The Simple Answers… To Life’s Most Important Questions.
Bible Study Course Lesson 6 – 6
Having seen how hard it is to rule the beast, and break the spirit, you must be wondering how it’s possible to even start; if you’ve been pushed around by these usurpers your whole life, how can you even begin to rule them? They’ll just ignore you. And that’s true! By yourself it would be impossible! Imagine taking a toddler, say 2-3 years old, and putting it on the back of a fully grown and stubborn unbroken beast, and expecting the toddler to ride.
The toddler would be lucky to even stay on the horse – but if it did, there’s no way the horse would obey it. The toddler simply doesn’t have what it takes to rule his beast, because the beast has a huge head start. They all grew up together; the beast, the spirit, and the soul. But at some point in early childhood the beast or spirit got the upper hand in their relationship.
And as the beast continued to grow and the spirit learned all sorts of dirty tricks to stay in charge, the soul was stunted, kept in the dark, prevented from developing as it should have. You’ve heard the expression “he’s a scared little boy in a man’s body”; that’s exactly true of pretty much everyone. Their beast has learned how to hide the truth behind bravado, behind possessions, behind false humility; but the truth is, the soul is just a little kid trapped inside a raging beast alongside a justifying, stubborn spirit that projects the illusion of adulthood.
THE INFANTILE SOUL
The last lesson taught you that without God’s help, we cannot learn the truth (John 6:44-45). We cannot overcome the rebellion within our minds on our own. Our soul is quite literally held in prison in our own body. Ecclesiastes 4:13-14 A young man who is poor and wise is better than an old, foolish king who won’t take advice any longer. A young man came out of prison to rule as king, even though he had been born in poverty in that same kingdom.
As you learned in Lessons 4-8 and 4-9, the book of Ecclesiastes was mostly written to express the thoughts of the beast. Because in order to defeat any enemy, you have to understand him. And so while the writer of Ecclesiastes justifies his own heart, he also shows us the weaknesses of – and how to defeat – that same heart. In this verse, we see that the “young man” is wise. That’s a soul attribute!
And it is compared to the “old, foolish king”, and foolishness is what happens when a heart pretends to be wise (Romans 1:21-22). Both of these “people” grew up in the same kingdom, but the soul has been kept in prison while the spirit or the heart ruled as king! Think of it like a human baby and a foal born at the same time; the human is meant to rule, but as they play together the horse quickly outgrows the human.
By the time the baby is forming words, the foal is ready to mate and have children of his own! Our soul has a much greater potential lifespan than our body, but as usual with such things, the soul reaches maturity much later than the beast. That’s why Jesus called our souls “little children” (Matthew 18:3), and why Paul referred to adult human beasts as infant souls in Galatians 4:19 and other places.
And so, as our souls make a few mistakes as children, the heart gets the upper hand; then as our family and friends teach us rules and laws, our spirit learns to control the beast. But the soul still toddles along, covered in its own drool. By the time we reach puberty, our beast is a teenager but our soul is still in diapers. By the time our beast and spirit are 20, our soul is still 6 or so.
And as the pressures of life take over, the spirit and beast are so stressed out keeping their life together that the soul is shushed into apathy and stops growing altogether. It is, effectively, locked in the basement while incompetent usurpers rule its kingdom. And the beast ages and ultimately dies with this baby soul trapped inside, unable to rule the by now clever, vicious, and cruel adult heart and spirit who will not be ruled by a child, nor give it the light it needs to grow into the prince it should be!
And that is why most souls remain little children their entire lives, while their beast grows old and their spirit gets more thoroughly set in its ways, harder and harder to rule, until asking the soul to rule them would be like putting an infant on a bucking bronco. This is what Solomon was picturing in Ecclesiastes 4; a poor soul born to be king, held captive in prison by an old, foolish tyrant who will not be corrected!
If you back up toEcclesiastes 4:7-2, you can see the by-now oft-quoted verses about the threefold cord, showing that the context of these verses IS the three parts of your self! And because two overwhelm a third, the stubbornness of the spirit and the intense desires of the heart quickly overwhelm the soul’s desire to make good judgments. And if this is the state of the average human, is it any wonder that they are such a mess? Matthew 12:25.
