THE WORD OF GOD
THE WORD OF GOD
Hebrews 4: 12, 13; 1 Peter 1: 23 - 25; Luke 8: 19 - 21
These scriptures speak of the Word of God, a title which is applied to the Lord Jesus Christ. It is said of Him in the book of Revelation that His name is called the Word of God. That will enable us to understand this expression in Hebrews 4, that “the word of God is living and operative”, and that is something which in a living way was seen in the service of Christ here on earth. The woman at the well of Sychar is a type of this; her inner state was penetrated by the Word so that she could say that He had told her all things she ever did. The Word of God has always that effect when it has access to the heart. It has a searching character, but at the same time an edifying effect, and thus it is said that “the worlds were framed by the word of God”,
Hebrews 11: 3. There is a difference that we should notice between the commandment of God and the word of God. As to the physical creation it says in Psalm 33: 9, “Forhe spoke, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast”. What He spoke brought out His thoughts and leads us to the book of Proverbs as to creation; there we read that Wisdom was present in connection with His acts in establishing the universe. God’s thoughts were revealed and set forth in creation, so in Hebrews 11: 3 it says, “By faith we apprehend that the worlds were framed by the word of God”. But what was thus made in wisdom remains. The commandment is with authority. It must remain. Therefore if any believer is in evil associations, the commandment comes first; that is, you must not remain in them. It is not your own free choice; it is a settled thing that you have to leave such associations. When I, according to God’s commandment, leave evil associations the word of [p. 2] God becomes operative. It comes to my soul in living power and it searches me, as it says, until it divides soul and spirit, joints and marrow, and discerns the thoughts and intents of the heart. By this we understand, beloved brethren, the difference we must make between God’s commandment and God’s word. The word spoken of in this chapter alludes to the glad tidings that were brought back by the spies from the land of Canaan. We all remember that twelve spies were appointed by Moses to go and spy out the land. In type it would mean that they would bring back the tidings of heaven. The Holy Spirit in our time corresponds to their testimony then. This testimony of the Spirit has specially in mind the gospel which was entrusted to Paul. It is not only the gospel of our salvation, but the glad tidings of the glory of the blessed God (1 Timothy 1: 11). That is to say it involves the whole of Luke’s gospel. Not only am I saved from the judgment of God and from this world, but the name of the believer is recorded in heaven. Therefore the testimony of the twelve spies contains the tidings which have come from heaven by the Spirit, as Peter says, “which have now been announced to you by those who have declared to you the glad tidings by the Holy Spirit, sent from heaven”, 1 Peter 1: 12.
Twelve spies were sent out and when they came back their collective testimony was that the land was good. Later ten of them denied their testimony but Caleb and Joshua kept to it, so that there was in Caleb and Joshua a complete testimony as to the land. It also says that they carried with them a cluster of grapes from the valley of Eshcol and this was borne between two on a pole. The testimony was therefore not only in words but there was proof in the fruit that they brought with them from the land. And, beloved brethren, it is of great interest that in the chapter where all this is recorded (Numbers 13) it says that Moses changed Hoshea’s name to Jehoshua, which means Jehovah the Saviour. He is a type of the Lord Jesus Christ as one of the witnesses; Caleb is the other witness. We have therefore in the Person of Jesus and in the Holy Spirit sent from heaven a double witness of the riches of heaven. The Lord says to Nicodemus, “If I have said the earthly things to you, and ye believe not, how, if I say the heavenly things to you, will ye believe?” And then He says, “And no one has gone up into heaven, save he who came down out of heaven, the Son of man who is in heaven”. Beloved brethren, what a perfect witness we have in the Person of Jesus. He says, We speak that which we know, and we bear witness of that which we have seen. This speaker was not only One who had come down from heaven, but He is in heaven. And then the Holy Spirit is sent down by Him from heaven. That is to say that the Holy Spirit has come down from a heaven where Jesus is. How precious this is to our hearts! We have the name of Jesus in Numbers 13, and in Acts 7:55 Stephen sees Jesus, the glory of God and Jesus in heaven.
And when He speaks it is, “I Jesus”. Beloved brethren, the testimony is of heaven, where Jesus is. And His presence there is the earnest of our presence there also because He will come again and take us to Himself. The whole assembly shall be caught up together as is said, “God ... has raised us up together, and has made us sit down together in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus”, Ephesians 2:4 - 6. But whilst it is true that we shall be caught up together, it is also a blessed truth that every individual saint has his name recorded in heaven. Every one will be acknowledged there. The Lord says Himself, “Rejoice that your names are written in the heavens”, Luke 10:20. Another thing which is mentioned in Numbers 13 and to which I want to refer is Hebron. It says in that chapter that Hebron was built seven years before [p. 4] Zoan in Egypt. There are grouped together, therefore, in this chapter, the thoughts of Jesus and of a world which existed before this world was, of which Hebron is a type. It was built seven years before Zoan in Egypt. Zoan was a place of the wisdom of Egypt, a place where the glory of Egypt was, the glory of this world; but God has prepared for us things and wisdom which were before the world’s foundation. “Things which eye has not seen, and ear not heard, and which have not come into man’s heart, which God has prepared for them that love him”, 1 Corinthians 2: 9. But they are revealed; God has revealed them to us by His Spirit, for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God. We see therefore that we have a perfect testimony of what is in heaven. Have we, beloved brethren, believed this? That is the issue in Hebrews 4. Hence the exhortation in verse 11: “Let us therefore use diligence to enter into that rest, that no one may fall after the same example of not hearkening to the word”. We are tested by the word of God as it reveals to us what is in heaven, and therefore we get the next verse which shows us what the word of God is and how it searches us. He says it is living and operative. It divides soul and spirit, joints and marrow. One would ask what those joints are. We cannot go or turn without the joint; and the marrow is the life of the bones. Here we see the actual frame of our being, and the inner power which sets the bones in movement. The Word of God penetrates every movement, and that which causes the movement.
