Post by Cindy on Aug 1, 2015 11:06:55 GMT -5
The Essential Place and Power of God’s Word
6. The Regenerating Power of God’s Word (1 Pet. 1:23). Just as we owe our natural existence to the Creator’s spoken word and life-giving breath, so we owe our New Birth to the power of God’s Word and the Holy Spirit’s activation of its power. God’s intent for our created being is only completely fulfilled when our spirits are alive toward Him. As sin has produced spiritual death in people (Eph. 2:1-3), so salvation in Jesus Christ has provided spiritual life. This text tells us that the “seed” that has produced new life in us is the Word of God, which has begotten us again by the Holy Spirit’s power (Titus 3:5) and made us members of God’s new creation (2 Cor. 5:17). The power of God’s Word—the Holy Scriptures—is in no way more manifest than in this: its power to bring spiritual life to all who open to its truth. James 1:18 elaborates the fact that God’s “word of truth” is the means by which He brought us new life, emphasizing that He has done this as a direction of His own will. God’s will to save us (2 Pet. 3:9) has been effectively expressed in His Word, which accomplishes that work (John 1:13).
7. The Authority of God’s Word over Our Lives (Ps. 119:89-91). This text asserts the all-encompassing, absolutely authoritative Word of God as unchangingly secured in heaven, noting: (1) The timelessness of God’s rule by His Word. Though times and seasons change, though social customs, human opinions, and philosophical viewpoints vary, they have no effect on the constancy or authority of God’s Word. (2) God is faithful in applying the power, promise, and blessing of His Word, along with its requirements of justice and judgment (v. 90). Just as He spoke and the earth was created and is sustained, so He has spoken regarding His laws for living. The relativism of human thought does not affect His authority or standards. (3) While creation abides by His Word (responding as His “servants,” v. 90), man is often a study in contrast to this submission to the Creator’s authority. Whatever our past rebellion, however, upon coming to Christ a practical reinstatement of God’s Word as the governing principle for all our life is to take place. Not only does Jesus conclusively declare this (John 8:47), but Paul notes that to respond otherwise is to compromise the level of life to which we have been called (1 Cor. 2:13-16). As “spiritual” people we are to refuse the “natural” inclinations of fallen humanity. As we hear and yield to the authority of God’s Word, we verify that we are no longer dominated by the world’s spirit of error (1 John 4:6).
8. God’s Word and Our Soul’s Nourishment (Deut. 8:3). Jesus quoted this text in Matthew 4:4, when He faced Satan’s snares in the wilderness. The obvious message of the passage is that there is no survival of the soul without God’s Word—daily. That the parallel is used of Israel’s receiving the daily supply of manna makes clear that a regular, daily portion of God’s Word is to be sought and fed upon by the believer.
This is not a matter of legal duty, determining one’s salvation, but a matter of personal responsibility, determining one’s obedience to the pathway of discipleship. Let no one suppose, however, that spiritual survival is possible for long without nourishment from the Word of God. First Peter 2:2 declares that God’s Word is as essential to the believer as milk is to a newborn child. But as we come to terms with His Word as key to our survival, let us also see that God has given its pleasantness as a joyful source of sweetness for our living (Ps. 19:10).
9. God’s Word and Practical, Fruitful Living (Ps. 119:105). We are all inexperienced in too much of life to be without a guide. God’s Word is that guide. The whole of Psalm 119 unfolds manifold features of God’s Word, showing how dynamically it will assist us in life’s most practical circumstances. No single verse focuses this more clearly than verse 105, which shows how God’s Word lights the way, giving direction for each step (“to my feet”) and giving wisdom for long-range plans (“to my path”). Joshua links the regular application of God’s Word to life as the most certain way to both success and prosperity in living (Josh. 1:8). Further, Psalm 119:130 notes the wisdom God’s Word gives to the “simple” (Hebrew pethawee), a truth specifically pointing toward the avoidance of making decisions based on human delusion or outright senselessness. Also, Proverbs 6:23 reminds us that the “reproofs” or corrections the Bible gives are as much a part of the “light” it provides as any positive or confirming direction we find therein. Let God’s Word guide, correct, instruct, lead, teach, and confirm. Do not hasten ahead without it—ever.
