The Human Spirit

RV66-01

© Berean Memorial Church of Irving, Texas, Inc. (1993)

Please turn with me in your Bibles to the letter to the church at Laodicea in Revelation 3:14-22. This is segment number 16. The United States, as you heard this past week, has achieved the dubious honor of achieving a debt of $1 trillion. I don't know whether that has ever happened in the history of the world before or not, or whether this is the only nation that has done that. But it is a sad day. For some people, it's a very happy day, because they have been the beneficiaries of a great deal of squandered money. For others, it's a very sad day, because they are going to have to be paying that $1 trillion back again. This $1 trillion happens to be the reported indebtedness. Our government knows how to tread lightly. So, they have a reported budget indebtedness, and then they have what is off-budget indebtedness. That runs something like another $6 trillion. So, you folks aren't out of the woods by a long-shot, even after you get this first $1 trillion paid off.

A nation that owes such an unfathomable sum of money is viewed as being truly rich. The truth of the matter, however, is that the national debt of the United States is too large ever to be repaid. An accompanying sad note that was reported this past week is that the gross national product is declining, as the pyramid of debt finally begins to paralyze all effort at forward progress. So, this matter has become very serious – indebtedness to such an extent, such that the nation's productivity is gradually strangled. The result is that the United States is moving in the direction of becoming a poorer nation, instead of the richest nation of all the world, as all the world views it.

The Sabbatical Year

The divine law of economics that God provided for this particular situation, perhaps, is going to have to be invoked. Such national indebtedness always destroys a society in time, depending upon how big and powerful the nation is to hold off the inevitable destruction. In order for that not to happen to the people of Israel, God instituted, among other economic laws that the Bible laid out for them, one which was called the sabbatical year. Every seventh year (in a cycle of a series of sevens), all debts were canceled. Everything was wiped out. Everything was brought back to scratch. Therefore, you did business on that basis. When you did business, you always calculated how far it was down the line to the sabbatical year where everything was going to be wiped off the books, and you lent money, and so on, accordingly.

The Year of Jubilee

It seems that that is perhaps where we are going to have to come. There are more and more voices that are timidly beginning to declare the repudiation of all national debt. The people of Israel even had a backup system called the year of jubilee. In the year of jubilee, which was every 50th year, there was the complete restoration of the basis of all capital possession, in the form of the land being returned to the original families. In the Bible, wealth is a family matter. Wealth is something that parents create and hand down to their children, who become parents, in turn, and exploit the wealth that their parents have given them, to pass on to their children. In Israel, the basis of wealth was land. Every family group within every tribe was allotted a parcel of land, and it was theirs in perpetuity. They might come across hard times, and they might have to do something in terms of selling or leasing out this possession of theirs in order to make it, but come the year of jubilee, that land returned back to that family's possession – whoever was living in that family line at the time.

So, it was impossible for the nation of Israel to come into the kind of catastrophic economic circumstances that we are in (in this country) today. We are viewed, nevertheless, as a very wealthy nation. Who could pile up trillions of dollars of indebtedness except a very wealthy nation?

Well, the truth of the matter is that the real wealth of the United States never has been in its material possessions, as vast as those have been. Its wealth has always laid in the divine viewpoint enlightenment from the Bible which this society possessed. Its wealth lay in the position that it held as God's client chosen nation to dispense divine viewpoint truth to the world in the 20th century. The wealth of the United States has always laid in its application of Bible doctrine principles to personal and national life. But today, Americans are squandering that real wealth – the wealth of the enlightenment of the pure gold of doctrine. They are not viewing this as something to hold in esteem. They do not value their understanding of biblical principles which has characterized this society from earliest times.

The Lord Jesus Christ was advising the people of Laodicea to turn from the reversionism that reflected in a lack of a mastery of the details of life, and to seek the gold of doctrine from Him, because they were in that deluded position that the United States is in today – that we're rich, when in fact we are not. In the present intensified stage of the angelic warfare, Americans also need to return to the pure gold of doctrine, which has always been our real wealth, and from which, in fact, our material wealth has resulted. American poverty is certainly evidenced by its moral decline, and its devotion to the religion of secular humanism.

