What We Truly Are
Let’s take a brief look at God and his attributes. The difference between homo-sapien (you and me) and God is night and day. As Creator of all things that exist (i.e. universe, matter, time, etc), God is omnipotent and omniscient.
As we ascribe and define God’s attributes, we are not describing His personality nor his looks. God’s attributes are intrinsic. In other words God is. God is I AM. God is His attributes, meaning absolute.
To help explain so that we can understand, let’s illustrate or compare ourselves.
As humans, we have a body and soul. But, if we think about this statement, really, only half of it is truly stated: we have a body—we can all agree on this point. However, to say we have a soul (though we do), is not correctly stated. We should say: we are a soul. We have a body, but our life is our soul. Our body is our possession. We (our soul) will live on without our present body. When we die physically our body doesn’t leave our soul. Our soul leaves our body. One’s soul lives on, and since one no longer can use a dead body, one leaves it.
As an unbeliever, one goes to the holding tank—the underworld called Hades or Hell, to await judgment (Luke 16:19-31; Revelation 20:11-15).
As a believer, one departs and goes immediately into the presence of the Lord, face to face with Him (2 Corinthians 5:1-8; Revelation 20:6).
The soul-life that we are is everlasting. So it is not said that we have a soul, it is that we are a soul with soul-life, imparted by God at birth—the breath of life given at our first breath.