EXODUS FOR THE SOUL
What this means is that every symbol of prison in the Bible, every symbol of slavery, probably has some bearing on the state of our souls. Jesus came to teach us the truth and set us free; but He did that for Egypt too, which means that Egypt – a nation, therefore a beast – is a type of slavery of Israel’s soul! And further, that the death of Pharaoh corresponds to the death of the beast in water baptism (don’t ask, we’ll get there). It’s all connected.
Which is why Romans 6:4-13 describes the death of that beast, to give life to the soul; just as Pharaoh’s death gave life to the new nation of Israel, all of whom were to be souls (Exodus 19:6), which had been trapped inside the beast of Egypt! Ecclesiastes 4:15 (GWV) I saw all living people moving about under the sun. They sided with the second young man, the king’s successor.
Solomon goes on to describe the young man, the newly enthroned soul, as being supported by all the “living people”. Who is living? 1 John 5:11-12. So God gives you the initial understanding and strength you need, but then He brings you to people who will support your soul against its internal enemies who still chafe against the soul’s unaccustomed rule.
1 John 5:16 (GWV) There was no end to all those people, everyone whom he led [true Christians]. But those who will come later will not be happy with the successor. Even this is pointless. It’s like trying to catch the wind. But as you go back to your old friends later, they won’t like your new soul. You’re different, and no beast, and certainly no spirit, likes things to be different! (1 Peter 4:1-4). To your own beast, that seems like a drawback; so it’s saying to the soul “if you do this, our friends won’t like us anymore!”
The beast sees “longing for the spirit” as a complete waste of time! Because it can’t have it! Only something MADE of spirit – like a soul – can see something ELSE made of spirit! (1 Corinthians 2:14). But the beast only cares about physical things like itself. But Solomon’s beast was wrong. This is not a waste of time, and longing for the spirit is not pointless. The fight is winnable – and the prize is immensely valuable, but only to the soul! The beast already knows it dies either way so of course it doesn’t care! (Ecclesiastes 3:18-19).
Solomon’s beast saw it this way because Solomon only understood the OC. It couldn’t see beyond the physical blessings and cursings of the law; and if that truly were all we fought for, this would be a waste of time (1 Corinthians 15:19). But the beast missed the point of its own parable; that those who truly live in the light of the sun, those who are truly kings of their bodies… can actually CATCH the wind. Because when you know the light of truth, it sets you free from the slavery to the “old and foolish king who will no longer be corrected”, (John 8:32), so you can receive the holy spirit of the Father! (Acts 5:32).
SOUL ABUSE
As I said, Ecclesiastes is an argument between Solomon’s beast and his heart. But the tone of the argument is filled with the heart haranguing against the soul, harping over its every mistake. See, whenever a people are governed by an unpopular leader, his subjects will use anything they can to justify their rebellion. They’ll make fun of the way he walks, the way he looks, anything they can find.
And if he makes the slightest actual mistake, they will rejoice in the streets for weeks (Ecclesiastes 10:1). And yet when the soul’s wisdom does save them, he still gets no respect (Ecclesiastes 9:13-18). Note that it was the wisdom of the poor man – the soul – which saved the “few men”. Yet a tiny mistake justified them ignoring everything he said! Likewise, your heart and spirit are going to abuse your soul for every mistake you make.
They may be wrong a hundred times a day, but the one error your soul commits will be all you hear in your head; you may have thoughts like “I’m so stupid”, “why can’t I listen”, “why did I do that”, “why don’t I pay attention”, “I’m never going to get this”,” I’m wasting my time chasing after the spirit”. Is this really your soul criticizing your heart and spirit? Or is it the other way around? Do you ever have thoughts like “I shouldn’t have wanted that”? Or is the thought “I shouldn’t have chosen to eat that when I wanted it”?
Who is really being criticized with that thought? The chooser! The soul! These thoughts will often take the form of third-person criticism; you, using your own name, will say sarcastically “congratulations _me_, you screwed up again!”; now think about this… why would your soul speak to yourself in the third person? It wouldn’t! But your spirit or heart would use exactly this language to remind your soul it is unfit to rule!
