Essential Equipment: The Word of God
Introduction: Ill. A traveler was preparing for a long trip. A friend asked if he was all packed and he said, “Yup, just about. I've got my map, a lamp, a library of 66 books, a mirror, a microscope, a volume of fine poetry, a package of old letters, a song book, a hammer, and a sword.” The friend said “you can't get all of that in one suitcase.” “Sure I can,” the traveler replied. “It doesn't take much room” Then he placed his Bible in the suitcase and closed the lid. (Sermon Central ill.)
The Word of God is essential equipment for our lives. It is like the Swiss army knife that has many tools and can do many things!
This week I emailed a middle school out in California to inquire about an article I read that detailed how a man pulled his child out of their school because they were teaching Islam to his son. I honestly didn't expect to hear anything back but to my surprise they offered a nice, thorough, and well-articulated response. And I admit I wasn't sure what to do, so I did what I always do when I'm not sure what to do, I prayed and asked God what to do. And the one thing that came to me is that God's word is greater than mine and I should use it. So I prayerfully sent the superintendent, John 14:6 and while I haven't heard back from him, I believe that God's Word will find it's mark. If we try to fight fire with fire everyone gets burned. If we try to match flesh with flesh or talking points with talking points or match logic with logic, the truth is, we might be outwitted. But when we use the Word of God, It brings this spiritual war onto a whole new battlefield; God's home turf, where He never loses.
A couple of weeks ago I alluded to the scripture that we will draw our attention to this morning. It is found in Hebrews 4:12 - “For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow, it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.”
Transition: This scripture describes the Word of God in four ways.
The Word of God is Alive.
“For the word of God is living”
Matthew Henry said “Saint's die, Sinners die; but the word of God lives.” Like our Savior, who is alive, so is His word! His word brings life. If you have a King James Bible it reads “For the Word of God is quick,” The word 'quick' is an old English word for living. The idiom 'The quick and the dead' comes from 1 Peter4:5 & part of the apostles creed: “From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead” obviously, that isn't referring to judging those who are speedy or fast but those who are living and those who are dead. 'Quick' means alive and if you allow the word to touch your soul, it will not just bring you life, it will bring you everlasting life. Vibrant life! Joyful life! It brings a peaceful life! Which may sound strange considering Jesus said “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.” He brings peace to believers. He came to bring us peace with God, peace with our selves, and peace with our brothers, but He brings a sword to unbelievers. To a fallen and sinful world that is at conflict with our faith, He brings a sword!
The Word of God is alive and it brings life! Like Elisha's bones when it touches a dead man it brings him back to life. The Word of God may be thousands of years old and yet no matter how flippant and apathetic we are to it, it can still touch a dead man and bring him back to life! I am proof of it! You are looking at a man who was dead to hope, dead to peace, dead in the world, and dead in sin. And it was the Word of God that touched me and brought me back to life!
Transition: If you ever feel dead, read the word because it is Alive! And not only is it alive the verse joins two adjectives together: 'quick and powerful' (KJV) or 'living and active' (NIV)
The Word of God is Active
“and active”
The King James says 'powerful'. But in the Greek it means 'energetic', but it should be understood as 'energetically effective' or 'powerfully effective'. You may have two employees, one who works hard but the other gets results. He is effective at doing what he gets paid to do. He gets results. The word of God is powerfully effective in doing what it is suppose to do. It gets results. It never goes out and comes back void. It has the power to pull down strongholds, raise the dead, cast out demons, make the deaf hear, the blind see, and the lame walk.
It is powerfully effective in converting: The word of God is the best way to convince anyone of salvation through Jesus. All of our eloquence, all of our intelligence, all of our humor, our anecdotes, our illustrations with all of our passion, can never convince any man of Christ without the Word of God. It may impress but it will not convert. Using our own tools is like shooting bee bees at a battleship. The sinner's heart is like armor and the only weapon that is powerful enough to break through the hardened layers of prejudice, pain and pride, is the Word of God! It does what we can not.
It is powerfully effective in condemning: The word of God should not be restrained for the sake of pleasing our palates. We shouldn't take our favorite parts of the word and preach on them every Sunday for 15 years. The promises of God are yes and Amen! Just as He promises life to believers, He also promises death to unbelievers. The word is powerful in condemning.
