One Important Difference Between the Spirit and the Intellect

As much as I have made practical epistemological observations, I have not much delved into Biblical anthropology. Many very good theologians conclude that the human construct consists of two parts: body and spirit. They define the spirit loosely as anything bearing no physical presence. Given that the Bible mentions that humans also have a soul, or mind, then such would fall within this definition.

I consider that any word used in the Bible by one author may not perfectly comport with another author. I would also observe that typically many words carry multiple meanings even when used by the same author. The word translated "spirit" from the Greek texts is "pneuma", also translated by such words as "breath" or "air". It's the root word of modern English words such as pneumatic. It is representative of our source of life. Inasmuch as we might say "he breathed his last", we would associate breath with physical life. But even ancient people recognized an aspect of our life that is substantial rather than merely existential from which our life comes.

The word translated "soul" in the same Greek texts is the word "psyche". It's the word we use in modern English to refer to our mind and is the root word for such as psychiatry or psychology. It likewise refers to the essence of our existence, particularly manifested in the machinations of our thoughts.

The similarity between the two words results in statements in the Bible where the two appear to be used interchangeably. I don't like this argument as a hermeneutical principle. As an example, I could say, "That ball is red." I could say, "That ball is round." Then I could argue that "red" and "round" means the same thing because they are used interchangeably. This is why I'm wary of this hermeneutical argument.

I observe that Paul uses the two words side by side in 1 Thessalonians 5:23 in stating the human construct:

"Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ."

I also observe that he possibly uses them in 1 Corinthians 15:45 as a distinction between Adam and Christ:

"Thus it is written, “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit."

(The word translated "being" here in the ESV is the word "psyche".)

Finally, Paul indicates in Hebrews 4:12 that there is a division between them while indicating a very close link between them:

"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."

Given this, I tend to separate them in my understanding but I understand how they can be nearly synonymous. So, while I lean toward trichotomism I'm not dogmatically against dichotomism.



That said, I want to draw a distinction between the two for the purposes of drawing out the difference between theology pursued for cognitive ends and theology apprehended for spiritual ends, for there is fruit in this.

It is good to contemplate the things of God whether these thoughts are simple or complex. My children from a young age asked questions about God that came to their mind. The simplest among us are capable of thinking about God. Our considerations attain greater complexity and sophistication with greater intellect and education.

Between revelation and depraved perceptions we hold all kinds of true and false beliefs about our Creator but it is good to struggle with the knowledge of God. This is why we debate one another over theology and why we must address any blindness we have with regard to the sin of our hearts. But the sin of our hearts is a spiritual matter that affects our cogitations.

Spiritual gifts are abilities that we are given according to the provision of God to build the Church in the name of Christ and edify it. But the fruit of the Spirit is a set of attitudes that are evident in the faithful:

Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. (Galatians 5: 19-24)

Thinking about theology and debating it, while it is a good pursuit, involves the handling of information - the use of the mind. We may have many reasons for pursuing theology. A good reason for pursuing theology is because we love God and desire to know him better. A bad reason for pursuing theology is to justify our sin before God and before men who hold the revelation of God as a high standard for discerning sin. Whether one reason or another is in play is a spiritual matter. So, the activity of our mind is driven by the activity of our spirit.

But I observe those who argue as though they were competing for truth rather than love. While I would say that there is no love without truth and the truth is true whether there is love or not, I would also observe that we cannot understand the truth unless we have love. Therefore, when contending for the truth against unbelievers or those who are weak in the faith, it is imperative that the goal be to draw out spiritual fruit first understanding that not all knowledge is fruitful for this.

As it is, revelation is given to us in the scriptures not for the purpose not of arriving at a perfect understanding of the truth, for we cannot know it perfectly in this sinful world. The purpose of God's revelation to us in the scriptures is to inform our capacity to bear spiritual fruit. Therefore, it can be said that while we apprehend the truth with a spiritual desire to do so, we also gain the spiritual desire to do so by the revelation of God through both the scriptures as well as the Holy Spirit.



I'd like to offer an example of how we are to be informed spiritually by the information from the scriptures we apprehend with our minds and often debate.

One common debate in western culture since the reformation has been with regard to reformed theology. The United States was founded on the hinge of western sociological thought using the Romantic considerations of personal freedom, the Christian considerations of personal responsibility and in reaction to the tyrannical tendencies of the European monarchies that take these personal freedoms and responsibilities away. The problem in western thought is that we have taken the concept of civil freedom and responsibility, infused them into popular philosophies, and allowed them to influence our theological sensibilities.

