Live the Word

Have you ever felt as if you needed to keep the fact that you are a Christian a secret? What if people found out? Are they going to make fun of me? Will the stop being my friend and turn against me? The Bible is full of stories of prophets being killed, Jeremiah writings were burned by the king, Daniel was thrown into the lion’s den. Peter crucified upside down. John boiled in oil then imprisoned on an island. Paul was beaten, shipwrecked, flogged, imprisoned, and the list goes on. Back when I was in Jr. High the English teacher gave us a choice of two things to write on. I chose to write on the verse in Proverbs about pride going before a fall. When I got my paper back the teacher had given me a grade of A++. There was a group of girls who had been bullying me since the 6th grade at it was to no surprise that when they heard what the teacher said as she handed the paper back to me that would have something to say about it. Since I was the only one in the class that chose to write on the Bible verse they assumed I did it to get in with the teacher. I would hear taunts of “Teacher’s pet.” when I would walk past them. I never responded to them so eventually, they gave up. I was not ashamed of my choice to write on. They would never accept the reason that I didn’t want to write on the other choice because I thought it was boring. Even if I did write on that instead of the Bible verse and got a better grade than them they would still do the same thing. Yet people don’t like the Bible and what it has to say even when the Bible has a lot to say about how to live life. So, why then do people hate to hear the Word of God?

It could be that they don’t want to face the facts about themselves. The writer in Hebrews 4:12 ESV, states,

For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

OUCH! That hurts. As we break it down the first thing we see is God’s Word is sharper than any weapon known to man. A weapon not only for offense but also defense. It is capable of separating the soul from the spirit. The times when the pastor is teaching and you swear that he had bugged your house that we. Maybe it was a message that just moved you to tears. If you have dislocated a joint or donated bone marrow you know how painful that can be. Maybe, what really gets to people is that the Word of God knows our thought and intentions which means there is nothing we can hide from God.

There are some people that believe parts of the Bible no longer apply to today.

The entirety of Your word is truth,
And every one of Your righteous judgments endures forever. 

Psalm 119:160 NKJV

But that is the Old Testament.  Fine. Jesus said in Matthew 24:35 ESV,

Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.

It is through the Word of God that we become ready and able to walk through this world, 2 Timothy 3:16-17,

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

What do we do with God’s Word? There are two things. We read, study, and memorize the Bible, Psalm 119:11 ESV,

I have stored up your word in my heart,that I might not sin against you.

Most of all we live it out, James 1:22 ESV,

But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.

 

(Photo by Sarah Noltner on Unsplash)