Just consider the current example that we're viewing of the air traffic controllers' strike. Everybody who is a member of the PATCO union as an air traffic controller is an employee of the United States government. As an employee of the United States government, it was required of each of them to stand and take an oath on the Bible (this book right here). They took the oath that those of you who have ever been in the military service know very well. You took it. It entailed such expressions as the fact that you would defend the Constitution of the United States from all enemies, foreign and domestic, and that you assumed these responsibilities without any mental reservations or intent to evade. Then the PATCO employees (union members), employees of the United States government, had an added phrase that they swore to – that they would not strike against the governments of the United States, "So help me God."

Yet, we have a whole union who brazenly parades before this nation as having a right to go out on strike after having taken an oath before Almighty God not to do it. Whether their cause is just or unjust is beside the point. It is an interesting illustration of the moral degeneracy of the United States away from the real wealth of doctrine that it once possessed. When a person raised his hand and said, "So help me God," in an oath on the Bible, and all that that represented, that was inviolable. Whatever else he would do, he would not go back on his word so declared. It was traitorous to even consider.

However, the whole union now reflects the attitude of our society – that they can give their word, and break it with impunity. Almost 90 days later, we have the reverberations of the shock of discovering that, for a change, there was somebody at the helm of the leadership of the United States in the White House that said, "Hey, right is right, and wrong is wrong. An oath is an oath, and a violation is a violation. A contract is a contract, and a breaking of your word is a breaking of your word, and there are consequences when you do that." They didn't count on that. We haven't seen that in decades around here. All of a sudden, here is somebody acting like the Bible is important. Here is somebody acting as if Americans still believed that there was a God out there who had laid down principles, and we were obliged to be obedient to Him. Here is a man who is finally acting on the pure gold of real truth.

That is our real wealth as a people, and a mighty people we indeed have been. But we have become instead poor, blind, and naked, just like the Laodiceans for the very same reason – that we began to take lightly, even in religious circles, what the Bible had to say. So, we stopped studying it; we stopped learning it; we stopped feeding upon it; and, we stopped applying it.

The Grace System of Perception

We have seen that God has provided us with a system by which the doctrines of Scripture become operational in the lives of believers. We have called this the grace system of perception, because it is a system of learning divine viewpoint truth on a basis where everybody is equal in his access to that truth. We have seen that this system includes several provisions:
  1. The first one is the completed can in the Scripture given to us in an inerrant record – written without error, and delivered to us by the inspiration of the Spirit of God.

  2. There was the provision of the local church organization structure to provide some basic instruction in doctrine.

  3. There was the provision of the spiritual gift of the pastor-teacher elder to each local congregation as the responsible agent for teaching the people of that congregation the Word of God.

  4. There was the provision of the priesthood of believers for direct and private access to God and to His truth, so that each is responsible before God for his own spiritual status.

  5. There is the indwelling of the Holy Spirit to give understanding of doctrinal truths which are being taught. Just because you hear the Bible taught does not mean that you will understand what is being taught. It takes the ministry of God the Holy Spirit, as your teacher, to make these truths clear to you. He indwells you for that purpose.

  6. There is the provision of the relationship of control by the Holy Spirit, which is described as the filling of the Holy Spirit to guide the believer in the use of the doctrine which he has learned and believed. Once you have understood a spiritual truth, then you need guidance in applying that truth in specific situations.

  7. There is the provision of a living human spirit to serve as a reservoir for storing the doctrine which you have received – the doctrine which you have learned and which you have believed. The human spirit is empty of all divine viewpoint at the point of your regeneration. God the Holy Spirit fills that human spirit with divine viewpoint over a period of time, and it takes time to do it.
If you have been a Christian who has been knocking around churches for a long time and have not been taught the Word of God, and you have not fed upon the Word of God, and suddenly you decide that you want to get with it, and you want to get functioning under divine blessing – so, far, all you've got is an enthusiastic decision that's moving in the right direction, but I guarantee you that you're going to have very little guidance from the Spirit of God. You're going to have very little guidance from God because you're not capable of receiving it. You have to develop the capacity, and it takes time to develop the capacity. Your decision to move in that direction is right, but expect some trouble as you move along to a place where you begin logging enough time in the Word to begin to start stabilizing your pattern of life within divine guidance procedures.

