, by means of the human spirit within us.
In order to contact anything, we need a certain organ to sense and substantiate it. For instance, it would be impossible to substantiate the sound of a voice without a hearing organ. If we were to lose the function of our ears, it would seem that the many voices around us did not exist, because we would have no organ that could substantiate them. Likewise, if we were to lose our sight, we could not substantiate color, and it would seem that such a thing as color did not exist. Although we might know that color exists, to our senses it would not exist, because we would not have the organ to substantiate color. This explains why unbelievers say that there is no God. To them there is no God simply because they have lost the function of their spirit. People who have lost the function of their spirit cannot substantiate God, because God is a spiritual being. We need to use the right organ to substantiate God, and that organ is our spirit. The Lord Jesus tells us in John 4:24 that “God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit.” If we would know God, touch God, contact God, sense God, and substantiate God, we must use the right organ, that is, our spirit.
God created the stomach as the organ for us to receive food and water. In a similar way, He created the spirit as the organ for us to contact Him and receive Him. We would emphasize the fact that to sense and substantiate anything requires the right organ. For the physical world, God created our body with its senses, and for the spiritual world, in which God is the foremost item, He created a spirit within us. It is by this spirit that we can contact God. For this reason, when we pray, we need to stop our whole being and exercise our inner organ, that is, our spirit. We should pray not by our memory, nor by our mind, will, or emotion, but by the deepest and innermost part of our being, our spirit.
Many times we have experienced that the more we think and consider, the more we feel that the Lord is absent. If we exercise our mind and our reasoning too much, we may reach the point where we doubt that the Lord exists. But when we stop our whole being and exercise our innermost part, we sense the Lord’s presence, because we are using the right organ to substantiate Him.
The soul is the medium between the body and the spirit. The word psychology comes from the Greek word psuche, which means “soul.” Thus, psychology is related to the soul, and the psychological realm is the soulish realm. The soul is an organ by which we can sense and substantiate the psychological realm. Reasoning, anger, and joy belong to this realm. Both the Scriptures and our experience confirm that man is of three parts: spirit, soul, and body.
Hebrews 4:12 also speaks concerning the three parts of man: “For the word of God is living and operative and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing even to the dividing of soul and spirit and of joints and marrow, and able to discern the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” This verse says that the soul and the spirit can be divided, showing that the soul and the spirit are not identical but are two separate parts of man. It also speaks of the joints and the marrow, which are parts of the body. It goes even further to speak of the heart with its thoughts and intents. The heart is different from the soul and from the spirit. Ezekiel 36:26-27 says, “I will also give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you...And I will put My Spirit within you.” In these verses three things are mentioned: a new heart, a new spirit, and God the Spirit. We need to differentiate between the soul and the spirit and also between the heart, on the one hand, and the soul and the spirit, on the other hand. Furthermore, verse 27 tells us clearly that God has put His Spirit within us.