Your heart and spirit do not want your soul to succeed. They do not want you to be competent. They do not want you to judge them, and be master of your own body… master of them. So the voice in your head that criticizes your judgments? Your spirit. The voice in your head that makes you feel bad about yourself? Your heart. But you are a soul. You have the God-given, divinely-appointed right and responsibility to rule your mind. You don’t need their approval (John 15:15).
It helps to have them on your side but as willing servants, not as partners and equals… and not as someone who is entitled to judge you. You need their opinions; like any boss, you need your employees to point out when you missed something. But once they’ve pointed it out and you’ve made a decision, they should shut up. If you screwed up, your soul should admit it! And do better next time! (Ezekiel 18:21-23). That’s all God cares about, so how dare your spirit and heart keep shaming you for your failures??
If your soul has learned its lesson, you have no reason to ever think about your mistake again. But guilt, shame, embarrassment, despair, depression… these feelings come from the beast. Your soul does not have to tolerate these thoughts because the ruler doesn’t have to explain himself to his servants! If it’s wrong, you will bear the punishment for it but not from your servants, from your own master. It has no obligation to hear the self-destructive – wait, which “self” does that phrase talk about? – I should say, soul-destructive thoughts of the lesser fractions.
Such thoughts are, literally, soul-abuse. Self-doubt is not really self-doubt, but soul-doubt. Doubt from your spirit that your soul is capable of making good decisions. Doubt from your heart that your soul is interested in the heart’s welfare and aware of its needs. You NEED to hear the criticism of the heart; you NEED to hear what the spirit thinks the right thing to do is; but then you must judge whether they are speaking the truth or not; and when your soul makes a decision, it should be final. Any spirit that judges your soul for sins God Himself has forgotten is NOT “in captivity… to the obedience of Christ”! (2 Corinthians 10:5-6 KJV).
2 Corinthians 10:5-6 (BBE) Putting an end to reasonings, and every high thing which is lifted up against the knowledge of God, and causing every thought to come under the authority of Christ; Being ready to give punishment to whatever is against his authority, after you have made it clear that you are completely under his control. And so when your heart or spirit start to criticize your soul for a certain mistake, you should say “Yes!
I did that, and it was wrong and I am going to do better next time… but now let’s talk about your responsibility for that mistake. Who wanted to do that sin? I’m looking at you, heart! Who said it was
OK, “because he started it”? I’m looking at you, spirit! So yes… I sinned because I didn’t properly control YOU TWO.” THIS is “putting an end to reasonings” of the spirit, and putting an end to a heart which is proudly “lifted up against knowledge”. Your soul should turn it back on them, and put them in their place; for yes, your soul sinned and it will bear the punishment for it; but it sinned because of them and how dare THEY speak against your soul for following their lead!
AFFLICTION
There is one day of the year when God commands us to afflict our soul – the Day of Atonement (Leviticus 23:27). The rest of the time, the affliction of our soul is because of our abusive and vindictive and not-yet-broken fractions! Knowing this, Psalms 143 makes a lot more sense. Read all of it, then notice Psalms 143:3– the enemy has made his soul dwell in darkness! In prison! Sound familiar? And because of their usurping the throne, his spirit and his heart have to deal with the problems of life which they weren’t designed to do!
So they are overwhelmed by trying to run a kingdom they are not competent to run! (Verse 4). Seeing this, David asks God to free his soul from their prison (Psalms 143:9-12), because they have been afflicting his soul! Similarly, Isaiah 51:17-18 speaks of a total lack of souls in Jerusalem;Isaiah 51:20-21 show that because of that, they are drunken, furious beasts! And so God promises to turn the tables, and put the beasts in
prison to the soul, and make them drink of the cup they gave the soul to drink! (Isaiah 51:22-23). Yet Israel never really had their souls in charge; they chose a different path at Sinai, and never looked back. And then they wondered why God wasn’t truly happy with their religion: Isaiah 58:3-4. Notice that they were afflicting their soul, “to smite with the fist of wickedness”! To make their spirit be heard by God, and get vengeance on their enemies!
Is that what God wanted? Isaiah 58:5. What did He want instead? Isaiah 58:6. Fasting – outside the Day of Atonement – wasn’t meant to afflict the soul! The fast was meant to FREE it! It was meant to let the oppressed go free, by weakening the body so that the soul would be stronger in comparison! But rather than use fasting as a chance to better rule their weakened beasts, they were fasting to get God to smite their enemies; to quench the spirit’s thirst for justice!
