See if this helps Rick. There is repetition in these, but there is a bit of a difference in each one that can help bring it all together.
http://www.forums.bible-truths.com/index.php/topic,655.0.html ------
Dear Aaron:
You are not paying attention to my writings. The consciousness is not in the body, and it is not in the spirit. The consciousness of man is in his soul, and his soul is resultant outcome of our spirit being united with a body. God breathed the breath and spirit of life into the man formed from the dust of the ground, and the man then BECAME a living soul. He BECAME conscious of his own being.
At death we are no longer conscious of our being or our death. Our spirit must be reunited with a new body in resurrection before we will regain the soul and consciousness that we had before we died.
http://bible-truths.com/kennedy2.htm --------------------
The words "soul" and "spirit" have become corrupted through theology so that they are now used interchangeably, as if they were synonymous. They are not synonymous. There may be certain similarities between soul and spirit, but similarities do not make them one and the same.
The "soul" is the seat of sensation, consciousness, and feelings, not the body or the spirit. It is the spirit that imparts life to the body and the body then becomes a living soul (Gen. 2:7).
A thorough study of the word "soul" in the Scriptures proves that it is used of consciousness, feelings, and emotions. Hence, "sensation" is a good word to define its usage.
- souls can touch (Lev. 5:2)
- souls have knowledge (Pr. 2:10)
- souls have memory (Lam. 3:20)
- souls can love, and be joyful (Psa. 35:9; 86:4)
- souls can hunger and thirst (Deut. 14:26)
- souls can sin (Lev. 4:2)
- life can be given to a soul (Job 3:20)
- souls can die (Ezek. 18:20)
- souls can be converted (Psa. 19:7)
- none can keep alive his (own) soul (Psa. 22:29)
- honey is sweet to the soul (Pr. 16:24)
- even God has a soul (Lev. 26:11, I Sam. 2:35, Jer. 32:41)
- souls can hear (Acts 3:22-23)
- souls can experience pleasure (Heb. 10:3)
- souls can be purified (I Pet. 1:22)
- and souls can receive salvation (I Pet. 1:9).
These verses show the wide range of emotions and sensations that "souls" experience, but dead souls experience nothing in the unseen or imperceptible (hades). We need to pay close attention to the meaning of words. Hades comes from the Greek a(i)des. The a is a prefix which is equivalent to our un- and the stem -id means perceive. Thus we have UN-PERCEIVE, or imperceptible: the unseen. Etymologically, your doctrine of torment in hell falls flat on its face. From the words that God chose to call this condition of the soul after death, one thing is crystal clear: There is absolutely no perception there. And the soul has everything to do with perception and sensation as clearly seen from the verses above.
v
In Scripture, death is called a "return" [Heb. shub]. Before we were born we had no body, no soul, and no perception of any kind. At birth God gave us a body, implanted to us His spirit, which gives the body perception (through the brain and the five senses). At death, we [shub] RETURN. The reversal of what happened at birth. The spirit returns to God (Ecc. 12:7), the body returns to the dust (all the elements of man's body are found in the ground or earth) (Job 10:9, Ecc. 3:18-21), and the soul returns to no perception again (the imperceptible or unseen-hades) (Acts 2:27 and Psalm 49:15). This is what the Scriptures very plainly teach: where all that man "is" came from, that's where all that man "is" returns to.
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TV ANALOGY
Here is an analogy that is applicable and easy to understand: God's spirit gives life to the body. Only in life does a man have consciousness or sensation. When God takes back His spirit, the body and soul are dead.
Picture a TV console as representing the human BODY with all its intricate circuitry and components.
Now picture ELECTRICITY as the invisible, powerful force representing God's life-giving SPIRIT.
Picture the blank PICTURE TUBE as representing the SOUL.
Without the electricity (God's spirit), the TV and picture tube (body and soul) are dead. All the time I hear preachers talking about our souls and our spirits as if they were one and the same. Soul and spirit are not one and the same.
