PARENTHOOD
a divine stewardship

SOULISH ENJOYMENT

As tripartite men, we have three kinds of enjoyment: physical enjoyment, spiritual enjoyment, and psychological enjoyment. Physical enjoyment includes the enjoyment of fine food and of a pleasant place to rest. Spiritual enjoyment includes the enjoyment of God's presence, God's blessing, God's speaking, and God's grace. Between the physical enjoyment and the spiritual enjoyment there is the psychological enjoyment, which includes things such as the enjoyment of sweet music, the satisfaction of being praised by others, and the pleasure of being with our intimate friends.

Which of these three types of enjoyment do you think is the highest? According to the New Testament, both the physical enjoyment and the spiritual enjoyment are for the soulish enjoyment. The reason for this is that God did not create man as a body or as a spirit, but as a soul. In Matthew 11:29 the Lord Jesus said that if we would take His yoke upon us and learn of Him, we would find rest to our souls. This kind of rest, however, needs to be supported by the rest of the spirit. If our spirit does not rest in the Lord, our soul cannot be at rest. Soulish rest needs to be supported by spiritual rest. Those who attend nightclubs may be satisfied in a fleshly, soulish way, but they do not have the support of spiritual satisfaction. Because they lack this support, their fleshly and sinful satisfaction is vain. However, the rest we enjoy in our soul is lasting because it has the support of the rest in the spirit, the support of spiritual satisfaction.

The highest enjoyment is neither the physical nor the spiritual, but the soulish. The physical enjoyment is for the soulish enjoyment, and the spiritual enjoyment supports the soulish enjoyment. As human beings, we all seek enjoyment. There is no one on earth who does not seek it. Even children desire enjoyment. The children's enjoyment is mainly in their soul. Soulish enjoyment dominates their actions and behavior. The behavior of children is genuine because with them there is no performing. But as we grow up, our behavior ceases to be genuine because we learn to perform. Genuine enjoyment is soulish enjoyment. Therefore, what the Lord was talking about in Matthew 16 was the soulish enjoyment.

SAVING THE SOUL BEING TO PLEASE THE SELF

We need to understand this matter of the saving or losing of the soul in the light of our experience. We also need to remember that the subject of the last half of Matthew 16 is the building of the church, and that we should not isolate verses 21 through 28 from verses 16 through 19 since these verses are concerned with the way to build up the church. Suppose the brothers living in a brothers' house have seen the vision concerning Christ and the building of the church. They realize that the Lord desires to recover the church life for His economy. However, the living situation in the house may not be very encouraging. Perhaps no one is willing to do the dishes. Because of the discouraging situation, some of the brothers may consider moving out of the house. But if they move out, they will be saving their souls to have an easy way for themselves.…By this we see that to please the self is to save the soul.

USING THE THIRD KEY

Now we need to see what it means to lose the soul. In the process of the building of the church, we should not save our soul. Rather, we must always lose it. Do not move from one brothers' house to another to seek a better situation to make things easier for yourself. Every brother is God's will, and you need to bear each brother as a cross. If others will not wash the dishes, then you should wash them. But if you feel sorry for yourself because you are the only one to wash the dishes, the gate will be opened for Satan to come forth. He will tempt you to move out of the brothers' house. When such a temptation comes, you need to use the third key, the key of losing the soul. If you use this key, you will say, "Praise the Lord! Tomorrow I shall wash even more dishes. Satan, don't talk to me any more. The more you talk to me, the more dishes I will wash. I am willing to lose my soul to the uttermost." After a short period of time of losing the soul, there will be a transfiguration in the church, and in this transfiguration you will be rewarded positively. In the church life and in all the meetings you will have the highest enjoyment of the Lord's presence. But those who have been saving their soul will be rewarded negatively during this time of transfiguration.

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