Maintaining our Spirit

Lesson 1: What is the spirit of Man? (Proverbs 20:27)

It does not take long to realize after being saved that you are in a new battle. The flesh still has the same lust that it had before you were saved but now you have the Holy Spirit of God showing you that these things are wrong. This is the struggle that Paul was talking about in Romans 7:15-25. But what many saved people do not understand, probably because they are not taught, is that you still have the same spirit of man that you had before you got saved as well. Note that in Romans 8:16 the Holy Spirit bears witness with the spirit of man (our spirit) that we are the children of God. The spirit of man is still there we just have the Holy Spirit as well.

In this series we will show that the spirit of man is one of the main driving forces for our flesh. This is why we are told to keep it clean along with the flesh (2 Corinthians 7:1). Also, in this series we will show a good definition for the spirit of man, how the spirit of man affects the flesh, and how we can learn to control our spirit in order to be better servants of God, husbands, wives, fathers, mothers, etc.

According to 1 Thessalonians 5:23 man has a body, soul, and a spirit. The body is the part of man that we see when we look in the mirror. The soul is the real you that lives forever in heaven or hell depending on whether you are saved or lost. The spirit returns to God when you die (Ecclesiastes 12:7). But what is the spirit of man?

Before discussing the spirit of man, we should note that there are many different kinds of spirits. In other words, God created different spirits. We will list some of these below:

• God is a spirit (John 4:24)
• There is the Holy Spirit (Matthew 3:16)
• There is the spirit of beast (Ecclesiastes 3:21)
• There is the spirit of man (Proverbs 20:27)
• There are spirits of devils (Revelation 16:14)

Regarding the spirit of man, it comes from God and return to God (Ecclesiastes 12:7 ; Zechariah 12:1), but the spirit of beast goes downward (Ecclesiastes 3:21). So, there are different spirits that go to different places.

What is the spirit of man? (Proverbs 20:27)

This is the only verse in the Bible that says the spirit of man is something. Here the spirit of man is said to be “the candle of the Lord searching all the inward parts of the belly”. Well on the surface this definition does not seem very helpful, but if we look at the word candle through the Bible, we can learn what the verse seems to be saying.

In Job 18:6 ; Job 21:17 ; Proverbs 24:20 the word of God seems to connect a man’s candle to his life. That is when a man dies physically his light, or his candle is put out. Therefore, there seems to be a direct connection between the spirit of man and life from God. James 2:26 shows us that the body without the spirit is dead. Also in Ecclesiastes 8:8 retaining the spirit is connected with staying alive. Our definition for the spirit of man will be life from God. But as we will see in later lessons the spirit of man is also connected with our personality.

This spirit is also connected with breath. This makes sense because without breath there is no life. Below we will list some verses that connect life with breath.

• Genesis 2:7 (God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life)
• Job 27:3 (my breath is in me, and the spirit of God is in my nostrils)
• Job 33:4 (The Spirit of God hath made me and breath of the Almighty hath given me life)
• Job 34:14 (he gathereth unto him himself his breath and his spirit)
• Psalm 104:29-30 (takest away their breath, they die)
• Isaiah 42:5 (he that giveth breath unto the people upon it, and spirit to them that walk therein:)

The verse for our study says that the Spirit of man is the candle of the Lord. From this verse we see that the spirit of man also connected with light. Will we use this in order to understand an interesting verse in the first chapter of the Gospel of John.

In John 1:4 we see that in the Word (Jesus Christ) was life and that the life was the light of men. So light is connected with life. In John 1:9 we see that Jesus was said to light every man that cometh into the world. This is not talking about salvation because not every man that lives choses to receive salvation. Therefore, it is speaking about Jesus giving everyman life. So light is connected with life. See also John 8:12.

How does this connect with the spirit of man being the candle of the Lord?

When you are born God gives you life and therefore you candle is now burning. Therefore, we see that life from God is connected with light and breath, this is why the proverb says that the candle of the Lord is the spirit of man. With these scriptures it becomes plain that the spirit of man is life from God.