They fasted to get the attention of other men, to get praise and flattery, and feed their beast! (Matthew 6:16-17). Note that true fasting is anointing the head (soul), washing the FACE, and therefore supporting the soul, not afflicting it! Psalms 69:10. Yet even the Gentiles understood that to get God to forgive them, their beasts had to be the ones to fast! (Jonah 3:5-10). Jesus didn’t need to “fast often”, because He kept His beast and spirit under control (Mark 2:18-20).
Although He did fast before confronting the most unclean spirit of them all (Matthew 4:1-2). Likewise, His disciples – while He was with them – didn’t need to fast because they were under the control of His soul! When they started to get out of line, Jesus’ soul promptly jumped on them (Luke 4:8, 8:25, 9:55, etc.). But without that present and dominant soul, they would need to fast to keep their heart and spirit under control, and thus to be righteous and faithful enough to be able to perform mighty works (Matthew 17:14-20).
INCITING A REVOLT
Back in the summary of Lesson 4-2, I told you the story of how I made those horses suitable to be written by the inexperienced riders I was traveling with. They couldn’t get their horses to obey them because they were so afraid of the horse, or afraid of hurting the horse, or just plain had no clue how to start. So I had to be a soul to their beasts and hold the bridles for them.
They were these infant souls we’ve been talking about, and God gave us horses to ride precisely so we could visualize this problem in a clearer context than the hazy confines of our own mind (Psalms 32:8-9). Notice the use of “mine eye”, the soul, in that scripture. The soul is admonishing the heart not to make it use a bit and bridle, which James told us is the spirit’s statutes (James 3:2-6). Just like when a parent says “I’ve warned you, don’t make me come over there!”
David used the same image in Psalms 39:1, although he was ultimately unable to maintain that control over his beast in the rest of the chapter (Psalms 39:2-6). That’s why he ended up admitting defeat and asking God for help (Psalms 39:7-13) Notice that last verse “O spare me, that I may recover strength, before I go hence, and be no more.” My friends were exhausted and frustrated ruling their horses, and even though they had a bit/spirit to help, they didn’t know how to use it.
So I spared them, so they could recover their strength and ruled their beast for them… for awhile. God does this for us in many ways; one is in Psalms 94:11-13, where God punishes us. When our hearts and spirits are at their wit’s end, truly scared that they are going to fail, they are briefly in a position where they would be willing to accept any idea, try anything… even if the idea came from their soul (Luke 15:11-19).
Another way is to have us be servants to other men; because they will break our bad habits out of their own selfishness, if for no other reason (Lamentations 3:24-31). This is why Paul offered to come with a rod (1 Corinthians 4:21), because the Corinthians really were not broken in heart or spirit (1 Corinthians 5:2, among other examples).
And that can work… if the soul is willing to seize the opportunity to step up and take charge while the spirit and beast are broken by the rod of men (Proverbs 22:15, 26:3).But if the soul is too cowardly, too weak, or simply not interested in capitalizing on this opportunity, then as soon as the crisis passes, the beast and spirit will resume their usual roles (Judges 2:14-19).
NO MAN CAN COME TO ME
But the most important way God helps us rule our beast is the one I already quoted in John 6:44-45. In order to become a wise and loving soul, the Father must “draw you” to Christ. Then, once drawn to Christ, He will prepare them to meet His Father. What this means in real-world terms is that God can temporarily rule your beast and suppress your spirit so that your soul can breathe freely for the first time since childhood. I’ve seen this many times, in many people. Things that didn’t make sense suddenly do; things they couldn’t do are somehow possible.
In the blind and deaf state we are all in before God calls us, we literally cannot see or hear the truth (Psalms 107:8-15); so God has to “bring down their heart with labor” (Psalms 107:12), in order to “bring them out of darkness and the shadow of death” (Psalms 107:14), and “break their bonds in two” (verse 14). We are blind and deaf because of our soul’s sins (Psalms 107:10-11). We can’t hear the truth because our soul has allowed our corrupt spirit to translate everything we see and hear into something that justifies
itself. And yet it is these same blind souls that God addresses in Isaiah 29:18-21. Thanks to the spirit and the heart, the soul is in a dark prison where no light enters. It literally CANNOT see or hear God! (Matthew 4:16). So God consumes the scorner (the heart?) and brings to nothing the terrible one (the spirit?). He reaches inside that person and speaks to their soul, down in prison (Psalms 146:7-8) – just as He did to Peter (Acts 12:5-9). This is precisely why Jesus came (Isaiah 49:7-9), because we need Him to show us the way out of prison! (Psalms 5:8-12).
