The
feature of intensification is inherent in all realms; the
physical, the metaphysical, and the spiritual. In nature,
harvest is the intensification of a process. The end is
but the full outworking or development of what was
inherent in the beginning. We are living in an age when,
in every realm, this process has reached an enormous
proportion. It is not new potentialities. All that we are
now seeing is but the discovery of what has been present
all the time. Atomic energy, for instance, is not
something newly created in the twentieth century. It has
been in the constitution of things from the beginning; it
has only been discovered and appropriated in this
century.
The
same is true in every other connection. Sin is no new
thing, it is in the nature of man. If sin has become
intensely more pronounced and more widely and wickedly
expressed, it is but the full development of what was
'original'.
We
are living in a time when the psychic element in this
universe and in creation is manifesting itself in
colossal proportions. If 'psychic' means soul; and if
soul means mind (reason), feeling (emotion), and will
(volition), then it can be seen that soul is developed to
a degree that dominates this world in every realm. It is
true that this wheel sometimes develops a bulge at one of
its three sections, or even two, and the wheel becomes
unbalanced. Emotion and will may become out of
proportion. Sometimes reason takes control and
predominates. But when we have said all that can be said
on this matter, let us hasten to add that all this is but
the human ego.
It
is what the New Testament calls "the natural
man". Translators have so worded it because it would
sound strange to translate literally and say 'the soul',
or 'the soulical man'. This may be a simplification
resort, but it may also gloss over a very serious matter.
The gloss may be to weaken and conceal the contextual
contrast between this species and category of humanity
and "he that is spiritual", or 'the man of
spirit'.
This
difference of categories and 'species' is traceable back
to the very beginning of human life. If "God is
Spirit" as Jesus affirmed; and if only spirit can
communicate with Him, and He with spirit, as Jesus also
declared (John 4:23,24), and it it is true that God
walked and talked with man before he offended and
separated himself from God, it is not only the solid
implication of the whole of Scripture but the clear
teaching of the Word of God and of history that the
injury and separation took place in what man was then,
that is, in the realm of his spirit. He must have
previously been preeminently a man of spirit, by which
all his communications with and government by God
proceeded. If the spirit was violated, or man as a man of
spirit was changed, then man became a changed order of
being, and that was, a man of soul, with his spirit
closed to God. The Bible calls it "separated from
God". Therefore he became a soul-and-body man or
species, with his spirit nullified in its true functions.
So
man, in the 'Fall', fell out of his true union with God
into himself, his ego, and thenceforth was a man
wholly of natural mind, feelings, and decisions and
volition. This nature and consequence can be seen quite
clearly in the fact that, in order to interrupt the true
normal relationship with God for all Divine purposes and
interests, Satan made his attack at the point of the
soul: firstly, reason - "Hath God said?"; then,
feeling - "it is pleasant". Then the will
followed reason and emotion which were put into the act,
the choice and deed. This changed the order of man's
nature, and, as we have said, made of him another kind
than God made him.
This,
then, was the beginning; man became preeminently a
soulish, psychic creature. The process has gone on with
ever-increasing strength and range. The whole commercial
world is built upon this nature. Every advertisement
contains the three features - reason why; an appeal to
the advantage; and the capture of the act. But in every
other realm a Satan-inspired and energized soul-force is
his method of controlling his captured kingdom.
In
our times the principle of 'dictatorship' has reached
abnormal proportions. We have seen men of almost
uncontrolled soul-force sweep nations into the vortex of
unspeakable destruction and carnage. We are seeing a
swift and unrestrained movement towards 'Antichrist',
that is, the 'super man', the man or system of psychic
powers which simulate the miraculous and the
supernatural. The Bible tells us all about this. But for
this present we have two things in mind; this development
as an intensification of what came in through Satan at
the beginning gives very strong evidence of the hastening
harvest when the sickle will be plunged into the field of
this humanity and it will be cut down. Intensification in
any realm is always a warning. Abnormality is always a
symptom that there is danger in the body corporate.
But
our special emphasis is on the need to note that there
is, and will be, an increasing invasion of this soulical,
psychical character into the realm of 'Christianity'. We
have seen this especially in the past century in the
matter of reason or rationalism. The enthronement of
'liberalism', rationalism, and human judgment in the
things of God has done an immeasurable amount of damage
to the true life in the Spirit, and has almost entirely
set aside the supernatural, especially in the matter of
new birth; which, of course, is the new birth of the
spirit of man.
In
the work of God too often an autocratic and abnormally
strong human control has been asserted; bringing
everything and everybody under a domineering and
legalistic mastery. But we are seeing an immense amount
of the appeal to soul along its emotional line, with much
imitation of the supernatural. All this is leading, as
the Devil would have it, to confusion in the things of
God, and to no small amount of discredit to the Lord. It
all ministers to suspicion and fear. Anything that is
abnormal, the pushing of things to an extreme, is to be
suspect and feared. It is in this way that the great
deceiver and subverter discredits the truth and brings
dishonour to the Lord's name.
Sooner
or later this abnormal asserting of the soul-force will
bring its own nemesis of judgment, as we have seen both
in Bible history and in recent times in the case of
'dictators'. Our mental institutions tell a sorry tale in
this matter, and there are all too many who, having so
projected themselves, their ego, into
Divine things, are mental, nervous, and spiritual wrecks.
This is possible in all human personality.
Saul
of Tarsus could have been a very real case in point, for
he had such force and strength of soul naturally. The
Lord's precautions for him were brokenness: "...lest
I should be exalted above measure". The Lord saw to
it that there was plenty of ballast in Paul's life to
keep him balanced and moving only by dependence upon God.
Brokenness
is a great safeguard against ourselves and the Devil. The
Lord never ministers to our self-sufficiency, and
certainly never does anything to inflate us. Rather is it
the other way. Christ is the offset to Antichrist; and
that means that Christ must become our only strength,
wisdom, and understanding.
We
have dealt with this whole matter in much greater
fullness in our book What is
Man?, but there is a place and need for
this supplementary word.
Let
him that reads take note.
First published in "A Witness and A
Testimony" magazine, Jul-Aug 1964, Vol 42-4