10. True Spiritual Growth Requires God’s Word (1 Cor. 3:1-5). Beginning in 1 Corinthians 2:10, Paul elaborates our need of Holy Spirit-given wisdom and revelation, and he ties this very firmly to our receiving the “words…which the Holy Spirit teaches” (2:13). He immediately turns from these observations to an outright confrontation with the carnality of the Corinthians, attributing it to the shallowness of their intake of God’s Word (“not able to receive [solid food],” 3:2; see also Heb. 5:12-14).
The demanding truth of this passage is that no amount of supposed spiritual insight or experience reflects genuine spiritual growth, if it is separated from our basic growth in the knowledge of God’s Word in the Bible. Without this rootedness in the Word, we may be deluded about our growth. Such “rootedness” is in truth and love, not merely in learning knowledge or accomplished study. In order to experience true spiritual growth, we must spend time in the Word and separate ourselves from the hindrances of lovelessness, competitiveness, and strife.
11. Loving God’s Word as Jesus’ Follower (John 14:21). Jesus completely aligned His life and will with the Father’s (8:29), which indicates His total allegiance to the Father’s Word and commandments. He also said He disapproved of any attitude that would reduce respect for or teach less than full obedience to the entirety of God’s revealed Word (Matt. 5:17-19). Thus, in this text, when He explicitly links His disciples’ love for Him as Savior with their will to keep His commandments, we conclude Jesus’ clear intent: If we love Him, we will love His Father’s Word, also.
In John 5:39 our Lord declares that the knowledge of the Scriptures is the pathway to knowing Him well. Further, upon His resurrection, He unveiled the fullness of His own Person as revealed in the Old Testament (Luke 24:27). These texts cluster to teach us that to follow Christ, to know Him, and to grow in insight as people walking with the Resurrected Lord, a basic and continuing requirement is a steadfast commitment to hearing, heeding, and studying the Bible.
12. God’s Word: Purifier unto Holy Living (James 1:23-25). Purity of life is not a quest for perfection as much as it is a quest for liberation from those things that may inhibit effectiveness and reduce power-filled living. This text shows the Word of God as a means of reflection—a mirror into which we are to look and see ourselves. The call is not only to heed what we see and accept the Bible’s corrective instruction, but there is an unwritten lesson here. We should avoid the temptation to see (and judge) others in the Word, analyzing what they ought to do, instead of what we need to do. Second Corinthians 3:18 also likens God’s Word to a mirror, but describes the image seen as no less than the Lord Jesus Himself. The sum of the two texts: The Bible shows us Christ’s likeness in order that we may measure our conduct and character against His and allow God to shape us into Christ’s likeness (Rom. 8:29). Other promises for cleansing through God’s Word: Jeremiah 29:9 speaks of the “fire” in the Word, which can purge as well as ignite; and Psalm 119:9 holds special promise to the one who wants a pure life of holy power. God’s Word is a powerful, cleansing, delivering agent.
13. God’s Word, Evangelism, and Expansion (Is. 55:10-11). Evangelism (the spreading of the Good News) and expansion (the enlarging of life’s potential under God) both multiply by the “seed” of God’s Word. Jesus described the Word as “seed” also (Luke 8:11), the source of all saving life and growth possibilities transmitted from the Father to humankind. All increase of life within His love comes by His Word, as human response gives place for His blessing. When received, God’s word of promise will never be barren. The power in His Word will always fulfill the promise of His Word. We never need wonder how faith is developed or how fruitfulness is realized. Faith comes by “hearing” God’s Word (Rom. 10:17), that is, by receiving it wholeheartedly and humbly. Fruitfulness is the guaranteed by-product—whether for the salvation of a lost soul or the provision of a disciple’s need—God’s Word cannot be barren or fruitless: His own life-power is within it!
