Christianity Oasis Forum

[saint701]

The Quickening

Hello All,

Blessings!

My first Bible was a KJV. It was a large family type Bible with pictures, maps, and a good concordance. I still use it, but rumbling past the word “quickening” in 1 Cor. 15:45 recently brought me up short. I realized my understanding of the passage was sadly lacking. My understanding of living soul and quickening spirit was all too superficial, and my treatment of the scripture as somewhat mundane was truly inexcusable. I realized that the scripture I had so often overlooked was in fact a key that would unlock a greater understanding of the Adam of Genesis and the second Adam, our Lord.

1Cor.15
[45] And so it is written, the first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.

I'm embarrassed to say so, but as many times as I have read that God made Adam from the dust of the ground I have entirely overlooked the significance of that fact. Man was made of dust, therefore he was physical creature. Yet in the verse above Paul defines the difference between and Adam and our Lord, the first a living soul, the second a living, (quickening or life giving), spirit.

If I was only a journalist I would insist the scripture 1 Cor. 15:45 be written with the correct parallelism required in formal writing. The scripture would read, “And so it is written, the first Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam a living spirit. But quickening actually goes farther than “a living spirit” as our Lord was made alive in the spirit to begin with, but further implies life giving as in terms of God quickens whom he wills. God not only made Jesus alive in His Spiritual life, He continues His work in us. He refreshes us, revives us, and revitalizes us as an extension of the immortal life He first made Jesus with, His Spirit. He quickens our spirit. He imparts the divine life of Jesus into us.
In 1 Cor. 15:45 above the Greek word psuche is used for soul. If we were to translate psuche into Latin we would use the word anima. In our vernacular God making Adam’s psuche/anima alive would simply mean, God made Adam to begin breathing easily.” Psuche and anima are the Greek and Latin counterparts to the Hebrew word for soul which is nephesh, used in Gen. 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. This is confusing. By implication the writing, “God made Adam a living soul,” misleads us to think something more is going on here than really is.

In man's physical reality he is an animal. In Appendix 13 of the Companion Bible, the soul, (nephesh), as it applies to the first few chapters of the Book of Genesis, refers to the air by which one breathes. A nephesh, (soul), whether animal or human animal simply means an air breather. Strong's Hebrew definition of nephesh #5314 and 5315 where God is making Adam alive implies “a breathing upon.” God breathed into the nostrils of Adam the breath of life. Such would be akin to giving Adam mouth to mouth resuscitation. By breathing into the nostrils of Adam He filled Adam’s lungs with air, which had to be expelled, making his heart pump and life begin. Now isn’t that incredible!!?? (There is a further implication here which I will not expound upon, and it is that God here was in human form also breathing air. Such would be akin to God in human form visiting Abraham and eating at his table before rescuing Lot and destroying Sodom and Gomorrah. They were seen as men by those where Lot lived and the people wanted to make sport with them.
Somewhere in my lifetime nephesh was entered into my vocabulary as spirit, but should nephesh be applied to Adam as spirit, it is done so in terms of an animal spirit, not a divine one. The human spirit is not alive with the life of God, but is equated with the natural man that thinks the God Kind Of Life is foolishness. The human spirit is dead to the life of God. The human soul, then, (psuche/nephesh-as applied to mortal man that is an animal), sides with the desires of the flesh. God gave Adam physical life. After God created him, He caused Adam to begin breathing using something akin to mouth to mouth resuscitation. The first Adam looked like God, (made in His image), but lacked the Immortal Spirit God lived by. By taking a closer look at the life of Adam in Genesis we come to see just how body ruled he truly was.

Please bear with me now as I touch upon several scriptures in Genesis that help us understand how those things alive in the Garden of Eden appealed to Adam’s five senses.

Gen. 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.
[8] And the LORD God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed.
[9] And out of the ground made the LORD God to grow every

tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food

; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

In scripture 9 above we have a preview of what is to come. Either man will eat of the tree of life, become an immortal spirit, or eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil and die to the divine life. Notice the emphasis on that which is physical...all trees pleasant to the sight and quite tasty!

[23] And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh.

She shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. Notice the emphasis being on the physical life. We have yet to see anything of Adam or Eve that speaks of them having a spiritual nature.
[15] And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the Garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. He was assigned physical labor.
[16] And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat…notice the emphasis on satisfying the desires of the flesh.

[17] But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

Without sin Adam has God as a companion and Lord even though he is only a living soul having a physical nature. At this point he is still alive to God, but Adam is body ruled. He is dominated by his physical appetite and has strong sexual desires and hungers just like any animal would.

Gen.3
[6] And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat. Like all the rest of the trees, the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil was physically appealing.

It seems that Adam and Eve would fall at some point because of their animal nature if they did not find the Tree of Life in the midst of the garden and eat of it first. Of course they did not, but sinned unto death. (A sin unto death is a willful, (here Adam only) decision to submit one’s will to be possessed by evil). This sin absolutely cannot be committed by a young believer. It can only be committed by a Christian of full age willingly and knowingly acting on the directions of an evil spirit. In so doing this Christian takes death back into his spirit driving the Spirit of God out. In so doing he becomes twice dead. There is no longer any sacrifice available for him to be saved again. It is impossible for him to have faith in God, and ultimately He tells Jesus to leave him alone, period. There is a sin unto death; I do not say that you should pray for it. (1 John 5:16-17).

So what was the significance of man’s fall? It was to introduce the theme that natural man even if created without sin, will ultimately fail to please God. His natural appetites will ultimately get him killed. It is the introduction of the plot that God’s law through the soul, living in the flesh, is a law of sin and death. Those of the flesh cannot please God. This plot is further worked out in the nation of Israel even before they received the Law of Moses in their making of the golden calf, and their subsequent problems sinning in the sight of God until He scattered them among the nations as the punishment for their disobedience.

So what is the significance of the quickening? The significance of the quickening is the salvation of man’s soul. Where before the soul reigned over its mortal body unto death; this because of the weakness of the flesh, the quickening spirit now reigns through our soul over our mortal body in a way that tends to life. This process is progressive as our soul must endure much suffering at the hands of its own self will before turning toward the spirit for leading, teaching, and guidance. Once the soul understands that the strength of the spirit tends to life and peace, and sees its many failures siding with the flesh, the soul gradually realizes the difference between life and death, and because of the presence of the quickening spirit which Adam did not have, the soul is progressively saved by choosing life, particularly the life that love brings. Ultimately, the sin consciousness that brings death to the soul is swallowed up by the love life of God present in the spirit that He has given us. Once the love of God has taken root in our soul we find that we are more than happy to love and obey Him, be happily subject to Him even to death if necessary, and have the same love for our family members of God. It is only through the Holy Spirit in our spirit that the soul can be saved. Ultimately we accept the fact that we must walk as Jesus walked, that He is truly the way, the truth, and the life.


Blessings!
Love, In Christ Jesus, saint701.