Yet as I’ve said many times, you will not hear the voice of God echoing resonantly in your skull. But remember: Jesus dwells in your heart. And so when Jesus wants to lead your closer to God, your heart will start wanting something uncharacteristically good! Christ dwelling in you can actually make you enjoy studying these lessons; not because your heart does; not because your spirit likes to be bashed constantly at every turn; but because that’s what the spirit now dwelling in your heart likes.
God will temporarily relieve you of the impossible burden of conquering your heart and spirit, and give your soul a chance to “grow up in him” (Ephesians 4:15), and His spirit will shine light directly into your heart that your spirit can’t shut out so that you can grow up like the other calves already did! (Malachi 4:2). But as I said, that’s temporary. God will not fight the battle for you; He just promises to make sure that it’s a fair fight.
He will lead you out of prison, but He won’t carry you out. He will offer you freedom, but if you stand there dazedly blinking in the sunlight until your jailers return… you’ll wind up in a much worse prison than you started in (Matthew 12:43-45, 2 Peter 2:21).
A REST FOR YOUR SOULS
This makes Matthew 11:28-30 look very different. Note Jesus’ offer: to go into bondage! To wear the yoke He gives you to wear. He offers to make you a slave! But look at what He says of Himself: He is meek (broken spirit) and lowly of heart (broken heart). And He is offering to put your heart and your spirit into HIS yoke, to give your soul rest from them! By accepting the judgments of His soul, like Adam and Eve were supposed to do in the first place, and placing your beast in the yoke of the Lord, it makes it harder for the ox in such a yoke to “kick against the pricks” of the plowman’s whip (Acts 9:5), and thus easier for the infant soul to manage them!
In this verse, Jesus is simply offering in yet another way to help our soul grow up in Him. This, of course, is what He meant in Psalms 23:3 – remember, He had just said “the Lord is my shepherd” – the Lord was ruling this beast so His soul could be restored! God had shown them how to do this, literally from the very beginning in the Garden of Eden (Jeremiah 6:16), but they were too busy saying “no God, we’ve got this, we can do it by ourselves!” Compare to Jeremiah’s attitude in Jeremiah 10:23-24.
Now typically farmers would plow with a pair of oxen; that’s two oxen and a single ruler. Sound like a familiar pattern? And the ruler is the one who holds the plow and dare not take his eyes off the team of beasts in front of him for fear they will turn aside OUT OF THE WAY! (Luke 9:62).
Knowing that symbols involving yoke, plow, and so on are about the fractions of the mind, it makes sense why Solomon connected the proud heart and high look with the plowing of the wicked (Proverbs 21:4). As contrasted with the “plowing” of the righteous in Proverbs 21:3, or the way the Lord “plows” inProverbs 21:1. And what does a yoke represent? Acts 15:5, 10. Clearly, Moses’ statutes were a yoke! The spirit that ruled the OC was a yoke of bondage (Galatians 5:1).
And it is good for us to bear that yoke in our youth (Lamentations 3:27), for if we have not heard Moses and the prophets, we will not hear Jesus (Luke 16:29-31). Yet Jesus offers us HIS yoke, instead of the yoke of Moses or of worldly masters (1 Timothy 6:1). Notice the similarity in language; He said “take my yoke upon you”, compare that to Acts 1:8; so then “yoke” is simply a symbol of the spirit which keeps beasts under control!
So since we haven’t broken our spirit, Christ will break our yokes (Ezekiel 34:25-31, particularlyEzekiel 34:27), and temporarily replace our spirits with His own until ours is re-educated enough to be holy without His help; until our spirits are sanctified by His spirit! (Hebrews 2:10-13). In a sense, He puts a hand on the plow for us until our soul is strong enough to put its own hand to the plow and not let go!
