Salvation of the soul

SALVATION OF THE SOUL

 

We will be looking at the meaning of these two words today – Soul and Salvation.

The Bible tells us that as human beings we have a body and a soul and a spirit.

1Thessalonians 5:23 may your spirit and soul and body be kept strong and blameless …

 

Our soul sits between our spirit and our body. It receives information from our spirit through our conscience and intuition which informs our soul about what is happening in our inner world. The soul also receives information from our body’s five senses which informs it about what is happening in our outer world.

 

The soul processes each of these areas of information through its three modes of activity, which are the mind, the emotions and the will.

The mind receives information and orders it according to what it ranks as being of value to our life.

The emotions/feelings react or respond to information as to whether it is helpful or harmful

The will finally decides how to act upon the information when it has evaluated what the mind has considered, and how the emotions and feelings move it one way or the other.

 

Our area of focus today concerning the salvation of the soul is about how our soul responds to the inner world of our life in the spirit.

And this is where the soul actually relates to the two different worlds of our inner spiritual life and they are a) the natural human spirit and b) the human spirit that is joined by faith to God’s Spirit.

All of us have a human spirit that was created in the image of God before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 1:4) and that is the reality of the inner world of humanity since Adam. It is perhaps the most vulnerable part of our being and is open to being wounded and isolated and feeling deprived. It can see itself in a place of ‘not having’ even when it is in a place of relative plenty. It yearns for fulfillment, and God know this, and so does the devil.

When the Holy Spirit was poured out on humanity on the Day of Pentecost God’s Spirit was made available to be joined to our human spirit. Our faith brings into being our new inner world reality of ‘God with us’ (Acts 2:16).

 

This soul of ours is the critical measure of who we will come to be during this life of ours, the person that will give an account of itself on the day of judgement before God. It will either struggle through life following its own choices as to how to have the needs and demands of its own vulnerable human spirit met, perhaps doing its best to take on this world and being overcome by its chaos and disorder.

Or this soul of ours will be found of God and transformed and have its mind reordered and renewed, its emotions healed and restored, and it’s will subdued into harmony with God by The Holy Spirit. This will be what we can really call Salvation.

 

As afflictions and burdens weary the mind and body, and the soul follows a weakening will, looking for rest, God waits to heal and to save the soul – come to me all you who burdened and heavy laden… and you will find rest for your souls (Matthew 11:28).

 

When the Apostle Peter writes to the Christians he tells them what the Good News is all about, the Gospel of the Salvation of our lives. He speaks about the faith and grace that has come to us that was not available to God’s people in the Old Testament. He tells them that the prophets told God’s people that something wonderful was coming one day but that even the prophets who proclaimed it did not understand when and how it would happen. He was talking about the Salvation of our souls.

 

1Peter 1:8 Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with inexpressible joy, receiving the goal of your faith - the salvation of your souls. 19 This salvation was something the prophets did not fully understand and even though they wrote about this grace that would come to you; they had many questions as to what it all could mean… these things have now been revealed to you by the preaching of this good news through the Holy Spirit, things which angels also long to look into.

 

What did the prophets say? Let us look at what Isaiah said – He talks about the pain and suffering and grief that Jesus went through when he overcame the world of chaos and disorder that he was born into. He tells us what this suffering saviour would do for humanity. He would heal the inner life of humanity by restoring our peace, carrying our griefs and sorrows and forgiving our sins. 

 

Isaiah 53.4 Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, Smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes (wounds) we are healed (made whole – strengthened).

 

And then further on in the next chapter Peter actually repeats what Isaiah the prophet said.

 

1Peter 2:24 He himself carried our sins our sins in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his stripes (wounds) you have been healed. For you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the shepherd and carer of your souls

 

What is being healed here?

Guilt, shame, feeling lost and uncared for - Our soul – the inner life.

This gives new meaning to the phrase ‘saving the lost’.

 

Healing for the body is a different matter. Physical healing is always a separate act of grace and faith in us and it occurs by the sovereign will of God.

