A key but overlooked truth in the Bible is that all humans have a spirit-partner. Either the Holy Spirit or an unholy spirit opposed to God. In some cases, many unholy spirits—demons. One man in the Bible had a “legion” of demons [Mark 5:1-9]. In the Bible Jesus regularly confronted and exposed the demonic realm, setting deceived and captured souls free.
Paul reminded believers of this. “And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the flesh and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind” [Eph 2:1-3].
Souls are set free only as the Holy Spirit shares God’s heart and one responds. The Spirit is then the bond—the seal—of a believer’s communion with God as made available through Jesus. A person remains united to God forever with the Spirit’s presence. And the Spirit faithfully pours out God’s love in a believer’s heart from the moment of first encounter onward.
The devil by contrast, postures as if he is God’s counterpart. In fact he is a created, finite cherub gone wrong. In his rebellion he works to form a realm of functioning death that is the opposite of real life. A pathway of deceit as opposed to truth. Of hatred in place of love. Of darkness rather than light. He dissolves and devours souls. So physical life in this age is shaped by a contest between opposed spirits. A battle of evil versus good.
Is this important? Needless to say! As spirit-to-spirit beings we are never alone, even if we aren’t conscious of any connection. As in our experience as social beings in a crowd in which we aren’t very self-aware of our ordinary living-in-society. We rarely focus on our devotions or social values as we shop, sip a coffee, golf, or go to work.
All this emerges in the Bible in which our spirit is also called our “heart.” Or our “inner man.” This motivational center—linked by metaphor to the ever-changing pace of our inner organ, is stirred by fear, love, anger, ambition, and more. But we don’t usually notice our heart at work. No more than we notice the air we’re breathing.
This is unfamiliar stuff to most of us, even though the Bible regularly speaks of human hearts. As when Jesus spoke of souls in Mark chapter seven—”This people honors me with their lips,
but their heart is far from me…”
Most people prefer to talk about “free will”—a focus on human autonomy based on a common experience of choosing. Yet our spirituality is the basis for choosing. It’s the motivational basis behind every choice. C. S. Lewis exposed this in his clever portrayal of a budding Christian in the Screwtape Letters. Hearts always define what a person choses as a spiritual disposition—our “serving one master”—that forms all our values and motives. Our choices follow.
A grasp of sound spiritual life starts with God. He is the ultimate Spirit being. And this is a bigger claim than we may realize. Especially given our self-perception as physical beings, seeing life from the “outside-in.” Yet we actually live from the “inside-out” as spirit-defined beings. Physical food, for example, usually trumps spiritual food. Outward circumstances seem in control much more than God is—until we’re in crisis. So religion is an add-on to “real” life. The Psalmist warns, then, “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God’” [14:1]. This is the enemy’s main Lie.
The Bible’s account of life overturns the “fool’s” Godless views. The Father is Spirit. He also has his Holy Spirit who searches and then discloses God’s inner being [1 Cor 2]. And the Son, who also existed as Spirit or “Word” before creation, spoke of this: “Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world” [Jn 17:24]. He speaks of a reality without tangible “stuff.” So the Triune God is one Spiritual being who exists in three eternal distinctions. As “love”—the Lover, his Beloved, and the bonding Activist who shares this love.
Once again, truth of this sort is more than we normally grasp. It only comes to us through revelation, not reason. Although when the Bible is illuminated by the Spirit it sets out sound reason. The human spirit/heart is the basis of who we are—our center of being. “Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life.” Proverbs 4:23
It may be that many church-going souls still don’t see this ongoing spirit-to-spirit reality as a fact of life. And what the implications are. Even though the apostle Paul called authentic believers to “keep in step with the Spirit” in Galatians chapter five.
In that chapter of Galatians Paul set out a practical spiritual contrast. One spirit offers “sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these.” While “the fruit of [God’s] Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control…” [Gal 5:19-24].
Sadly, some churches are “spiritual” communities that display the wrong spirit’s presence, much like the religious communities Jesus encountered in his day. And they, in turn, had him crucified. Yet it was also the Father’s will that Jesus be crucified. The irony of the Bible narrative as a whole is that God isn’t blocked by evil. Instead he works all things for good in those who love him.
Christ’s death, then, displayed the empty and selfish ambitions of a broken spiritual community in contrast to the true Spirit community of his followers. And even today all who have the Spirit of God will regularly value his works; and not the enemy’s deadly values and choices.
Let’s end with Paul’s exhortation in Romans eight. “For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.”
Amen. Let’s keep in step with the Spirit and invite others to the Son he reveals. And enjoy the Father who offers his love and shares the Son with us.