The yoke is typically designed for a pair of oxen, yet there are also yokes for a single animal. And this, too, is part of God’s symbolism: Malachi 2:14-15. The act of plowing is specifically the act of planting seed, which was precisely what God was seeking when He created a man and a woman. Thus most yokes are designed for two beasts! A man’s beast, his wife’s, and a spirit yoking them together while the husband’s soul rules from a distance.
Yet there are also yokes for unmarried single beasts, to allow a single soul to rule a single beast with a single spirit! Yet when you are trying to plow with beasts that cannot agree, or have a huge difference in abilities, or one is clean and the other is not, the soul will find it almost impossible to keep them walking straight (2 Corinthians 6:14-16).
Because trying to please both beasts in one yoke is impossible, and the spirit will break under the force of the wildly divergent desires of these hearts, and trying to pull them back on track by brute force will exhaust the soul and make it impossible for it to find rest! But if you simply will not take His yoke, and if your soul cannot or will not take the reins of your body and lead it like He’s teaching you… well, then you’re not worthy of Him, and you will be of “those who turn back” (Zephaniah 1:6).
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION
As always, it’s back to the Golden Rule. Do you want your children to need constant supervision for the rest of their lives? Or do you want them to be capable of solving their own problems, controlling their own tantrums, preparing their own food? They will never learn how to do that unless they’re forced to do it. Yet they can’t possibly survive long enough to do it without you changing their diapers, without you pulling them back on the way of truth with correction and rules, without you sheltering them from the worst of the consequences of their ignorance.
And so when God calls you, He makes sure you can hear Him; and He rules your beast enough to give your soul a chance to grow up enough to handle it alone. And then He steps back, and tests you, by closing His eyelids and letting your own soul solve problems alone (Psalms 11:4-5). The obligatory one verse that would replace this lesson is Psalms 142:5-7. That really says it all.
And yet, however sincerely your soul asks this, and however abundantly God may answer, you will fail the first time. Just as, after I broke the horses and gave them back to their riders, the horses were wonderful… until their riders failed to reinforce the lessons I taught the beasts, and soon the beasts were acting as they did at first. But the second time I rode them, the horses recognized me; and the idea of obedience was not so strange, it was not so hard to remind them who was in charge.
And so I told the riders what they did wrong, humbled their mounts again, and gave the riders a new chance. Some did better – the souls which were capable of growth. The others didn’t; no matter how many times I put the horse back in the proper attitude of subservience, the rider simply wouldn’t do what it took to remain the master. So I stopped trying, and let the souls serve their beasts; another ride, another beast, another day I might try again.
And that, of course, is exactly what any of you would do, and exactly what God does to us. He breaks our heart enough to make it manageable, then steps back and lets us ride alone; and then He sees the mess we made of things and steps in and breaks it again, to give us a rest from the battle. And then He does it again, and again; and as long as we make progress, He remains optimistic for our future.
But if we simply give up and say it’s just too hard to rule our beast, too hard to break our spirit… if our soul finally agrees that chasing after the wind is, indeed, not worth the effort, God says “fine… we’ll try again, with a fresh beast and a new bridle, in the 2nd resurrection” (Ezekiel 36:26). In that day, their spirits will be educated better from day one, because the spirits of just men made perfect will be around. Thus, they will not have to rule an evil spirit and an evil heart, just an evil heart (Ezekiel 11:19).
They will still have to manage that spirit, of course, but it will be starting out good, not starting out evil as ours did, corrupted by the spirits of the world. And since that’s only half the job the firstborn had to do, they will be not be worthy of the double portion we are earning for ruling both the heart and the spirit (Deuteronomy 21:15-17). Ezekiel 18:31 Cast away from you all your transgressions, whereby ye have transgressed; and make you a new heart and a new spirit: for why will ye die, O house of Israel?
But whether they do it now, or later, they will ultimately have to rule their heart themselves – same as us. And they will have to learn to manage their spirits, same as us – just somewhat easier than we had it. Because before you are given eternal life YOU, not God, will have to make your own heart new, and your own spirit like God’s. Because that is the whole point of salvation – proving that your soul is strong enough to rule the beasts and break the spirits, so that you can be a king and a priest in the Kingdom of God.