“HEAVEN – OUR HAPPY HOME!” Sermon ONE, Part ONE:

“WE HAVE A BODY, BUT WE ARE MORE THAN OUR BODY!”

1. As humans, created in the image of GOD, we have an earthly physical body! Our earthly physical body is an “earth suit” that we need to exist in this present physical world. So, we exist temporarily in an earthly physical body.

Illustration: Dr. Story Musgrave. STS61, December 2^nd to 13^th, 1993.

2. While we live out our earthly lives in our earthly physical body, we are spiritual beings created in the image of GOD and like GOD will live forever! Since we are created in the image of GOD, we are also three-part beings!

Hebrews 4:12 “For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.”

3. We are spiritual beings. This is the “us” that lives within our earthly physical body!

– We “have” a spirit, but we are not “spirits” (as are angels.)  As living beings, our spirit is our nature as a living being and the source of our ability to relate to and with GOD.

4. We are a soul, and we are described as “having a soul.”

Genesis 2:7 “And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.” (KJV)

Genesis 2:7 “Then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.” (ESV)

Genesis 2:7 “Then the Lord God formed the man out of the dust from the ground and breathed the breath of life into his nostrils, and the man became a living being.” (CSB)

Hebrew – “nephesh” (literally, a breathing / living creature)

Definition – a soul, living being, life, self, person, desire, passion, appetite, emotion.

As souls (living beings created in the image of GOD) we share some, but not all, godlike characteristics including a mind, emotions, will, (although our will is limited while GOD’s is not) and eternality.

5. As living beings created in the image of GOD, WHO is a Spirit; we also have a spirit!

Our spirit is that part of us that is often called our “nature” as in “human nature.” Is the part of us through which we relate to GOD. Because we are sinners by nature, before we are regenerated our human spirit is described as, “being dead.”

Ephesians 2:1-3

(1) “And you were dead in the trespasses and sins (2) 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—

(3) among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.”

Theological Note: When GOD describes unregenerated humans as “dead” HE must be speaking of the spirit (or nature) since if either the body of the soul were dead we could neither “walk” nor “follow” anyone or anything!

In these verses, our deadness is from our “spirit” which being dead to GOD, lives “in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind…”

Amen!