The Word of God is powerful

For the word of God [is] quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged 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. (Hebrews 4:12).

It says in the above verse that the Word of God is powerful. What does that mean? Let's look at it in more detail. Powerful here is the Greek word energes. We recognize the modern words "energy" and "energetic", which come from energes. If something is full of energy or someone is energetic, we immediately think of action. Something is being done or someone is doing something.
The Word of God is like that - it does something, all the time and every time.
When God created the heaven and the earth, He used words. God said, and things happened. Has God changed? No, He is the same yesterday, today and forever (see Hebrews 13:8). If His Word was active and achieved what He willed then, His Word is still active and achieves what He wills today. Does God walk around on the earth saying things today? No. Today you and I are the ones God has sent to proclaim His Word. His Word in our mouths has the same power today as His Word in His mouth had then. Amazing? Absolutely!
The question that comes to mind, is of course: If God's Word is as powerful, i.e. so full of energy and active as if God Himself spoke, why don't we see more of God's acts around us?
Good question.
I believe the reason is that we don't believe that God's Word works. We don't have faith in His Word.
You see, for God's Word to work and achieve what it is sent to achieve, it needs to be backed by faith. It's not enough to recite "by His stripes I am healed", and then leave it at that. You need to believe that by Jesus' stripes you were really healed. You need to say it with force, not necessarily with a loud voice, but with a firm conviction.
Faith comes by hearing (see Romans 10:17), and the more you say God's Word, the more you hear it and the more you believe it.
To encourage you to exercise you faith muscle and say God's Word on a daily and continuous basis, remember that
EVERY WORD FROM THE BIBLE IS FILLED WITH THE SAME POWER THAT RESURRECTED CHRIST FROM THE DEAD AND CREATED THE UNIVERSE.
Now that is Good News! That is powerful news!
 

Faith - how it developes

It's some time since my last post. It's due to summer and lots of activity. But I believe I will be coming back with more posts this fall.

Today I want to take a look at faith and see how it developes. Let's start by reading from Romans 4;19-20:

Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead - since he was about a hundred years old - and that Sarah's womb was also dead. Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God ...

Abraham was an old man when God told him he was going to become a father and his old wife would be the mother. How would you and I have reacted in the same situation? We probably would have laughed it away with a shrug, and gone one with our lives as before. But not Abraham. In the two verses above, we see that he took 3 steps that led to Isak's miracle birth:

1. He faced the facts
2. He did not waver
3. His faith was strengthened through his persistence

1. What facts did he face? The facts that his body was as good as dead (today we would probably say that he was impotent), and that his wife was past the age of child-bearing. She had gone through menopause.
2. In spite of these obstacles, he did not waver. What does that mean? He held fast to God's promise in spite of the physical evidences.
3. In stead of thinking in his mind that he was impotent and his wife was past the age of child-bearing, he was thinking of God's promise. "God will give me a son. God is going to bless my wife and me with a son." These thoughts threngthened his faith and led to them having Isak.

I am reminded of a couple of verses from 2 Chorintians 4:17-18:

For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

The clue is where we fix our eyes (meaning our thoughts, our attention). For Abraham, the seen were the actual facts of age, but the unseen was God's promise: their son. Abraham fixed his eyes on God's promise. Where do you fix your eyes?