The Holy Spirit guides the believer to the use of the refined gold of doctrine which is stored in his human spirit. If it's not stored there, the Spirit of God cannot be guiding you through it. This brings us to the fact that the human spirit is a very precious and a very important facet of your being.

The Human Spirit

Now, we're going to stop and take a look at the human spirit.

  1. The Human Spirit is Distinguished from the Human Soul

    First of all, we should observe that the human spirit is distinguished from the human soul. Notice Hebrews 4:12: "For the Word of God is living and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even through to dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and as a discerning of the thoughts and intents of the heart." The Word of God, because it is alive and powerful, divides between the facets dealing with the soul and the spirit. Both of these elements are part of your immaterial being. They're not part of your physical body. Yet, they are distinct – each of them. The Word of God deals with them each in a distinct way.

    Notice also 1 Thessalonians 5:23, where the apostle Paul says, "And the very God of peace sanctify you entirely. And I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." That's what constitutes a total human being: a physical body; a soul; and, a living human spirit.

  2. Creation

    The second point to observe about the human spirit: at the original creation of man, the human spirit was received along with the human soul. In Genesis 2:7, we have this recorded: "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of (and this should be plural) lives." "He breathed into his nostrils the breath of lives, and man became a living soul." This is because there was a dual life that was breathed into man. There was a life that was breathed into him which was his soul, which activated that physical body; and, there was a life breathed into him which was his human spirit, which activated his contact (his line of communication) with the living God who had created him. So, there is the breath of lives which produced the human spirit at the point of creation.

    When Adam and Eve sinned, the thing that God told them would happen immediately went into effect. They died spiritually on the spot the moment they bit into that fruit, and that spiritual death then set into motion a corrupting influence in their physical structure, and the body began breaking down. Over a period of years (in their situation, it took almost 1,000 years), Adam's body finally broke down sufficiently so that death ensued. But the death spiritually was there immediately, as God had foretold it would be.

  3. We're Born with a Dead Human Spirit

    So, today, a person is born physically with a dead human spirit. Every baby comes into the world physically alive, but spiritually dead. In Jude 19, we read, "These are they who separate themselves (speaking of unbelievers – sensual), having not the spirit." Of course, if they do not have God the Holy Spirit, they do not have the living spirit. Anybody who does not have a living human spirit does not have God the Holy Spirit. Once you have God the Holy Spirit within you, then you have a living human spirit as well.

    We may also add to this 1 Corinthians 2:14: "But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned." The natural man cannot know the things that God the Holy Spirit deals with: spiritual phenomena; or, real truth, because these things are spiritually discerned. They are discerned by means of a spiritual factor within man; that is, his human spirit. Therefore, people who are natural people (that is, unbelievers) have no living human spirit. I would not say that they do not have a human spirit. They have a dead human spirit. Sometimes some people like to say they don't have a human spirit. I'm uncomfortable with that, because when a person dies physically, he still has a physical body, but it's just dead – it's just not functioning. That doesn't mean he doesn't have a body. It's just out of operation. That's the same thing that we're born with. The human spirit is there, but it's out of operation at the point of our physical birth.

  4. The Human Spirit is Made Alive

    The fourth point to observe is that the believer's human spirit has been made wondrously alive at point of his salvation (at the point of regeneration). In Ephesians 2:1, we have this declared to us: "And He has made you alive who were dead (spiritually dead) in trespasses and sins." Ephesians 2:5: "Even when we were dead in sins, He has made us alive together with Christ. By grace you are saved." How were you made alive? You were made alive in terms of that human spirit which was dead. That is the effect of regeneration – to have a human spirit which is brought to life.

  5. The Human Spirit is the Storage Space for Doctrine

    So, we look at point number 5. The human spirit serves this role within the believer. It is the storage space for doctrine in the form of full knowledge. That is described by the Greek word "epignosis," in contrast to the Greek word "gnosis."