Next plug in the electricity (God's spirit). The TV comes to life, and we see the picture tube (soul) animated. We see color, sound, dancing, singing, talking, intelligent conversations, all live via satellite. The dead TV becomes a living, visible, animated, intelligent entity-"Soul." But notice very carefully, the Soul (the animated picture in the TV tube) is not one of the original components. It is not a component in and by itself, but is rather the result of two other vital components, Body and Spirit (the TV console and electricity).
At bedtime I sometimes tell my daughter to give the TV a rest. When one turns off the "on/off" switch the TV goes to "sleep." The power light is still on, but the TV is blank and silent.
But now, pull the plug and take away the electricity (spirit) and what happens to the TV console (body)? It dies. It's just a box of circuits. Not even the power light is on anymore. If left unplugged it will, in time, decay and return to the dust of the ground.
And what happens to the colorful animated picture on the screen (soul) when we take away the electricity (spirit)? Want the real answer? Ask a child. Let several children watch TV together, then pull the plug and ask them where the picture went? A child will shrug his shoulders or say "I don't know" or say "It disappeared." Guess what? He is Scripturally correct on all three counts.
Without spirit there is no life and no consciousness. Without power a TV has no life and no animated picture. It's dead.
http://www.forums.bible-truths.com/index.php/topic,118.0.html -----
Dear Dallas:
Is too, until recent years, referred to man as having three "components"--body, soul, and spirit. NOT TRUE. Man is made of TWO components--body and spirit. God never put a soul into Adam. The soul of man is not a component, but rather the product of two combined components, namely: body and spirit. God formed man's body out of the ground. He then breathed into this body the breath of life (spirit), and the MAN, not some separate component, but the man became a "LIVING SOUL." The soul is not the living soul, but rather the man is the living soul. There is no soul without the body of man. Understood?
http://www.forums.bible-truths.com/index.php/topic,240.0.html -------
It is true that we all speak of "THE soul" as if there is a separate entity inside of our body that is called "the soul." Not true. Without the spirit there is NO SOUL. Without the body there is NO SOUL.
Take a blue piece if transparent plastic or cellophane. Place it half way over a same size piece of yellow cellophane. You will have blue on one side, yellow on the other, and GREEN in the middle. The blue is the body, the yellow is the spirit, and the GREEN IS THE SOUL. Notice that there is NO SOUL without the blue body and the yellow spirit. Separate the blue and yellow cellophane and the GREEN soul disappears. This is exactly how the human soul must be combined with a body and spirit, or IT DOES NOT EVEN EXIST. They are very closely related and appear to overlap, but there are distinction between soul and spirit. Understood? Good.
http://www.forums.bible-truths.com/index.php/topic,1675.0.html ----
Dear John:
Yes, there is a spirit in man (AND ALL ANIMALS). Nothing can live without "spirit." Spirit IS life (Ecc. 8:8; Ecc. 12:7; Luke 23:46; I Cor. 2:11; etc.).
There is no consciousness in our spirit alone. There is only consciousness (soul) when man's spirit is combined with a body. God retains our spirit until resurrection when He puts our spirit into a new body and we once again become conscious or receive back the quality of "soul." We are said to have new "spiritual" bodies, not that we are made "spirits."
http://forums.bible-truths.com/index.php/topic,3933.0.html ----------
We are told nothing regarding our pets except this; "For that which befalls the sons of men befalls beasts; even one thing befalls them: as the one dies, so dies the other; yes, they have all one breath; so that a man has no preeminence above a beast for all is vanity. All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again. "Who knows [whether] the spirit of man [men] goes upward, and [whether] the spirit of the beast goes downward to the earth?" (Ecc. 3:19-21).
At death, our spirit returns to God, but the spirit has not consciousness. The consciousness is called "soul," but the soul dies at death, and the body returns to the dust. In resurrection God puts our spirit back into a NEW body and we once again experience soul--life and animation.
Now you know as much as I do. I too lost my favorite cat a year ago.
God be with you,
Ray