14. God’s Word: Read It! Study It! Memorize It! (2 Tim. 2:15). The Bible—God’s inspired Word—is the only conclusive source of wisdom, knowledge, and understanding concerning ultimate realities. It is a fountainhead of freeing truth (John 8:32) and a goldmine of practical principles (Ps. 19:10), waiting to liberate and/or enrich the person who will pursue its truth and wealth. Thus, Paul’s instruction to “be diligent…a worker” has been applied by serious Christians through the centuries as a directive to study the Word of God. The only way to healthy, balanced living is through the “rightly dividing” (Greek orthotomounta, literally, “cutting straight”) of God’s Word. Such correct, straight-on application of God’s Word is the result of diligent study. The text calls us beyond casual approaches to the Scriptures, telling us to refuse to suit the Bible to our own convenience or ideology.
In his earlier words (1 Tim. 4:13) Paul also told Timothy, “Give attention to reading [God’s Word],” but now he emphasizes studying like a “worker” (from Greek ergon—“toil, effort”). Psalm 119:11 urges memorizing of the Word of God as a mighty deterrent against sin. Memorizing the Scripture also provides an immediate availability of God’s “words” as a sword, ready in witnessing and effective in spiritual warfare (Heb. 4:12; Eph. 6:17).
Hayford, J. W., & Thomas Nelson Publishers. (1995). Hayford’s Bible handbook.
See also: A Reflection on Psalm 119 which I'm still adding to as I can. Please also check out the How to Study the Bible; Devotionals & Plans Forum for more information about studying God's Word, as no Christian can live without studying it daily. When we are not doing that, we are living in sin, for the Lord commands us to study His Word daily. If we don't know all of His Word, then we can't know Him as He wants us to, or know His Will for us, or how He wants us to live our life.
6. The Regenerating Power of God’s Word (1 Pet. 1:23). Just as we owe our natural existence to the Creator’s spoken word and life-giving breath, so we owe our New Birth to the power of God’s Word and the Holy Spirit’s activation of its power. God’s intent for our created being is only completely fulfilled when our spirits are alive toward Him. As sin has produced spiritual death in people (Eph. 2:1-3), so salvation in Jesus Christ has provided spiritual life. This text tells us that the “seed” that has produced new life in us is the Word of God, which has begotten us again by the Holy Spirit’s power (Titus 3:5) and made us members of God’s new creation (2 Cor. 5:17). The power of God’s Word—the Holy Scriptures—is in no way more manifest than in this: its power to bring spiritual life to all who open to its truth. James 1:18 elaborates the fact that God’s “word of truth” is the means by which He brought us new life, emphasizing that He has done this as a direction of His own will. God’s will to save us (2 Pet. 3:9) has been effectively expressed in His Word, which accomplishes that work (John 1:13).
7. The Authority of God’s Word over Our Lives (Ps. 119:89-91). This text asserts the all-encompassing, absolutely authoritative Word of God as unchangingly secured in heaven, noting: (1) The timelessness of God’s rule by His Word. Though times and seasons change, though social customs, human opinions, and philosophical viewpoints vary, they have no effect on the constancy or authority of God’s Word. (2) God is faithful in applying the power, promise, and blessing of His Word, along with its requirements of justice and judgment (v. 90). Just as He spoke and the earth was created and is sustained, so He has spoken regarding His laws for living. The relativism of human thought does not affect His authority or standards. (3) While creation abides by His Word (responding as His “servants,” v. 90), man is often a study in contrast to this submission to the Creator’s authority. Whatever our past rebellion, however, upon coming to Christ a practical reinstatement of God’s Word as the governing principle for all our life is to take place. Not only does Jesus conclusively declare this (John 8:47), but Paul notes that to respond otherwise is to compromise the level of life to which we have been called (1 Cor. 2:13-16). As “spiritual” people we are to refuse the “natural” inclinations of fallen humanity. As we hear and yield to the authority of God’s Word, we verify that we are no longer dominated by the world’s spirit of error (1 John 4:6).