    We begin with the Triune God: Father; Son; and, Holy Spirit. That God has produced for us a Bible – a revelation from Himself in the form of the inerrant Bible. Out of that Bible, from its original languages, the pastor-teacher elder in the local congregation digs out the spiritual truth (the spiritual phenomena); and, brings together the factors that constitute all that is said upon a specific doctrinal principle. He summarizes it into categories of doctrine. Then, under the filling of God the Holy Spirit, he (filled with the Spirit), with the congregation listening (filled with the Spirit), gives instruction, and the believer, under the filling of the Holy Spirit, is taught.

    This believer has a perceptive mind. The mind (in the brain) has a perceptive function (a learning function). He learns doctrine. You just learn the facts. You just learn what we say. We lay it out. For example, we say that Jesus was born of a virgin. We lay out the facts, and you learn the facts. You haven't said, "I believe it," and you haven't said, "I don't believe it." You haven't had any response. You just say, "You're saying that Jesus Christ didn't have a human father." Whatever it is that is being taught, you're just sitting here and you're learning it. You're hearing the information. You're hearing the facts presented.

    This knowledge in the perception side of the mind is what we call "gnosis" knowledge. It's just information knowledge. If you do believe it, this goes from the perceptive mind down to this human spirit reservoir. Here, in various categories of truth, are stored the real spiritual truths (the refined gold of doctrine) that you have learned. By faith, you have transferred it, from where you have learned it (and what it is in the perceptive mind), into the human spirit, where it becomes "epignosis" knowledge (the full knowledge). It is operational knowledge. The "gnosis" in your perceptive mind will do you no good. You cannot use that. You cannot function with that. You cannot live according to that. That is just information that you have. You may have rejected it outright, or you may have rejected it by being neutral and indifferent toward it.

    That's the character who grows up in church and learns the Bible all his life, and lives like the devil. He has a mind and a perceptive understanding of truth, but that's as far as it has gone. For the Word of God to affect your life, it must come down into this human storage reservoir. Faith (believing) stores it in there. Then a very marvelous thing begins happening: From the human spirit, this truth begins to affect all the areas of your life through your soul.

    Let's look at a few verse to illustrate what we're talking about here. John 14:26: "But the Comforter who is the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He shall teach you all things and will bring to your remembrance whatever I have said unto you." You must be filled with the Holy Spirit. That is why we begin every service by encouraging you to confess all known sins. To be filled with the Spirit means to be controlled by God the Holy Spirit. To be controlled by God the Holy Spirit, in time (temporal fellowship), means that you are in fellowship with Him because you have no barrier between you and God the Father. You are in the inner circle of temporal fellowship, and, of course, you are also in the outer circle of eternal fellowship. That's at your point of salvation. You can never leave that. But you also have the inner circle of temporal fellowship.

    So, when you sin, you leave the inner circle, but you stay in the outer circle. When you sin, you go out to an area of carnality; and, when you come back in, you're in the area of spirituality. Confession of that sin brings you back into the inner circle. When you are in the inner circle, you are in this status of being filled with the Spirit. It is very important for you to understand that. Most Christians go through church all their lives, and they waste their time, because they don't understand this principle right here. Therefore, God the Holy Spirit can't teach them, and the things of the Word of God never click into their lives and become real and functional. It all becomes some wonderful thing, and they try to cover it over with an emotional response, because the reality is never there.

    When you're filled with the Spirit, then you have learned this truth through the ministry of God the Holy Spirit, and that's what John 14:26 is telling us. In 1 Corinthians 2:9, we have that very important passage that gives us further information about learning divine truth: "But as it is written, eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for them that love him." This is not talking about heaven. This is talking about the pure gold of Bible doctrine. These are the things that you learn from the Scripture that are of such inestimable value to you in your life. No human being can come up with it on his own. Nobody could invent it. The finest imaginative mind of man could never produce this.

    "But God has revealed them unto us (these spiritual real truths) by His Spirit, for the Spirit searches all things; yea, the deep things of God." This is God the Holy Spirit. "For what man knows the things of man except the spirit of man which is in him? Even so, no man knows the things of God, but the Spirit of God. Now we have not received the spirit of the world, but the spirit who is (and the Greek says, 'which is'): the spirit which is of God." "Who is" is not a wrong translation, because this does refer to the Holy Spirit. But again, if God the Holy Spirit is there, then the human spirit is there. So we may view this "spirit" with a small "s."

