We have seen that man is tripartite, of three parts, and that the soul and the spirit must be divided. Now let us consider the respective functions of the body, the soul, and the spirit. The body is not a person but a vessel, a container, to contain us as a person (1 Thes. 4:4). In actual fact we do not dwell in a house but in our body. Therefore, our body is both the vessel in which we are contained and the dwelling place in which we dwell (2 Cor. 5:1). This is illustrated by the fact that when a person dies, we often say that he has departed. Even though his ears, eyes, nose, and the other parts of his body remain, he himself has gone. After its contents are gone, a Coca-Cola bottle is an empty bottle; likewise, a body without the person is an empty body. Therefore, strictly speaking, the body is not the person but the vessel, the container, and the dwelling place of the person. Although I dwell in my body and am contained by my body, it is my soul, not my body, that is my person. I am a soul.
Man’s spirit also is not his person. The Scriptures never call a person a spirit. It is the angels, not we, who are called spirits (Heb. 1:14). We are souls with a spirit as a receiver. Whereas the body is the vessel, the container, and the soul is the person, the spirit is a receiver, an organ for us to receive God. Therefore, without our body we have no house in which to dwell, and without our spirit we have no receiving organ for us to receive God. Let us illustrate this by a small transistor radio. On the outside there is a box as the container, and on the inside there is a small receiver to receive the radio waves. Without this receiver, although there may be a box outwardly, and although there may be radio waves in the air, the radio cannot play any music. We must realize that we are a “radio” and that God today is the Spirit who is filling the whole universe with spiritual “radio waves” for us to receive. We cannot receive God by our ears, nose, hands, or mouth; we can receive Him only by our spirit. The receiver, the receiving organ, for us to receive Christ is our spirit. This means that we need to open our entire being, including our mind, our emotion, our will, our heart, and eventually our spirit, our deepest and inmost part, and say to the Lord, “Lord Jesus, I receive You.” It is not sufficient merely to talk about Christ and listen to a message about Him. We must open ourselves by opening our mind, our will, our emotion, our heart, our thoughts, our imaginations, and eventually our spirit, the deepest part of our being, to Christ to allow Him to come in.
We would emphasize the fact that our body is not the receiver but the container to contain our soul as our person. Furthermore, we cannot receive Christ by our soul, because our soul is not the receiving organ. The receiving organ is our spirit. We must be right with our spirit, which means that we must “tune” the receiver rightly, so that the “radio waves” will come in. This means that we must be right with our inmost part, our deepest part. Those who say that there is no God say this because they do not use their receiving organ. If they would exercise their receiving organ, that is, exercise to be right with their spirit, they would be touched by God and even convicted by Him. They would sense something convicting them within all the time.
We have seen clearly that we are made as vessels to contain God. If we are going to contain God, we must receive God in Christ. We do this not by our body, nor by our mind, our emotions, or our will, but by our inmost part, which is our spirit. The spirit is the receiving organ. This matter is vital and needs to be stressed very much. Without knowing the difference between the spirit and the soul, we will never be able to experience Christ as life in a practical way.
In recent days, after traveling and visiting many places and having contact with many believers, I have discovered that although they may know the doctrine that Christ is life, many simply do not know the proper way to experience Him. Although we may talk about Christ as life, we may not know how to experience Christ in a practical and real way. The reason for this is simply that we do not know that our human spirit is the recipient, the receiving organ, the receiver for us to receive Christ. There are two verses which prove that we must receive Christ. Both use the word receive. John 1:12 says, “But as many as received Him,” and Colossians 2:6 says, “As therefore you have received the Christ.” The organ by which we receive Christ is our spirit. In order to be exercised in the matter of experiencing Christ as our life, we must know how to exercise our spirit, and we must also know the difference between the spirit and the soul.
We have seen that man was created in the image of God for the purpose of containing God, and that man was made in three parts, having a body as a container to contain the soul, having a soul as the self, man’s very being, and having a spirit as the receiving organ to receive God in Christ. We must realize, however, that at the time of creation man did not have God as life. He was just an empty vessel without the life of God. For this reason, after creating man, God put him in front of the tree of life, which signifies God Himself as life to man (Gen. 2:9). Man was put before the tree of life with the intention that he would receive the tree of life. This indicates that at the time of creation man was an empty vessel without its intended content. He needed to receive God as life, that is, to receive Christ as life.
This explains why without Christ a person’s life is empty. If a person does not have Christ, if he does not have God, he does not have the content of his human life. He is just an empty vessel. Today the Triune God is mingled with man, and He is ready and waiting for you to receive Him. Such a wonderful One, God mingled with man, with the human nature as well as the divine nature, is the Savior waiting for you to receive Him. You are just a vessel with a body as the container, a soul as your self, and a spirit as the receiving organ to receive this wonderful One. Everything is ready. If you receive Him, He and you will be mingled together as one. This is the wonderful mingling of this wonderful One with our poor person. Nevertheless, regardless of how wonderful He is and how poor we are, we were made as the only right and proper vessels to receive Him and contain Him.
This receiving and mingling is the relationship of God with man in His new creation. The new creation is simply God who has mingled Himself with His creature, that is, with His created man. God mingled with man is the new creation. In this new creation, therefore, the relationship of God with man is simply God mingling Himself with man and man receiving God into him, with the result that God and man become one.