| Grapevine Setting the Record Straight - Part 4 by Jack Northart When was soul life first created? Remember that the Hebrew words for soul life are nephesh (soul, life that has movement) chai (living). 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. [nephesh chai]. This verse does not say anything about God creating soul life in the man that he had formed. Why doesn't it? Because whatever soul is had already been created somewhere previously. Let's just see where that happened. Genesis 1:21 And God created great whales, and every living creature [nephesh chai] that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good. God creates for the first time, soul life. Water and earth already existed, so the substance that made up their bodies did not have to be created. Up until this point, "soul life" had not come into existence on earth. Scientists refer to life forms that existed and walked upright during the timeframe of Genesis 1:1 as "prehistoric man." These life forms did not have "soul life" for it had not been created until God created it on the fifth day as stated in Genesis. In fact, scientists have done DNA research and discovered that "prehistoric man" did have a different form of life than man has today. The fact of the matter is that there was some form of life that existed in the time between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2 besides the angels that God had created. Up until this recent DNA discovery, scientists assumed that "prehistoric life" was the same type of life known in man and animals today. But soul life was not created until this record in Genesis indicates. The Bible could have told them that all along! It's important to remember that once God creates something, He doesn't have to keep creating it over and over again. And soul life was not created until Genesis 1:21. Once it is in existence he does not have to create it in man. God simply MADE the soul of man. Again, the Hebrew word for MADE is asah, which means "a substance required of which the thing made consists." The substance required for the soul life in man already existed. So on the sixth day, man became a living soul. The confusion between the soul and the spirit has caused no end of difficulty for people. They say that the soul is immortal, for instance. They talk about the transmigration of the soul. These are erroneous usages of the words which are used in God's Word with exactness and perfection. Soul has nothing to do with whether you are a Christian or a non-Christian. As long as a person breathes, he has a soul. 1Peter 3:20 Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water. This verse is talking about the eight souls that were saved during the great flood. Were they Christians? No. Christ had not yet come. But it says eight souls - eight people, were saved. If there is a soul, there is breath life. The soul is that which gives a being its life. Genesis 1:24 And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature [nephesh chai] after his [its] kind… God made every beast wherein there is a soul, a life. The book of Leviticus explains where this soul life is located. Leviticus 17:11 For the life of the flesh is in the blood… Soul life is passed on from one generation to the next, both in people and in animals. It is the spirit of God that is in a man that separates man from the animals once he gets born again. He must make Jesus Christ his lord and believe that God raised him from the dead. (Romans 10:9). This once again makes him a three part being of body, soul and spirit. Most of the creation was done in Genesis 1:1 in what could have taken millions of years to complete. The setting back in order is what transpired in the six days recorded in Genesis 1. As we discussed in an earlier issue of The Grapevine, something cataclysmic occurred to overthrow the creation during the time between Genesis 1:1 and 2. And that event was when Lucifer tried to usurp the throne of God and he and a third of the angels of heaven fell, and were expelled from heaven. [See Ezekiel 28:15, Isaiah 14: 12-17]. This event caused the earth, not heaven to become without form and void. [tohu bohu]. This is important to understand because we will now be able to see the difference between the first heaven and earth, the second heaven and earth, which are now, and the third heaven and earth which are future. |
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