As a result, theology among western Protestants has become increasingly Arminian-ish. Considering this, the recent resurgence of reformed theology among Southern Baptists has been met with much resistance. The debate often becomes passionate. While I suspect most are motivated by a desire to uphold what they believe is the truth, what has suffered is the way the elements of the debate ought to inform our spiritual fruit-bearing.

I've made this observation before and it's a logical conundrum. However, our attitudes need not follow principles of logic. Is there anything good that should not be attributed to God? Therefore if we do anything good, including come to faith in Christ, then should we not give all the glory to God? Can we say that God does any evil? I know some become angry with God and would claim that he has done some wrong to them, but we should not say that any evil comes from God for he only does good things. Therefore, if we sin, who are we to blame but ourselves? So if we do good, we attribute it to God and if we do evil we assume the blame ourselves.

If we give God the glory for the good we do, then if we follow the strictures of logic, we should likewise blame him for the evil we do. If we assume responsibility for the evil we do, then if we follow the strictures of logic, we must also take credit for the good that we do. However, to follow the strictures of logic as such is to fail to bear the fruit of the Spirit. We do evil against God either way and distort the truth with a false sense of logic by justifying ourselves.

But there actually is no illogic to have the paradox in our attitudes where we credit God for good and assume the blame for evil; for truth, while not illogical, transcends logic. Logic is merely inadequate to fully encompass the truth. So understand as much as you can of God with your mind, but approach him with the fruits of the Spirit.

Well-Informed People

Yes, the title is sarcastic.

I don't listen to Howard Stern as a rule. I found this YouTube radio clip on Voddie Baucham's blog. When you hear the way the interviews go, think about all the interviews you see on the news or hear on the radio, or even hear at work or the public square. The people being interviewed here are clearly ignorant and they are likely not even aware of their own motives. Do the people you most respect have it all together? Do you? Feel free to even take what the "experts" say with a grain chunk block of salt.

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The thing I observe is that these people all sound rather earnest and confident in what they think they know. The fact is, we are all woefully ignorant and fall far short of having the noodles to accurately make the decisions we need to make with the certainty we often make them.

My pastor, Skip Cartin, made the point in yesterday's sermon that we shouldn't trust smart people; after all, smart people created this economic mess we're in. A few breaths later he criticized anti-intellectualism in the church. Unless I misunderstood him, his point is not that intellect is unimportant or useless altogether, but that it requires true wisdom, or trust in God, to be truly fruitful in Christ.

I would argue that a certain lack of cognitive function is helpful because if any of us had a melon full of seeds, we would get the idea that we didn't need to trust God. Our cofidence would be in ourselves rather than God. Furthermore, while self-confidence in our cogitations is elusive if we have too much doubt, then we will be immobilized from using what we do know. Therefore, don't judge the people in the radio clip too harshly.

I dare say that the great leaders among us are some of the best-informed and most confident yet are only moderately intelligent and often unaware that the world is much larger than their perception of it. There are typically multiple solutions to any given temporal problem and good leaders are generally oblivious to the fact that their solution is not the only one.

As it is, be aware that the people you trust, including yourself, are rowing along with only one oar in the water, and that's okay as long they trust Christ.

Knowledge and Morality: What is True Discipleship?

I realized my relationship in Christ when I was 11 and submitted to baptism. The church my family belonged to met in a building that had not been finished. As such, the temporary baptistery was a concrete hole in the basement that contained a pump at one end for drawing water unfiltered and unheated from a nearby branch. The presence of the pump underwater was frightening enough for me. The fact that it was February in Ohio was another matter – the water was literally near freezing. Yet I was pleased to demonstrate the realization of my faith in God in a tangible way.

However, the circumstances of my life changed quickly and dramatically, and I have spelled those circumstances out before. In summary, between the loss of my mother and a change to a new location, a new denomination and a new church family resulted in a lack of adequate discipleship. Discipleship in that denomination amounted to teaching on the Ten Commandments, The Apostle’s Creed, The Lord’s Prayer, The Sacraments, and Confession. Know these things and the church can ostensibly be certain that you are a Christian. All these things are built into the service of the liturgical church in some form or fashion and are typically presented that way. In other words, the hope is that the liturgy and a good understanding of it will provide one’s weekly dose of good medicine to make someone a better Christian.

The small problem is that worship is not about what we get out of it. It’s what we put into it. Worship is not about what we get from God. We have already received our salvation. Out of a response of joy, we give ourselves over to glorifying God in any way we can. That’s true worship. The large problem is that this does nothing to inform our attitudes in our daily life.

