In my first blog last Sunday morning, I made the statement that Jesus didn't just go to Gethsemane to pray; He went there to die. Read last week's blog for our scriptural foundation to back this truth.
This morning, I want us to spend a little time understanding the soul of man, since this is the part of Jesus that died in the Garden. Our Lord only took His three closest disciples - the ones we call His "inner circle" who had been privileged to be the only three who had witnessed Jesus' transfiguration when He spoke with Moses and Elijah (Mt. 17:1-9). Obviously there was something to be witnessed in this experience as well; but, as we will see in a later blog, Peter, James and John failed.
The Soul of Man
The soul of man is comprised of his mind, will and emotions. With his soul, a man is self-conscious.
The soul tells you that you are a unique individual with your own personal preferences, likes, dislikes, etc. because you have self-awareness. When God breathed into the lifeless body of the first man, Adam, he became a living soul (Gen. 2:7). Actually, the original language declares that God breathed into man's nostrils the breath of "lives" (plural). Why? Being a tri-partite being, man has, as it were, three expressions of life:
1. Bios - physical life, or the life of the body/flesh. The five basic senses of your biological being (sight, sound, touch, feel, smell) make you consciously aware of this natural, physical world. Without a body, you would have no contact with this earthly realm.
2. Psuche - life of the soul. You have a soul; you live in your body.You are self-aware.
3. Zoe - life of the spirit. This is the essence of God's spirit that "lighteth every man that cometh into the world," (St. John 1:9). Your spirit makes you conscious of the spiritual realm. Your spirit knows that there is good and evil, right and wrong. When Adam ate from the knowledge of the Tree of Good and Evil, he lost his spiritual sensitivity to discern good from evil (cp. Isa. 5:20). Nevertheless, "they that are joined to the Lord become one spirit" (1 Cor. 6:17).
When a man dies, his body returns to dust and his spirit to the God who gave it (Eccl. 12:7). However, a man's soul hangs in the balance. Souls can go to either heaven or hell, depending on
whether or not salvation was received by repenting of sins and accepting Jesus Christ as Savior. Look at the words of Jesus found in Matthew 10:28, "And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell." Jesus does not state that the spirit is destroyed in hell, only the body and the soul can be.
Jesus' Soul - the Propitiation for our Sins
There are those who do not understand scripturally that Jesus not only went to hell, but that He suffered the wrath of God against all sin and ungodliness. They believe that the full expression of God's wrath was met at the Cross, probably because that's what we've mostly been taught all our life. Yet, every time a sick person confesses, "by His stripes I'm healed", they're not referring to Jesus' work on the Cross, but rather, the price He paid at the whipping post. Healing is a part of the work of salvation, but it occurred BEFORE He got to the Cross.
Some believe that when Jesus said, "It is finished," that He was referring to the price He needed to pay to bring us salvation. I do believe that much was accomplished by our precious Lord in the suffering He did for us in His Body; nevertheless, I suggest to you that when He said, IT is finished, He wasn't saying, I am finished! He's still working on our behalf. His current ministry on behalf of His Body is that of our High Priest who ever lives to make intercession for us (Ro. 8:34, Heb. 7:25).
"Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins," (1 John 4:10). In other words, Jesus was the offering that satisfied God's wrath against sin. It's interesting that the Holy Bible says God "made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin..." (I Cor. 5:21). "The soul that sinneth, it shall die" is stated in Ezekiel 18:4 & 20. Had Jesus been guilty of personal sin, he would have never resurrected from the grave. He took our sin into hell and there he experienced the wrath of God against sin.
"But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man," (Hebrews 2:9).
I submit to you that when Jesus "tasted" or experienced death for every man, this was speaking not only of His physical death on the Cross [because the vast majority of us to experience our own physical death, although there will be an end-time company of saints who are raptured], but was speaking of His experience in hell, suffering separation from the Father and feeling the wrath of God against what He had become - sin. I believe Jesus had to experience the torment of the flames of hell for several reasons:
1. To fulfill O.T. types and shadows.
"And thou shalt burn the whole ram upon the altar: it is a burnt offering unto the LORD: it is a sweet savour, an offering made by fire unto the LORD," (Exodus 29:18).
"And thou shalt anoint the altar of the burnt offering, and all his vessels, and sanctify the altar: and it shall be an altar most holy," (Ex. 40:10).
"And he shall put his hand upon the head of the burnt offering; and it shall be accepted for him to make atonement for him," (Lev. 1:4).
Old Testament animal sacrifices only typified the Lamb of God who would one day come and take away the sin of the world. If Jesus, as the anti-type, was not to be "burned", then why does the type and shadow of a burnt offering exist?
2. To fulfill prophecy. Isaiah states that the soul of Jesus must be made as an offering for sin (Isa. 53:10).
3. To bring forth our new nature [2 Cor. 5:17, Gal. 6:15, Eph. 4:24, Col. 3:10]. This will take an entire teaching, but understand this: On the Day of Atonement, two goats were required to make one offering for the Atonement (Leviticus 16). One goat was slain (representing the Body of Jesus that would die and give His Blood); the other goat - the azazel or scapegoat - represented the soul of Jesus.
Why two goats? We'll answer that in detail on next Sunday Morning's Blog.
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