8. God’s Word and Our Soul’s Nourishment (Deut. 8:3). Jesus quoted this text in Matthew 4:4, when He faced Satan’s snares in the wilderness. The obvious message of the passage is that there is no survival of the soul without God’s Word—daily. That the parallel is used of Israel’s receiving the daily supply of manna makes clear that a regular, daily portion of God’s Word is to be sought and fed upon by the believer.
This is not a matter of legal duty, determining one’s salvation, but a matter of personal responsibility, determining one’s obedience to the pathway of discipleship. Let no one suppose, however, that spiritual survival is possible for long without nourishment from the Word of God. First Peter 2:2 declares that God’s Word is as essential to the believer as milk is to a newborn child. But as we come to terms with His Word as key to our survival, let us also see that God has given its pleasantness as a joyful source of sweetness for our living (Ps. 19:10).
9. God’s Word and Practical, Fruitful Living (Ps. 119:105). We are all inexperienced in too much of life to be without a guide. God’s Word is that guide. The whole of Psalm 119 unfolds manifold features of God’s Word, showing how dynamically it will assist us in life’s most practical circumstances. No single verse focuses this more clearly than verse 105, which shows how God’s Word lights the way, giving direction for each step (“to my feet”) and giving wisdom for long-range plans (“to my path”). Joshua links the regular application of God’s Word to life as the most certain way to both success and prosperity in living (Josh. 1:8). Further, Psalm 119:130 notes the wisdom God’s Word gives to the “simple” (Hebrew pethawee), a truth specifically pointing toward the avoidance of making decisions based on human delusion or outright senselessness. Also, Proverbs 6:23 reminds us that the “reproofs” or corrections the Bible gives are as much a part of the “light” it provides as any positive or confirming direction we find therein. Let God’s Word guide, correct, instruct, lead, teach, and confirm. Do not hasten ahead without it—ever.
10. True Spiritual Growth Requires God’s Word (1 Cor. 3:1-5). Beginning in 1 Corinthians 2:10, Paul elaborates our need of Holy Spirit-given wisdom and revelation, and he ties this very firmly to our receiving the “words…which the Holy Spirit teaches” (2:13). He immediately turns from these observations to an outright confrontation with the carnality of the Corinthians, attributing it to the shallowness of their intake of God’s Word (“not able to receive [solid food],” 3:2; see also Heb. 5:12-14).
The demanding truth of this passage is that no amount of supposed spiritual insight or experience reflects genuine spiritual growth, if it is separated from our basic growth in the knowledge of God’s Word in the Bible. Without this rootedness in the Word, we may be deluded about our growth. Such “rootedness” is in truth and love, not merely in learning knowledge or accomplished study. In order to experience true spiritual growth, we must spend time in the Word and separate ourselves from the hindrances of lovelessness, competitiveness, and strife.
11. Loving God’s Word as Jesus’ Follower (John 14:21). Jesus completely aligned His life and will with the Father’s (8:29), which indicates His total allegiance to the Father’s Word and commandments. He also said He disapproved of any attitude that would reduce respect for or teach less than full obedience to the entirety of God’s revealed Word (Matt. 5:17-19). Thus, in this text, when He explicitly links His disciples’ love for Him as Savior with their will to keep His commandments, we conclude Jesus’ clear intent: If we love Him, we will love His Father’s Word, also.