Likewise, people have disciplined younger generations to do what is right. We look at what children read and what they watch and are perhaps pleased when a story has a good moral to it.

We approach civil law the same way. We want the laws of the land to reflect good morals. We want people who do not share our morals to act the way we know is right. That way, we think, God will like us better and bless us with an easier life. It is a good thing to seek a society that honors God in its public quarters.

It’s easy to focus on the evil we all do because we do so much of it all the time. To say otherwise is a false pretense. It is many times as instructive to honestly and earnestly examine conscience and demonstrate how we deal with sin practically through repentance, confession and forgiveness.

The question arose recently, what of the Law of Moses are we responsible for upholding, or what part of the Law did Christ fulfill? The easy answer is to break the Law into categories that are Biblically arbitrary, but make some cognitive sense to us. We can say that some of the law is civil in nature, some of it regards the sacrificial system and other of it is moral. For Peter and the Apostles, Acts says that there is no requirement for Gentiles except that we “abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality,” as recorded in Acts 15. What? Nothing about murder? Does this comport with the Law summed up by Christ in the gospels where He said, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” But what does love for God and His people amount to? “This is how we know that we love the children of God: by loving God and carrying out his commands. This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome.” (1 John 5:2,3) So we’re back to square one.

Now it’s good to desire to honor and glorify God by following His law. It’s hard to get real dogmatic about what we are supposed to do and what we are not supposed to do. We have some basic admonitions. The thing is, we can’t even keep the simple ones.

True Christian discipleship is more than the mere dispensation of knowledge or the modification of behavior to do good things. It is instruction in wisdom. It’s one thing to recite the golden rule. It’s quite another to see someone in need and think, “If I were that person I’d want someone like me to help, and I think I will,” rather than, “That person looks like a fool; I bet I could make a joke about them and make myself look like a winner.” This is not to say that discipleship shouldn't include the teaching of knowledge or the admonition to do good. But knowledge makes arrogant where love edifies and extensive lists of dos and don’ts takes the focus from grace and makes us seek to appear to be what we are not. Therefore, knowledge and morality should not be imparted without teaching understanding in light of God's sovereign providence.

That said, disciplers can only impart knowledge and can only present stimuli to someone else. This stimuli can be rather persuasive and we can study this for our use, but ultimately it is the activity of the Holy Spirit that enlightens the disciple to the Truth of God. That's sanctification.

The Greatest Thing I Don't Know

"Knowledge makes arrogant, but love edifies." I Cor. 8:1

There are those who generate knowledge and those who use knowledge. Ultimately, all knowledge is created by God. Some knowledge is discovered like the laws of physics. The laws of physics as they are discovered are described using contrived means of mathematics and language. This is generated knowledge. Art can be said to be created. However, art is created with minds and lives influenced by no means outside of God’s created order. Inasmuch as art communicates anything, it must rely on some common frame of reference. So, all knowledge comes from God and is discovered and generated by people.

What good is knowledge? People claim great knowledge for the purpose of appearing worthy of praise and honor. If a truth is discovered, what purpose does it serve just to know it? This question has been asked by students for generations. A well-rounded education, we may say, is necessary to help us to apprehend and apply useful information. Without the practice of having learned information and having learning how to apply the information, even if we will never use the information later in life, it provides a foundation and framework for understanding the world around us within which we can use to correctly identify, place and utilize new information.

Aside from this, knowledge is useless unless used. What should we do with one who seeks to share knowledge? What good is the work of a physicist unless an engineer applies the knowledge he generates? What good is the work of a composer of music without musicians to perform his music? What good is the study and theorization of theologians and philosophers without ministers and politicians to apply it to the lives of people for good or for ill? What good is the work of an author without a publisher to distribute his words to those who will read it and be edified? What good is a teacher without students? What good is a cartographer without people who don’t want to get lost? What good is it when the King of Glory comes with knowledge of the Father and we do not recognize Him? "I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me." Mat. 25:40

We must worship God in spirit and in truth. What good is the knowledge of the truth of God without worshippers? What good is love without the least of these?

If a physicist theorizes and has no engineer;
If an economist reports trends and has no businessman;
If a composer composes and has no musicians;
If musicians perform and have no audience;
If a philosopher speculates and has no politicians;
If a scholar compiles information and has no teacher;
If a teacher teaches and has no students;
If a theologian struggles with God and has no ministry;
If worshippers do not worship the true God…

…then what's the use?