    "He has given to us, but the spirit which is from God, that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God." What spirit? That human spirit that is given to us at the point of regeneration from God so that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. With the human spirit, the divine viewpoint truths that we learn are captured and preserved. That's what's so important about your human spirit.

    Verse 13: "Which things also we do not speak in the words which man's wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Spirit teaches." This is comparing spiritual things with spiritual: "But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God. They are foolishness unto him. Neither can he know them, because they are (by means of a human spirit), discerned. But he that is spiritual (in the inner circle) judges all things, yet he himself is judged of no one. For who has known the mind of the Lord (doctrine) that he may instruct Him. But we have the mind of Christ." That is a fantastic statement. With your being in this inner circle of spirituality, under the instruction of the Word of God, and being receptive to it, there comes into your mind information of divine viewpoint truth that transforms the mind of Jesus Christ from Him to you. And this is literally true. You receive the very thinking of Jesus Christ. The mind of Christ becomes your mind. What a fantastic possession! What a tragedy not to know how the transfer is made. That's what we're talking about here: how the transfer is made, and all the pieces that go together, and all that must function and work together for this transfer to be effective.

    Let's look up one more verse on this transfer of divine viewpoint truth. 1 John 2:27 says, "But the anointing which you have received of Him abides in you, and you don't need for any man to teach you." "The anointing that you have received of Him" means the indwelling of the Spirit of God. That is the anointing that you have received: "But the anointing which you have received of Him abides in you, and you don't need for any man to teach you" – that anybody give you understanding of doctrinal truth. You need somebody to explain doctrine to you, but you don't need anybody to give you the understanding of that doctrinal truth. As a matter of fact, nobody could: "But as the same anointing teaches you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as He has taught you, you shall abide in Him." The truth of the matter is that God the Holy Spirit is there as your teacher to give you discerning understanding of spiritual phenomena, and only He can give it to you. What He gives you is not a lie. He gives you that which is the truth. So, you have stored in this human spirit this spiritual phenomena truth.

    This spiritual perception is the Holy Spirit teaching the human spirit via the human mind. This is what spiritual perception is. God the Holy Spirit is teaching your human spirit via the human mind. The human spirit is a key factor in this.

    Notice Job 32:8, which speaks of our human spirit: "But there is a spirit in man (a human spirit) and the inspiration of the Almighty gives them understanding." There is a human spirit in man, and the inspiration (the breathing out of God the Holy Spirit) gives understanding to your human spirit. That's exactly what we're talking about.

    Assurance

    Let's add to that Romans 8:16: "The Spirit Himself bears witness with our human spirit that we are the children of God." It is God the Holy Spirit who teaches your human spirit the truth of the gospel, and gives you understanding of how you're saved, and gives you understanding of the absolute righteousness that you need to go to heaven, that enables you to know that you're right with God. How do you know that everything is square between you and an Almighty Holy God, so that you're ready to go out in death? How do you know that? Some people think they know it by something that they've done that some preacher has told them to do: walk an aisle; raise a hand; sign a card; give some great gift of money; or, perform some religious ritual. But none of that is comforting. There is always the gnawing edge of doubt because those are all human works. When you learn that the Bible says that no human effort of any kind counts with God for anything at all relative to eternal life, then all those things begin to bother you. The only way you have peace in your soul that you are secure and safe from an eternity in hell is when God the Holy Spirit teaches your human spirit that that is so. That's exactly what Romans 8:16 is saying: "The spirit Himself bears witness with our human spirit, that we are the children of God." That's how you know. The truth of doctrine, which you have believed, makes it clear.

    What did Paul say? "I know whom I have believed, and I am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I've committed unto Him against that day." Paul says, "I have a conviction of where I'm headed because I know what I have believed. God the Holy Spirit has placed in my human spirit that information." And here's what he did with it. This human spirit information (from God the Holy Spirit), while you are again filled with the Spirit, has cycled up to the directive side of your mentality (to the direct function of your mind). Whether it's the gospel information; whether it's prophetic information; whether it's moral information relative to a proper moral, a proper life, or a proper sort of morality; whether it is guidance in personal affairs; whether it is guidance in social matters; or, whether it is guidance in life goals, all of this information, in the form of doctrine, is cycled up to your directive mind then, which is now possessed by God's divine viewpoint.