In John 5:39 our Lord declares that the knowledge of the Scriptures is the pathway to knowing Him well. Further, upon His resurrection, He unveiled the fullness of His own Person as revealed in the Old Testament (Luke 24:27). These texts cluster to teach us that to follow Christ, to know Him, and to grow in insight as people walking with the Resurrected Lord, a basic and continuing requirement is a steadfast commitment to hearing, heeding, and studying the Bible.
12. God’s Word: Purifier unto Holy Living (James 1:23-25). Purity of life is not a quest for perfection as much as it is a quest for liberation from those things that may inhibit effectiveness and reduce power-filled living. This text shows the Word of God as a means of reflection—a mirror into which we are to look and see ourselves. The call is not only to heed what we see and accept the Bible’s corrective instruction, but there is an unwritten lesson here. We should avoid the temptation to see (and judge) others in the Word, analyzing what they ought to do, instead of what we need to do. Second Corinthians 3:18 also likens God’s Word to a mirror, but describes the image seen as no less than the Lord Jesus Himself. The sum of the two texts: The Bible shows us Christ’s likeness in order that we may measure our conduct and character against His and allow God to shape us into Christ’s likeness (Rom. 8:29). Other promises for cleansing through God’s Word: Jeremiah 29:9 speaks of the “fire” in the Word, which can purge as well as ignite; and Psalm 119:9 holds special promise to the one who wants a pure life of holy power. God’s Word is a powerful, cleansing, delivering agent.
13. God’s Word, Evangelism, and Expansion (Is. 55:10-11). Evangelism (the spreading of the Good News) and expansion (the enlarging of life’s potential under God) both multiply by the “seed” of God’s Word. Jesus described the Word as “seed” also (Luke 8:11), the source of all saving life and growth possibilities transmitted from the Father to humankind. All increase of life within His love comes by His Word, as human response gives place for His blessing. When received, God’s word of promise will never be barren. The power in His Word will always fulfill the promise of His Word. We never need wonder how faith is developed or how fruitfulness is realized. Faith comes by “hearing” God’s Word (Rom. 10:17), that is, by receiving it wholeheartedly and humbly. Fruitfulness is the guaranteed by-product—whether for the salvation of a lost soul or the provision of a disciple’s need—God’s Word cannot be barren or fruitless: His own life-power is within it!
14. God’s Word: Read It! Study It! Memorize It! (2 Tim. 2:15). The Bible—God’s inspired Word—is the only conclusive source of wisdom, knowledge, and understanding concerning ultimate realities. It is a fountainhead of freeing truth (John 8:32) and a goldmine of practical principles (Ps. 19:10), waiting to liberate and/or enrich the person who will pursue its truth and wealth. Thus, Paul’s instruction to “be diligent…a worker” has been applied by serious Christians through the centuries as a directive to study the Word of God. The only way to healthy, balanced living is through the “rightly dividing” (Greek orthotomounta, literally, “cutting straight”) of God’s Word. Such correct, straight-on application of God’s Word is the result of diligent study. The text calls us beyond casual approaches to the Scriptures, telling us to refuse to suit the Bible to our own convenience or ideology.
In his earlier words (1 Tim. 4:13) Paul also told Timothy, “Give attention to reading [God’s Word],” but now he emphasizes studying like a “worker” (from Greek ergon—“toil, effort”). Psalm 119:11 urges memorizing of the Word of God as a mighty deterrent against sin. Memorizing the Scripture also provides an immediate availability of God’s “words” as a sword, ready in witnessing and effective in spiritual warfare (Heb. 4:12; Eph. 6:17).
Hayford, J. W., & Thomas Nelson Publishers. (1995). Hayford’s Bible handbook.
See also: A Reflection on Psalm 119 which I'm still adding to as I can. Please also check out the How to Study the Bible; Devotionals & Plans Forum for more information about studying God's Word, as no Christian can live without studying it daily. When we are not doing that, we are living in sin, for the Lord commands us to study His Word daily. If we don't know all of His Word, then we can't know Him as He wants us to, or know His Will for us, or how He wants us to live our life.
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