The knowledge that we acquire independent of our mind, will, and emotion is called revelation, and is apprehended through intuition. Through intuition we know, and our mind merely helps us to understand and express intellectually what we already know intuitively. (Jn. 4: 19; 6: 15).

Communion is our ability to worship God. God cannot be worshipped through the soul. Our emotions and intellect are bereft of any innate ability to worship God. In other words, God cannot be apprehended by our thoughts, feelings or good intentions, He can only be known directly through our spirits. God must be worshipped in the part of us that the Bible refers to as the “inner man” -- the human spirit. (Eph. 3:16). Therefore it is to be concluded that these three components of the human spirit are intrinsically interrelated to one another, and function coordinately. The relationship between conscience and intuition is such that conscience judges according to the dictates of intuition. The human conscience will condemn anything that violates the directives given by human intuition. Intuition is related to communion or worship in the sense that man knows God intuitively, and is a self-revelation to man’s spirit.

Ergo, spiritual darkness can be defined as the condition of the human spirit in which it has been rendered totally incapable of apprehending an experiential knowledge of God. Sin has so incapacitated the human spirit that it is completely void of any knowledge of its Creator. This condition has alienated humanity from God in toto, and is what the Bible defines as spiritual death. Consequently, humanity has become sensual or carnal. The word “sensual” is directly related to the word “carnal” and means that which is related to the body and the physical senses as that, which is opposed to the mind and intellect i. e. sensory perception. In other words humanity has been reduced to control by its physical appetites or sensory perception. This means that anything that cannot be apprehended through the five senses is in essence considered to be a non reality or not true.

However, it must be understood that all reality or truth originated with, and is defined by God, because He alone is the very essence of what true reality is. I use the term “true reality” because without a true and experiential knowledge of God, and who He is, we are forced to live out our lives in a false reality. This false reality is perpetuated through the soulish aspect of our being. “And the LORD God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.” (Gen. 2:7). The soul of man defines him as a personality. Humanity becomes conscious of itself through its soul.

There are three basic components of which the human soul is comprised. They are the mind or intellect, the will or volition, and the emotions. Through our minds we are able to reason, and to express our thoughts and feelings. Wisdom arises from our mind. It should also be noted that our mind is intangible, and is expressed through one of our physical organs called the brain. Without our intellect we would be foolish and dull. Man is also volitional. That is to say that God has equipped man with the ability to choose to or not to. It is through this ability that we express our decisions. We either will or will not. Without this ability man would be reduced to an automaton. It is through the emotional aspect of our being that we are able to express our likes and dislikes, love or hate, and to feel joy, anger, happy or sad. Without the component of our emotions man would be as insensitive as an inanimate object.

Secondly, sin has wholly reconfigured the psychological, and emotional makeup of humanity in that it has completely incapacitated the will of mankind to submit to its Creator. Humanity is totally and absolutely disinclined to having a relationship with God, except one of its own making. This relationship is known as religion, and is designed to allow man to justify himself before God, rather, than allowing God to justify him through faith in the death, burial, and resurrection of our Lord Jesus the Christ. It must be understood that when Moses directed the children of Israel to make a choice between life and death, he was speaking to them in terms of them being the people of God, and not as unbelievers. (Deut. 39:19). Unbelievers are incapable of making any choices outside of the parameters of their personal corruption.

In the book of Romans, the third chapter, verses ten through eighteen, Paul, writing by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, gives a definitive description of the absolute corruption that defines the character of the human race. In effect he states that through the malady of sin, humanity has been totally debased from being the crown of God’s creation to the lowest of the low in creation. Isaiah declares that, “the whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. From the sole of the foot even unto the head there is no soundness in it; but wounds, and bruises, and putrefying sores: they have not been closed, neither bound up, neither mollified with ointment.” (Isa. 1:5b-6). This statement is indicative of man’s warped state of being. In a word, man is suffering from a severely debilitating satanic psychosis called sin. (1st Jn. 3:8). From his head to his foot sin has rendered man psychologically and emotionally infirmed. This speaks to the reason why people suffer from various forms of mental and emotional illnesses. The word “psychosis” is defined as a major mental disorder in which the personality is very seriously disorganized and the ability to deal effectively with reality is usually grievously impaired. Psychoses are of two sorts: a) Functional --characterized by a lack of an apparent organic cause, and principally of the schizophrenic, paranoid, or manic-depressive type, and b) Organic --characterized by a pathological organic condition such as brain damage, disease, or metabolic disorders.

It is essential that the Believer know and understands that the sickness referred to here is not physical, but rather, mental, emotional, and spiritual. The cause of this sickness is listed as a wholehearted abandonment of God. “Oh, what a sinful nation they are! They are loaded down with a burden of guilt. They are evil and corrupt children who have turned away from the LORD. They have despised the Holy One of Israel, cutting themselves off from His help.” (Isa. 1:4 NLT). The word “guilt” in this context conveys the notion of feeling guilty for having done something that the human conscience has condemned as being wrong. (Romans 2:15). Consequently, the whole nation of Israel was tortured by a guilty conscience, and had to undergo an excruciating suffering. The country lying in ruins, because of urban blight and foreign invasion, signally manifested this suffering. Unfortunately, this is exactly what is happening in America today. Because there has been an abandonment of our traditional Judeo- Christian values, America is now undergoing a tragic decline in its spirituality. America needs a revival of epic proportions!

Once the human conscience has been assaulted by guilt, a crippling sense of low self-esteem begins to set in. This feeling can lead to other equally debilitating feelings, such as unworthiness to receive God’s love and forgiveness, and what I call the “it’s all my fault” syndrome. Whenever people suffer from a guilty conscience they walk around in a depressed state, which says, “I’m not good enough, so why even bother…?” These kinds of self- deprecating feelings lie deep in the person’s subconscious mind, and tend to lead to an attitude of perpetual defeat. Hence these kinds of people, although they may strive hard to succeed always end up becoming victims of their own self-fulfilling prophecies. They lose, because they choose to lose.