Every September we give up a few minutes of our morning worship service to a representative from Gideons International. We have monthly contribution to this wonderful lay organization built into our budget. Their sole purpose is to distribute the Bible all over the world. They put them in jails, schools, hotel and motel rooms and anywhere else they receive permission to do so. The representative shares with us some life-changing antedotes of people who have encountered the Living Word of the Bible placed by this organization. I personally know of a man who was saved as a result of a Gideon placed Bible in the Los Angeles County jail. He now has a ministry to the poor and homeless in 3 cities in our area where many have come to Christ for salvation.
Why is the Bible so powerful? I want to share with you a few thoughts on that question this morning from Psalm 119.
A. The Permanence of the Word. (89-91)
(89) "For ever, O LORD, thy word is settled in heaven."
There was never a time when the Word of God did not exist. (John 1:1) "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." Before the sun, the moon and the stars were made the Word was. Before anything was brought into existence, there was the eternal Word.
Not only was the Word present before anything was made, but the Word will remain after everthing else that was made ceases. (Matt 24:35) "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away." After science, philosophy, governments and education; and gold and big houses and the dollar have all passed away, there will be the precious living Word of the living God. Because God’s Word is eternal in heaven, clearly it can be depended upon on earth.
You can say, "Wait a minute, pastor!" I’m getting confused. First you said the Bible is the Word and now you say the Word was God. Which is it?" The Bible is the Word because it has one central character - Jesus Christ. Open the Bible anywhere and it reveals Jesus. That is why Philip could take a portion of Isaiah that the Ethiopian eunuch was reading and begin to preach Jesus Christ to him. So the person of the Word is Jesus. Furthermore, it is the living Word because God has empowered it through His Holy Spirit to accomplish to the last detail His perfect will and purpose.
The written Word, the Bible, totally expresses God’s work of creation, redemption and glorification which is all summed up in the living Word, Jesus Christ Who is God. It is because of this that Scripture often uses the Word interchangeably for the written Word and for Christ.
(90,91) "Thy faithfulness is unto all generations: thou hast established the earth, and it abideth. They continue this day according to thine ordinances: for all are thy servants."
As David hide in the hills and desert from Saul, he kept harkening back to the promises of God that he would be the king. His confidence in God’s promise was written hundreds of years before Christ. Can God be trusted to keep His promises 2600 years later? David writes that God can be trusted to "all generations." To emphasize that truth, he ties it to creation. When you or I walk out of this building and find no air to breathe then we can begin to doubt God’s promises. When we look up and there is no light or sun or stars, when there is no ground beneath our feet, no water in the sea, no beauty to fill our eye; then we can say God will not keep His promises. But until those things happen, trust God. All of those things operate at the pleasure of God and they are His sign that His promises are true and trustworthy.
B. The Preservation of the Word. (92)
"Unless thy law had been my delights, I should then have perished in mine affliction."
Again as David flees from Saul, he says that the anchor for his soul is the Word. When you and I run into life’s troubles what is the first thing we should do? Pray! Take your problems to God. But after that we tend to get confused. We look for answers in our circumstances, wait for our situation to change or perhaps even look for a sign through a dream (though I hope not.) Do you know where we should be looking for God’s answers? The starting place is the Word. We always think of prayer as one-way. We tell God what is on our heart and that’s it. But God wants a two-way communication. And most often the answer to your prayer will come as He reveals truth and direction and understanding to your circumstance through the written Word. So when you pray, open up the Bible and let God speak. It is through this means that He will often sustain you in your difficulties.
C. The Power of the Word. (93-95)
God spoke the world into existence. He spoke to Elijah from a whirlwind. He spoke from heaven at the baptism of His Son. Are looking from God to reveal Himself in that kind of power today? Everytime you pick up your Bible, that same authority speaks. (Heb 4:12) "For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart." The Word is powerful.
We see here that it has the power to do 3 things:
1. To Revive
(93) "I will never forget thy precepts: for with them thou hast quickened me."
We tell new believers that those who get into the Word will grow spiritually. However, what is true of new believers is also true of us who have been saved for a long time. The Word has the power to breathe new life into your life. So we should continually seek to be refilled with the truths of God. We must always remember that the Word and the Spirit go together. Only through the Word does the Spirit renew us inwardly.
There is another sense given to this verse also; elsewhere QUICKENED is used to mean the giving of life. It is by God’s Word that we heard of eternal life in Jesus Christ.
2. To Restore.
(94) "I am thine, save me; for I have sought thy precepts."
When people get out of fellowship with God one of the first things they do is to get out of fellowship with God’s people and remove themselves from the place of hearing the Word taught and preached. Someone has said "The Word will keep you from sin or sin will keep you from the Word." It is tragically true that sin keeps many from the Word when they most need it. David said when his sin overwhelmed him, he sought the Word. That is a lesson for us.
3. To Restrain.
(95) "The wicked have waited for me to destroy me: but I will consider thy testimonies."
You and I have an enemy who is always looking for ways to destroy us. His name is Satan, the devil. He wants to set snares to destroy your testimony, your family, your joy, your life if possible. The Word reassures us that we have been saved and that God will keep us through all tribulations until the day we see His glory.
D. The Perfection of the Word. (96)
"I have seen an end of all perfection: but thy commandment is exceeding broad."
The Word of God is perfect. It is inerrant and infallible. INERRANT means "containing no error." INFALLIBLE means "incapable of error." The Word of God contains no errors because the God of the Word can make no errors. God is truth. Every word of the Bible is truth. (Ps 119:160) "Thy word is true from the beginning.." The sum total of all Scripture is true. It is all truth. (II Tim 3:16) "All scripture is given by inspiration of God." What does ALL mean? Every bit of it. INSPIRED means "God breathed." What about human authors? Didn’t Mark, Peter and John and the O. T. writers all have a part? (II Peter 1:20,21) "Know this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation." Noone from his own mind sat down and wrote the words of Scripture. Why? "For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost."
So David says, the Word is perfect. Secondly, the Word is complete.
Only the Bible gives us the total view of life, death, and eternity. It never becomes irrelevant, outdated, old-fashioned or behind times. The settled truth is unchangeable. What are some of those settled truths? God’s holiness, God’s love and God’s only way to salvation; Jesus Christ are a few. There is nothing that needs to be added. God gave us all we need to know. In fact, He warns us not to take away from or add to the Word. We don’t need dreams or visions in the night to hear from God. Everything He has to say to us you hold in your hands. All we need to do is read the words on the page, absorb them and obey them as we let the Spirit of God guide us.
We have looked to day at some wonderful truths about the TRUTH. For you and I, here is the most important thing we can know about the Word. (John 20:31) "But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God; and that believing ye might have life through His name."
The Word tells us that God became man, lived a perfect life, too that perfect life to the Cross of Calvary adn there paid our sin debt when He took upon Himself the wrath of God that should have been ours. He was raised from the grave on the third day defeating forever the power of sin which is death and rose into the heavens thereby making a way for those who place their faith in Him to have eternal life.