1Corinthians 12:9 to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles… All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one accordingly (‘kathos’ as to how and when) as he wills (boulomai – to intend, be disposed). This means that healing of the body is always a sovereign act of God, even though in his sovereignty he allows us to be partners with him in these acts of grace by our faith. This is so that we can be used of God to bring healing to others. (We can obviously acknowledge that God also heals people with such sovereignty that they are healed without any human participation at all).

 

These gifts can be operated by all believers and there are some who have been notable in the use of these Holy Spirit anointings, but it is clear that the supernatural act of grace is always at the disposal of the will of The Holy Spirit. This means that these gifts operate with the same surrendered heart of submission that Jesus had, just as he said;

 

John 5:30 I can of Myself do nothing. As I hear, I determine; and My judgment is right, because I do not seek My own will but the will of the Father who sent Me.

 

 

The word ‘Salvation’

 

The original Greek Scriptures were written in pure colloquial Greek but our English Bible developed very differently and was not presented in simple colloquial English when it at last began to be read by Christians at around the time of the reformation. Many of the important doctrinal terms were words adopted from Latin that was adopted from Greek and then translated back into difficult English along the way and then into the cherished poetic prose of The Kings James Bible.

 

So we had pure Greek with the Church Fathers (Athanasius, Irenaeus), through till 380 AD which was translated into Latin by St. Jerome for 1000 years which dominated most of Christendom right up to the Reformation in 1517AD.

 

Along the way there was an awkward Anglo Saxon version (680-900 AD) then the English Wycliff translation (1380 AD) then the English Tyndale version (1526), and Tyndale was the first one to use the word Salvation in the English Scriptures and he used it only once, in John 4:22 … for salvation commeth of the Jewes…

 

For a thousand years the Latin Jerome version used the Latin word ‘salut’  which meant ‘health’ (as in drinking a toast – good health! - Salut). This word salut became the word

that we would eventually read as Salvation in our English King James vesion

 

The original Greek word we now call Salvation is sozo which had the meaning of being healed and to be made safe and made whole.

After the fine robust old English word ‘health’ dropped out and was displaced by an imported and now most important Latin word, ‘Salvation’, that the whole world of Christianity could at last read, that word came to mostly mean going to Heaven for any struggling human being of good conscience.

 

It was meant to be a present experience of the spiritual reality of the healing and wholeness of a New Creation life that comes from the forgiveness of sin and the joining of God’s Spirit to ours through the Holy Spirit (as well as going to Heaven!)

 

The problem is – What does it mean?  The Greek is much clearer and simpler.

 

 

The Salvation (saving, restoration and healing) of the Soul

We saw in the Scripture of Isaiah about Jesus suffering and being wounded for our healing, and we saw how Peter repeated that Scripture in the New Testament concerning the saving of our souls. So how is this good news healing and saving experienced by us in our everyday lives? How do we live it out.

 

Our souls are constantly being buffeted by the adversities and the contradictions of life generally, and these experiences cause us emotional suffering and feelings of grief and loss that can overwhelm us and rob us of our peace and take away our hope. The constant bombardment of bad news that circulates in today’s global community can affect our souls massively. this has become a kind of negative consciousness that hangs over everybody.

Where can people find that sense of certainty and confidence and hope?

 

It comes by our growing in faith, trusting that a merciful God is with us and inspiring us by his Spirit to live out that godly (healed and saved) life. When Paul writes to the Philippians he urges them to take this healed and saved life seriously as an awesome responsibility. He tells them to … ‘live out your salvation (sozo) with awesome fear and respect, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to do what his good will desires for you. (Philippians 2:12)

 

Our will can be healed and saved as he puts his desires in our hearts and transform our wilfulness into willingness.

Our mind can be renewed and re-ordered by receiving not just knowledge about God  but receiving spiritual truth from God by the Holy Spirit who is joined to our spirit.

 

Our emotions can be healed (saved) as God’s love comforts and encourages our hearts of faith, which is then able to express the love and peace and joy of the Holy Spirit.

Romans 14:17 For the kingdom of God is … righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.