More Wonderful Wonders of the Word
“Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law.” v. 18
“…I shall talk of thy wondrous works.” v. 27
“Thy testimonies are wonderful...” v. 129
Last time we looked at three “wonders” of the Word of God. We saw:
1. It’s a supernatural book
because God Himself is its author.
2. It’s a spiritual book
because the Holy Spirit helps us to truly understand it.
3. It’s the Savior’s book
Jesus was very clear what He believed of the Scriptures and the Scriptures reveal Him in every book.
In this study, we’ll discover 4 more wonders of this Book, which set it apart from and above all others.
4. It is a sovereign book.
When it comes to spiritual matters, the Bible is supreme in its authority. The Bible, not human reason, is our final authority for how to live.
WHY NOT CONSCIENCE?
We’ve often heard the phrase “let your conscience be your guide.” But your conscience is like a sundial—it’s not an infallible guide. It only works when a supreme authority (like the sun) shines on it, giving a fixed point of reference. Relying on your conscience would be like going out at night with a flashlight and shining it on the sundial to determine the time. That would depend on where you were standing when you held the flashlight! Don’t look at the Bible with the flashlight of human opinion. The Bible has—and is—a fixed point of reference, because the Creator is its author.
WHY NOT TRADITION?
We’re back in the same boat as with conscience. Traditions are not the authority, for—like conscience—they come from human ideas and reasoning.
There is a great illustration of this in Mark 7:13. The Pharisees and scribes have been following Jesus throughout the day. They don’t like what they see, for Jesus and His disciples have not been following traditions. They ask Jesus to explain Himself. He begins in verse 6 to show them that their traditions have been an escape hatch to keep from truly honoring God with a heart of obedience.
Jesus continues to firmly address the matter through verse 23. There was no doubt how He felt about this issue as demonstrated in verse 13.
“Making the Word of God of none effect, through your tradition, which you have delivered, and many such like things do ye.” (v. 13)
a. Through their ______________, they are making the Word of God of _____________.
How bold would one be to elevate human tradition above the divinely inspired Word of God!
If you turn to Psalm 138:2, you will read the significance of God’s Word.
“I will worship toward Thy holy temple, and praise Thy name, for Thy lovingkindness and for Thy truth; for Thou hast magnified Thy word above all Thy name.”
b. God says He has magnified His Word above _______ ________ ___________.
Throughout the Bible we read that God’s name is high and exalted. Yet He says in this verse that He has magnified His Word even above His name. A man and his word may be different in this dishonest world, but God and His Word are the same. And if you can bank on God, you can bank on the Word of God. This book is a sovereign book. Don’t take the Bible and parade it past the bar of human judgment to see if you agree with it or not.
Someone once said about the Bible: “God said it, I believe it, that settles it.” No, the better approach is: “God said it, that settles it,” for it is settled, whether you believe it or not.
Look at Psalm119:89 -
c.“_______________, O Lord, Thy _______is ____________ in _____________.”
5. It is a surviving book.
How long will the Word of God last? Will it one day fade to secondary status, as the writings of some past great thinkers have done?
Every now and then we hear about some new theory as to how the universe began, or someone has found a hidden, esoteric book. It becomes a flash in the pan, then people forget about it. The Word of God just keeps on going on.
What is Jesus speaking of in these two references?
a. Matthew 24:35
“Heaven and earth shall pass away, but _____ ________ shall not pass away.”
b. Matthew 5:18
“For verily I say unto you, Till ____________ and _________ pass, one jot or one tittle shall in ______ ________ pass from the law until all be fulfilled.”
c. What does the apostle Peter have to say in 1 Peter 1:24-25?
“…The grass withereth and the flower thereof falleth away, but the _________ of the __________ endureth [how long?] _______________.”
When the earth becomes a cinder and the stars splinter and fade, the Word of God will still be in existence. It doesn’t change. It survives.
We hold in our hands an incredible document, some parts of which are literally thousands of years old. Yet here we are in the 21st Century, the nuclear age, still finding help, comfort and wisdom from this Book of the Ages. Ponder this wonderful description from the late Dr. R. G. Lee:
“Enemy noise has not silenced one warning. The enemy’s black smoke has not dimmed one bright hope. All its enemies have not torn one blemish in its snow-white vesture, nor stolen one flower from its wonderful garden, nor diluted one drop of honey from its abundant hive, nor broken one string on its thousand-stringed harp, nor drowned one sweet word in infidel ink. The enemy has not plucked one petal from the Rose of Sharon, nor imposed one stain upon her purity.”
6. It is a sustaining book.
Not only does the Bible survive, but it enables us to survive. It sustains us. Just as you are physically sustained by physical nutrients, you are spiritually sustained by the Word of God.
a. Jesus explained this in Matthew 4:4.
“….man shall not live by ___________ alone, but by every __________ that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.”
Every word from the Word is to your spirit what bread is to your body.
b. Job proclaims his feelings in chapter 23, verse 12:
“…I have esteemed the words of His mouth more than ___________________ __________________________________.”
c. Look at the importance of the Word in 1 Peter 2:2:
“As newborn babes, desire the __________________________ of the _______, that you may grow thereby.”
The reason why we have so many “baby Christians” who remain babies is because they’re not growing. They don’t feed upon the Word of God.
Is it your heart’s desire to be a growing Christian, a mature Christian, one with power? Listen to Dr. R. A. Torrey on this subject:
“Oh, you may talk about power, but if you neglect the one book that God has given you as the one instrument through which He imparts and exercises His power, you will not have it. Ninety-nine Christians in every hundred are merely playing at Bible study. And therefore, ninety-nine Christians in every hundred are mere weaklings when they might be giants, both in their Christian life and in their service.”
Weakling or giant? The answer depends on time spent in the Word of God.
7. It is a supercharged book.
It has incredible power.
a. Jesus speaks of this power in John 6:63.
“It is the spirit that___________________; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are ______________, and they are ____________.”
b. This description written in Hebrews 4:12 is powerful:
“For the word of God is ____________, and __________________, and __________ than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a __________________ of the _____________ and intents of the _____________.”
The word “quick” here does not mean the speed at which the Bible touches your heart.
A CLOSER LOOK AT “QUICK” and “POWERFUL”
The word quick here comes from the Greek word zao, which literally means alive, the same word we get “zoology” or “zoo” from. It speaks of living things. It’s alive. It breathes. It sings. It pulsates with life.
The word powerful comes from the Greek word energes. It’s the word we get our word energy from.
Hebrews 4:12 tells us the Bible is alive and pulsates with power.
ANOTHER WORD FOR POWER
In the book of Romans, Paul uses another word for power in describing the Word of God. Turn to Romans 1:16.
“For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth…”
This time when the apostle Paul wrote “power,” he used the Greek word dunamis, the word we get dynamite from.
The dynamite of God is in this Book. It is powerful. I’ve seen it happen time after time…the “dunamis” of the Word comes into a person’s heart, and that person is powerfully transformed. It is “piercing” (verse 12), able to penetrate and scrutinize the innermost part of your personality.
In these last two opportunities to “Dig Deeper” in the Word, we’ve listed seven Wonders of the Word of God—but we’ve only scratched the surface of the ways His Word is wonderful.
As we close this study, join me in thanking God for the wonders of His Word:
Father, we thank You again for Your Word. We stand, dear Lord, not only in awe, but humbled. We confess our lack of study, appreciation, appropriation, and application of Your Word. We commit our hearts to You afresh to know it, love it, practice it, and ponder it in a better way. Please help us to do that, Lord, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
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