Jesus' spoken words about Judas were: “It would be better for him if he had not been born” now I don't know about you, but to me that's scary! That will definitely shake you up a little bit! You know once Christ says it, that settles it. I think 'Lord, I never want to be like Judas in any way, shape, manner or form!' Or how about his written words to Belshazzar and his band of idolaters, as the hand writes on the wall in part: “you have been weighed on the scales and found wanting” In other words, 'You were given a talent to do good and God did not find you worthy of what you were given, so he now gives to another, while you are condemned.' How would you feel if you read those words? Ouch! His words are also powerfully effective in condemning those who are stumbling blocks: Jesus said that “...stumbling blocks come, but woe to him through whom they come!” “It would be better for them to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around their neck than to cause one of these little ones to stumble.” These are the type of preachers who shut the kingdom of God in men's faces. It is a dangerous thing to be a hindrance to a new convert. You must watch what you say and do around those who are new or weak in the faith and don't hinder them or damage them or you might ruin their faith altogether. If a holy fear of condemnation is what we need to be kept close to Christ, and avoid sin, then we should want it all the more. Just like the song “If that's what it takes to praise you, Jesus bring the rain” not only the rain of trial, but the rain of fear of condemnation. I think: “Lord, if my legs are apt to run away from you then please break them! If my arms are likely to work against you then please cut them off! I would rather suffer temporary pain and have eternal life than to have temporary life and eternal pain! If Proverbs is true and the fear of God is the beginning of all wisdom, then a fear of his powerful condemnation should be embraced, not rejected.
It is powerfully effective in comforting: I know that there have been times when you have found comfort in the Word of God. You might have lost a spouse or a child, or parent and there was something from the book of Psalms consoled you like nothing else could. You highlighted it in your Bible, you underlined it, you put asterisks beside it, you might have framed it and put it on the living room wall. You knew that word from God was specifically for you! Or you are just flat out tired and lost all energy to keep going. You're not running or even walking anymore, you find it difficult to even crawl through life and then you find this in Galatians 6:9 “Let us not become weary in doing good for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up!” and suddenly God's pep talk got you up and running again. Or how about when someone's unkind words make their way back to you. Either through friends or family, co-workers, or even Facebook. You are grieved when you have been doing all you can do for the LORD and an enemy slanders you, tells you that your labor is lacking. Tells you that you are not good enough, you are not smart enough, you are not strong enough, you are not experienced enough, or that perhaps, you are doing too much for God (According to Matthew Henry: that's really speaking Satan's language there) The fact is: It hurts. It hurts a lot. Because you know that any spirit led labor for God is good. And you're proud of your labor for God, like a farmer who plows hard ground, and plants seed and pulls weeds, and waters and works his garden, is proud of the vegetables it brings. The words you hear should be edifying, encouraging, and rewarding. But instead the words you hear are critical, condescending, dismissive, and mean-spirited and you went from flying on cloud nine to suddenly feeling like you have just been gut-punched.
But then, God's forgotten word comes back and reminds you “Blessed are you when people hate you, when they exclude you and insult you and reject your name as evil, because of the Son of Man. Be glad in that day and leap for joy, for behold your reward is great in heaven.” You are comforted with the revelation that they aren't throwing insults at you, they are throwing your treasure up to Heaven and they don't even realize it! Wow! What a comfort God's word is! What a comfort it is to know that “people look at the outward appearance but the LORD looks at the heart.” What a comfort it is to know: “for the LORD searches every heart and understands every desire and every thought.” What a comfort it is to us to know that God knows! That has comforted me ever since I became a Christian. I know that God knows. He knows my innocence. He knows my motives. He knows I desire church unity. He knows I want to lead a flock straight and feed them well. He knows my intentions are to give him glory. He also knows I make mistakes. He knows I occasionally slip and fall but through it all, how comforting it is to know that my God knows it all!
Transition: The Word of God is powerfully effective in every which way, no matter if a child or a pastor should use it. It isn't those who use the sword that are powerful but the sword itself. Like a 5 year old with a machine gun, they may have never used it before but they are still dangerous! Which brings us to our next point about God's Word:
The Word of God is Sharp
“Sharper than any double-edged sword,”
The word is referred to a sword in Ephesians and a two-edged sword in Revelation and Hebrews. Really the sword of God is all edge, there is no blunt side to it. There is no useless chapter or verse in the Bible. It has two edges like a sword. It cuts in every direction. It is more lethal, and powerful than anything in the world. The World is material. The Word of God is spiritual and yet if effects the physical with incredible results. “Let there be light” and 'there was light.' (The spiritual effected the physical.)