    That's what this is. Don't forget that this is divine viewpoint in your human spirit. This divine viewpoint is cycled up to your mentality and your directive mind, where decisions are made (the decision-making factor); it gives guidance to your emotions; your emotions are directed by divine viewpoint information principles; and, the directive mind gives guidance to your will, so that out of your will come actions which are right – not wrong. Out of your will come actions which are right, because your will is controlled by God's divine viewpoint thinking.

    You can see why so many parents make a mistake about having their children do what is right. They think they can get their kids to do what is morally right, and right in other ways, by giving them lectures and threats and whatnot. They don't realize that God's system says that, first, in the directive mind, there must be a control of divine viewpoint truth. When that truth is there, then those emotions of that child will be guided by the Word of God. His will be controlled by the Word of God, and his actions then will be according to that which is pleasing to God. And that is what you're after. You have to get it in this way, or you'll not get it at all.

    This doctrine is in the human spirit, functioning in the soul. The soul consists of the mind, the emotions, and the will. The human spirit activates and influences the soul. All of that produces spiritual maturity in your life. That's how you grow in the Lord. That's how you grow in the knowledge and in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. That spiritual maturity structure then is erected in your soul. We have already looked at Ephesians 4:20-24 in detail. We will just refer to those verses in passing.

    Ephesians 4:20-24 describe for us the production of spiritual maturity: "But you have not so learned Christ." The previous context tells about a lifestyle which is a lifestyle in which the soul and its facets are hardened against God. Verse 20: "But you have not so learned Christ. If you heard Him and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus, that you put off concerning the former manner of life, the old man, which is corrupt, according to the deceitful lust, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness." That new man is this spiritual maturity structure in the soul. It is a structure which departs from evil, and grows in holiness. That spiritual maturity will orient you to the grace of God as to your lifestyle.

    That spiritual maturity will include giving to you a mastery of the details of life so that material things will be in their proper perspective in your life. It will give you a relaxed mental attitude so that you are free from mental attitude bitterness in your soul. It will give you the capacity to love. It will give you an enablement to love. Without having doctrine in your human spirit, you can't love your wife; your husband; your children; and, you certainly cannot love God. You come over with an emotional fakery. Sometimes people who are loved with a divine love can't recognize it or appreciate it, because they themselves don't have the receptivity. They're still operating on that world's system of love – that con job that the world puts out under an emotional gush, and says, "This is love." Then it will give you inner happiness, which is not based on circumstances; on people; or, on things. All of that gives you stability as a human being. Ephesians 4:20-24 describe for us that development.

    The unbeliever then has only his human IQ to function on, but the believer also has a living human spirit and God the Holy Spirit functioning in him, for the learning and storing of doctrine. In Ephesians 3:16-20, we have this described for us. This is the believer who has God the Holy Spirit and doctrine functioning in his life.

    When you are an unbeliever, everything you get is learned with the perceptive mind, and it's transferred directly over to the decision-making side. There's nothing guiding or affecting what you learn. This is how you learn reading, writing, and arithmetic. You transfer it right over to the directive side, and there's no control element on it. But for a believer, there is a very great control element. Notice Ephesians 3:16: "That He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might;" strengthened, that is, with the working of the Holy Spirit in the Christian: "Strengthened with might by His spirit in the inner man." This is God the Holy Spirit indwelling your body and affecting your human spirit.

    Verse 17: "That the Christ may dwell in your hearts." "May dwell" means to be at home while you're here on earth: "That Christ may be at home in your hearts by faith, that (with the result that) you are rooted and grounded." "Being rooted" means the filling of the Spirit of God. That is your anchor point. "Grounded" means the laying of the foundation of the frame of reference that a spiritual maturity structure gives you: "And being rooted (filled with the spirit) and grounded (spiritual maturity) in love." Remember that "love" is a code word. This love ("agape" love) is a code word for the filling of the Holy Spirit.

    Verse 18: "May be able to comprehend;" that is, to have doctrine as "epignosis" in the human spirit, with all the saints what is ..." And notice how the fullness of comprehension is described as a cube: "The breadth and length and depth and height." This is full comprehension. The Bible is trying to present to us a concept of totality of understanding that a Christian can possess, which is the mind of Christ.

