'For God loved the world Thus, Like This, On This Wise that He gave His

only begotten Son'.

That is how He loved, and any omission or softening of the insistence of

sacrifice and offering in the so-called 'simple Gospel' must not be

tolerated.  If God reveals that He loved 'like this', then we as faithful

ministers of His Word, must preach salvation 'on this wise'.  May this brief

note be blessed to all concerned.

Soul.

See Man (p. 70); and also Man3.

Let us enforce the point we would make, when investigating the meaning

of any word used in the Scriptures, by the following conversation:

A.

The word 'light' occurs in 2 Corinthians chapter 4, what do you

say is its opposite?

B.

The opposite of 'light' is 'darkness'.

A.

The passage I had in mind was verse 17 where we read 'Our light

affliction ... weight of glory', whereas you had in mind verse 6,

which reads 'light to shine out of darkness'.

The reader will readily perceive that we only know a term or the

meaning of a word when we view it in relation to its opposite.  Those who

lean to the doctrine that makes God the Author of sin, will sometimes be

found misquoting Isaiah 45:7: 'I make good, and create evil', whereas the

prophet said, 'I make peace and create evil'.  These antonyms are of vital

importance.  The bearing of this on the word 'spiritual' will appear when we

assemble the references and note what is used over against it.  In Ephesians

1:3 'all spiritual blessings' stand alone, but in 6:12, the word 'spiritual'

is placed over against 'flesh and blood'.  If, therefore, spiritual foes are

to be placed in contrast with flesh and blood foes, then it is at least

possible that the apostle, in the same epistle intends by 'spiritual'

blessings, a contrast with the blessings of basket and store that

characterized blessing under the Law.

In chapter 5, verses 18 and 19, we read:

'Be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the

Spirit; speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual

Here the parallelism is suggestive:

A

Be not drunk with wine.

B

A

Be filled with the Spirit.

B

Spiritual songs are placed in contrast with 'excess' which word

translates the Greek word asotia, a word that occurs elsewhere in Titus

and 1 Peter, where it is translated 'riot' (Tit. 1:6; 1 Pet. 4:4), and

in both places the context speaks of being 'given to wine' or 'excess