Spurgeon once said “You can not come near the Gospel without it having a measure of influence over you. And God blessing you, it may cut down and kill your sins when you have no idea that such a work is being done.” The word of God is so sharp that you may be bleeding under the flesh before you realize you've been struck. It is so sharp that it passes through the flesh and does it's work with your spirit, without drawing a drop of blood. That's sharp!
It is convicting. God's words are so sharp they cut us deep with the truth and the truth condemns or condones our lives. You can initially deny the truth but during judgment who can deny the truth!?
Like a thief arrested for robbing the local convenient store, but denies He had any involvement in the crime, but during the trial a video reveals the truth. And the truth can not be denied!
The word of God is sharp enough to cut its way out of years of obscurity and into the hearts of reformers like Martin Luther. I have no doubt that if you burned every Bible but one and even that, God's word will still somehow slice through to save millions in this depraved and fallen world.
Ill. Charles Spurgeon once mentioned that a rebellious man who went to hear evangelist George Whitefield – not to learn from him but to mock him. He called Whitefield, a member of the “Hell-fire club”. Later, he stood up amongst his fellow scoffers and delivered an impeccable recital of Whitefield's sermon. He imitated his very tone and manner, but what the poor guy didn't expect was that while in the middle of his mockery, the man paused and suddenly sat down, broken by the Word of God and then confessed the power of the Gospel. He later preached the same Gospel He once made fun of and brought others to Christ as well. That Sword is Sharp!
I read this week that prominent cosmologist & physicist Lawrence Krauss said “if we can plant the seeds of doubt in our children, religion will go away in a generation . . .” I truly laughed out loud! There is a part of me that wishes He would try it. Not because I want kids to be kept from the Word of God but because I know the power of the Word of God will cut its way into men's hearts, no matter how hard you try to suppress it. Like trying to drown a buoy in the lake. It will always make its way to the top. The Word of God will always be resurrected no matter efforts to bury it!
How futile it is when people try to kill the gospel, you would have a better chance of climbing to the moon on a rope of sand, than killing the gospel and those who try it will be disappointed every single time, whether they try to choke it with worldliness, starve it with neglect, poison it with false doctrine, or bury it with suppression. While God lives so does His Word! And God's not Dead!
Transition: Finally, We read that the Word of God is a divider, it differentiates pure from contaminated, it splits good from evil, goats from sheep, wheat from tares, wise from foolish, narrow from wide. It is discerning.
The Word of God is Discerning
“it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow, it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.”
The word not only lets you see what your thoughts are, it criticizes your thoughts: When it is inside you you can say to yourself: 'This thought is proud', 'that thought is good', 'that thought is selfish', 'this thought is Christ-like'. It's a judge of the thoughts of men. Only the Word of God can do that!
The Word of God is not only sharp like a double edged sword it is sharp at its point like a needle, so it penetrates us, and the two-edged sword slices us open. What the word of God really does, is it turns us inside out and make us see ourselves for who we really are. Then we must repent or rebel. Some people don't like what they see so they deny the word, they dispute the word, they hate the word, and they will run from church and run from preachers and they will run out into the world and bury their heads in the sands of ignorance and say “at least I'm happy” and they are right. At least for a while.. until their life is over and they have to give an account for why they ran from God and his word.
Ill. A friend of mine was telling me about his conversion. He was living in sin, no doubt about it. His friends asked him to go to church with them so He went with them to a large church in Tulsa and He recalls that morning was painful. The preacher was nailing his toes to the floor that day! Every single thing He preached was exactly what my friend said He was doing, and going through. The preacher landed one haymaker after another. And my friend admits He was mad! Real Mad! Strangely, however, He wasn't mad at the preacher, He was mad at his friends, because He believed surely it was his friends that called the preacher before the service and told him every thing that He was doing for the last 15 years! He kept saying to himself “I am going to get even with these guys after the service” and “I ain't going down to that alter, preacher I don't care what you say!” But something changed during the alter call, He said, it felt as if a voice said “Oh, yes you are” And He got up and went down to the front and was surprised that others were going down to the front as well. He thought “don't they know the preacher was talking to me and not them.” And as He prayed the prayer of repentance, He felt a change in his life immediately, like a weight being lifted off of him. Praise God! The truth is, it was the word of God driven by the Holy Spirit that hit its mark in his heart and thankfully He responded and received Christ as his Savior!
The Word of God searches us and personally finds us and everyone else too! Amazing!
In Conclusion, I would tell you to make sure that you Hear the Word, Read the Word, Speak the Word, Do the Word/Live the Word and you can live in great confidence knowing that God's sword is in your hands working for you instead of his hands working against you!