The epistle to the Romans teaches us that our bodies should be presented as a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God. When we then, as we see in Hebrews 4, are exposed to ourselves, not to others, but to ourselves, and when we judge ourselves in relation to it, the blessedness of the priesthood of Christ is available to us, as it says, “Having therefore a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God”. The Word of God, by exposing us to ourselves, shows us how feeble we are, but at the same time how strong He is, and that we have such a high Priest, Jesus, the Son of God who has passed through the heavens. Therefore we can approach with boldness to the throne of grace and receive mercy and find grace for seasonable help.
Instead of turning back as the Israelites were doing in resistance against the word of God, we subject ourselves to the love which is ours, and determine to go forward in the assurance that our high priest will be with us to the end. It is beautiful to dwell on Caleb’s and Joshua’s testimony. It was no hurried survey they made in Canaan and it was not one-sided. There were twelve of them and they remained in the land forty days. They brought back with them the bunch of grapes as an evidence of the fertility of the land. The words of Caleb and Joshua are beautiful. They said, “The land, which we passed through to search it out, is a very, very good land. If Jehovah delight in us, he will bring us into this land, and give it us, a land that flows with milk and honey; only rebel not against Jehovah”. These verses contain, as you see, a loving offer to the people. God has provided the means which we need to enter the land. He has delight in us. How wonderful to think that God delights in us, that He loves us so much that He has provided such a land for us. Beloved brethren, let this land be our longing; our great high priest is prepared to help us right to the end.
Let us now look at our scripture in Peter. I want to point out that inward formation takes place alongside the exercises we have just spoken about. Peter says that we are born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the living and abiding word of God. If a word of God exposes the activity of the [p. 6] flesh in me to enable me to judge it, the word at the same time forms me so that I am clothed with the character of God, so that it can be said of me that I am born again by the living and abiding word of God. You will all remember how the Lord alludes to new birth in John’s gospel. He does not there speak about the word, but emphasises the necessity of being born again. This side of the truth is stressed because of the Jews’ claim to be children of Abraham. They said, “Abraham is our father”, John 8: 39. They claimed this. In John the Lord stresses the necessity for them to be born again. Therefore, whatever my parents or my forefathers might have been, whatever glory might have been attached to them or however pious they might have been, I must be born again. As an answer to Nicodemus’s question the Lord refers to being born of water and of Spirit. This is an act of God. To be born again by the word of God is also exclusively an act of God. This in Peter though goes much further. It is not only to be born of water and Spirit but by the living and abiding word of God. The word of God had such an effect in me, that it can be said of me that I am born again by it, and the evidence of it is that I become partaker of the nature and character of God as it says, “Having purified your souls by obedience to the truth to unfeigned brotherly love, love one another out of a pure heart fervently”, 1 Peter 1: 22.