    Verse 19: "And to know the love." This is to know from your experience: "The love of Christ which passes knowledge;" that is, more than "gnosis." This word "knowledge" is "gnosis" knowledge: "And to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge (which passes more than something you learned by sitting in church) on to the full cube of 'epignosis' knowledge, that you might be filled with all the fullness of God." What is that talking about? That is this spiritual maturity structure in your soul.

    So, the spiritual IQ of a believer is achieved by a grace system. It is determined by the amount of Bible doctrine which is stored in the human spirit. Your IQ is determined by this. It takes time to develop a spiritual IQ, but you can build it up, and you can store it, and it is not dependent upon any human effort or actions on your part.

  6. The Doctrine of Common Grace

    Another thing to point out about the human spirit, is that, in the communication of the gospel to the unbeliever, the Holy Spirit acts as the human spirit for the perception of spiritual truth of salvation. Some of you probably thought, "Well, if a person cannot learn spiritual truth without god the Holy Spirit, how does an unbeliever learn the gospel that he has to understand in order to be saved?" Well, at that point, that's the one thing the Bible tells us – that God the Holy Spirit will teach an unbeliever, and that's the only thing He will teach him. That's the only ministry he has to the unbeliever.

    John 16:8-11: "And when He (that is, God the Holy Spirit) is come, he will reprove (convict) the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment." He will convict the world of sin because: "They don't believe on Me." He will convict the world of righteousness because: "I go to my Father, and you see me no more." God the Holy Spirit makes it clear to people that if you do not believe in Jesus Christ, you're doomed in your sin. It is God the Holy Spirit who makes it clear to people that they must have absolute righteousness to go to heaven. He shows people: "Of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged." It is God the Holy Spirit who makes it clear to people that Satan no longer has control over their lives unless they permit him to do so.

    1 Corinthians 2:14-16 add to this. God the Holy Spirit makes these things clear that an unbeliever needs to know in order to have clarity of the gospel to make a decision. We read this passage earlier. The natural man does not learn these things. They're spiritually discerned. So, God the Holy Spirit comes in and makes the gospel clear. We call this the doctrine of common grace. Everybody is given the common grace of illumination of the gospel. It is a convicting work on the part of God the Holy Spirit.

  7. Doctrine in the Human Spirit Refreshes Us

    The next point is that doctrine which is stored in the human spirit becomes the basis of the Christian's personal spiritual refreshment. 2 Corinthians 7:13: "Therefore, we were comforted in your comfort. Yea, and we had exceedingly more joy for the joy of Titus, because his spirit was refreshed by you all." It is the Word of God that rejoiced Titus. It was the Word of God that rejoiced his spirit among these believers. Doctrine builds a frame of reference in the mind for divine viewpoint. Doctrine builds our values and standards for our conscience. Doctrine gives us the vocabulary to talk about spiritual phenomena, and all of these things enable us to be refreshed by the Word of God.

    Believers often experience coming to the Word of God after some crisis in their lives, or some burden, or after a very hard day, or after being at the office and having listened to all the foul mouths, or being out on the job, and having listened to all the dirty talk. You come home, and you turn to the Word of God, and doctrine pours through your mentality, and it has a cleansing, refreshing effect. Where do you get spiritual refreshment from? In the midst of all the filth and the garbage that surrounds us and our society, the Christian who has doctrine in his human spirit is refreshed because of that – not because of some kind of emotional jag that he puts himself on. It is because he knows that God has spoken, and he has the information. He knows the truth. He knows where he's going. The living human spirit is the new creature that is described in 2 Corinthians 5:17.

  8. The Production of the Human Spirit

    The working of the human spirit is on a multiplied plain and a multiplied direction. This is just taking place. For some of you, because you have doctrine in your human spirit, this human spirit is producing about seven different things for you. For those of you that have little doctrine, it is producing these on a very modest scale, if at all. For some of you, with nothing, it produces nothing. Next time, we'll pick the story up at this point: the marvelous things that the living human spirit, filled with God's divine viewpoint, produces for that individual believer.

    Dr. John E. Danish, 1977

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