From this we understand, beloved brethren, that while Hebrews 4 would help us to go into Canaan as those who believe a testimony which has come down from heaven, this chapter in Peter would show us that we on the way should be marked by brotherly love, which is a result of the effect of the word of God in us, so that it can be said that we are born again by it. Therefore if I love the brethren from this viewpoint, I know why I do it. My intelligence has been formed by the word of God. To be born [p. 7] again according to John 3 involves instinct; what is born of the Spirit is spirit. A newborn babe has a natural instinct; it clings to its mother, but it does not have intelligence. It could not explain why it is clinging to its mother. Instinct is a feature of our nature which is of greatest importance. But when we come to this epistle the thought is not of a newborn babe, but of a person who has intelligence. I am born again by the living and abiding word of God. The word is the mind of God which has been working in me. It is not only an act of power after His own pleasure as by the Spirit in John 3, but by the word having entrance into my soul. Peter says, “This is the word which in the glad tidings is preached to you”. In this we find an indication of what we have before us. The glad tidings, which is the word of God, is planted into us and is able to save our souls, but it is even more than this; it forms me so that it can be said of me that I am born of God, that I, in that sense, am a child of God. John speaks of us being children as having received Christ: “but as many as received him, to them gave he the right to be children of God, to those that believe on his name”, but he continues and says, “who have been born, not of blood, nor of flesh’s will, nor of man’s will, but of God”, John 1: 12, 13. Here in Peter we have how this birth took place, by the living and abiding word of God. From this we understand that a person born in the way this scripture presents, is intelligent. He loves, and he knows why he loves. If anybody should ask him why he loves the brethren, he could tell them. A noble is made to love a poor man. How can this be explained? It is by the living and abiding word of God; it has had its effect on the poor man as well as on the nobleman. The noble knows why he loves the poor man, and the poor man knows why he loves the noble. They are both born again by the living and abiding word of God; the noble therefore [p. 8] knows what it says in this scripture, that “all flesh is as grass, and all its glory as the flower of grass”. We see how Luke speaks of Theophilus in his first narrative, Luke’s gospel. He writes to him as the most excellent Theophilus. He had the right, through the ordering of God, to this title, and Luke understood this by the word of God. The word of God would never nourish or promote socialism or Bolshevism. Luke speaks of this man as the most excellent Theophilus. But, beloved brethren, on the other side Luke was really more excellent than Theophilus. Yet Theophilus had in the ordering of God a place in this world that Luke did not have. But when Luke writes to him the second time, he leaves out the title. Theophilus had obviously considered the thought of being born again by the living and abiding word of God, and he had received the understanding that through this birth he was brought to the level where Luke and all christians are. The more we understand what it is to be born by the living and abiding word of God, the more mutual we will be, as it says, “The rich and poor meet together; Jehovah is the maker of them all”, Proverbs 22: 2. Yet it is not, as in the last-mentioned scripture, that we are made or created, but that we are born. That cannot be said of mere physical things; they are created, not born. Think of what it means to be born of God, of that which opens up His thoughts to us, that which in truth reveals His nature and His counsel, the living and abiding word of God! It is in this way we enter into Canaan as the family of God, the children of God. Luke 8 would help us further to understand what we have had before us. What we have been looking at up till now, refers to the acts of God. If one is to be born again by the Spirit as in John 3, or to be born again by the word of God as in Peter, it is God’s act. What we have in Luke 8 speaks of what I do in regard to the word of God.
The Lord’s mother and His brethren came to Him, and He got the message: “Thy mother and thy brethren stand without, wishing to see thee”. Why did they not go in? Why did they stand outside? Those born by the living and abiding word of God, will go inside. By this I do not mean that they were not born again by the living and abiding word of God, because they are later seen in the company of the christians, but in this scripture they only represent natural relationships and the Lord refuses that. Natural relationships have no value in the light of the spiritual world. Here we have the best of natural relationships, the mother of Jesus and His brethren.
Why should they be outside? It is just because they are not governed by spiritual feelings or sympathies. Take as an example unbelieving children of believing parents or an unbelieving wife or husband. Such children have a certain affection for their parents, and a wife for her husband or a husband for his wife, but it does not go very far. Such are outside. The natural will never lead us to Jesus. Maybe some would go a certain way on account of natural love; maybe you would go to the meeting because your parents go. Thank God for that. But that in itself will not bring you to Jesus. You are still without, and you want to see Him without. You want Him to come out. As soon as the word of God has its effect in you, you will not ask Him to come out, you will go in. When His mother and His brethren were outside, and it was told Him that they wanted to see Him, we see that He repudiates this relationship.
But who are His mother and His brethren? The Lord answers this Himself: “My mother and my brethren are those who hear the word of God and do it”. How serious it then is to have relationships with those who belong to the Lord, with those who bear the word of God and do it, and yet be denied by the Lord. The natural relationship is repudiated, and if [p. 10] the Lord Jesus should come tonight, your natural relationship would be of no help to you. You would be left here and your parents would be taken. Only those who have a spiritual link with Christ will go to heaven. The natural links have no value in this relation. What serious things the Lord would have to say to you. “I do not know you whence are ye”. He therefore shows us here what gives us true relationship with Himself, hearing the word of God and doing it. We see therefore, beloved brethren, how the brethren of Christ come into view in this gospel. In Matthew and Mark it is by doing the will of God, but in Luke they come into view by hearing the word of God and doing it. It is therefore not only like a picture on the wall, but it is a reality to most of us. There are such here that are marked by hearing the word of God and doing it, and are therefore known to be in the most intimate relationship with Christ. He says, “My mother and my brethren”.
Is there anyone here who is outside of this matter? It is a serious thing. Maybe in a natural way you love your parents and your brothers and sisters very much, but this gives you no standing in the heavenly family. The Lord says, “My mother and my brethren are those who hear the word of God and do it”.
I trust that what has been said at this time would help us to understand the importance of the word of God, so that we might not be found as those who reject the heavenly land, but that we might go forward into it. It says in Hebrews 10: 38: “And, if he draw back, my soul does not take pleasure in him”, but then it says in verse 39, “But we are not drawers back to perdition”. We go into Canaan as those who are born of God, by the living and abiding word of God, and who already are the children of God, as it says, “See what love the Father has given to us, that we should be called the children of God”, 1 John 3: 1. And we are known already as being brethren of Christ by hearing the word of God and doing it.