The Power of God's Word

 

The Vision of the Valley of Dry Bones, Gustave Doré, 1866

One of the most significant and powerful tools we have in fighting addiction and living a life of righteousness is the Word of God. Often, we enter the struggle with the world, the flesh, and the devil as if it is an armed conflict and we must overcome them by strength of will alone. We believe if we just try harder then we can overcome. But we can never have enough willpower to overcome the devil, because he doesn't come at us that way. Satan always comes at us sideways, with lies and deception. He didn't overcome Eve by wrestling her into submission, no, he told her what she wanted to hear. He fed her honey-coated lies, and she swallowed them one by one until she had eaten the forbidden fruit and plunged the world into chaos.

In order to effectively fight the lies of Satan and the addiction we must have the truth. The reason the Word of God is so effective is because it is the Truth. Not a truth. Not your truth or my truth, it is the Truth. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."(John 1:1) The Greek word translated "Word" there is "logos", which essentially means truth. From the beginning of time the Truth of God's Word has existed unaltered and unchangeable as the centuries have rolled by. Man may change, but God's Word does not. Empires rise and fall, but God's Word remains steadfast and sure. The prophet Isaiah said it like this, "The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand forever."(Isaiah 40:8) The sands of time shift and roll, but God's Word endures. It never alters or deviates. It stands firm. It is a rock undaunted. It provides us a sure foundation upon which we can build our lives.

There is power and authority in the Word of God. "For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged 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) That word "quick" means "alive" or "lively."  The Bible is not a dried-up old textbook, it is alive and filled with energy that can stir our hearts and awaken our minds. The Word of God can pierce into the deepest parts of our being and cut through the lies that the enemy has tied us up with. Many times, those lies run deep, and have their roots in the very core of our being, but the Word of God can probe those depths and dig them out. Many of these false beliefs are in connection to our identity and sense of worth, which we have discussed in other posts. The Word of God opens our understanding so that we come to understand who we are in Christ. Many times, we are blind to our own thoughts and motives. We don't really know why we are doing what we are doing. We continue to act out compulsively and we can't explain it. But then there are times we read a passage of Scripture or hear a sermon and we suddenly realize how our selfishness and other character defects have been driving our behaviors and we find the space to repent. The Word awakens us to our pride, selfishness, greed, lust, and envy and forces us to confront them.

The power of the Word of God lies in the fact that it transforms our hearts and minds. It changes our thinking and desires. As our hearts and minds are changed, our behaviors and our habits change. As our habits change so do our lives.

This is not an instantaneous process, even for someone like me who has been a student of the Word for nearly forty years, it has taken at least that long to learn and to live many of the principles taught in Scripture. There is still much more for me to learn. Willingness is always a great hurdle, too often we stubbornly resist what God wants to do in our hearts. We don't want to change. Even if we are willing, it still takes time. There are many dark recesses in our soul where sin and sickness lie, and it take time to explore them all. But the greater our willingness to allow God to change us, the more power the Word of God has to change us.

The nation of Israel had fallen into a desperate situation, they had been defeated by invading armies and exiled in strange lands. But God had sent the prophet Ezekiel to preach to them a message of great hope, a key part of that was his vision of the valley of dry bones (Ezekiel 37):

"1 The hand of the Lord was upon me, and carried me out in the spirit of the Lord and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones,

2 And caused me to pass by them round about: and behold, there were very many in the open valley; and, lo, they were very dry.

3 And he said unto me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, thou knowest.

4 Again he said unto me, Prophesy upon these bones, and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the word of the Lord.

5 Thus saith the Lord God unto these bones; Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you and ye shall live:

6 And I will lay sinews upon you, and will bring up flesh upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you and ye shall live; and ye shall know that I am the Lord.

7 So I prophesied as I was commanded: and as I prophesied, there was a noise, and behold a shaking, and the bones came together, bone to his bone.

8 And when I beheld, lo, the sinews and the flesh came upon them, and the skin covered them above: but there was no breath in them.

9 Then said he unto me, Prophesy unto the wind, prophesy, son of man, and say to the wind, Thus saith the Lord God; Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.

10 So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood upon their feet, an exceeding great army."

God was promising the people of Israel that through his Word, their graves would be opened, he would fill them with his spirit and bring them back to life.

This is what God wants to do with us as well. What stands out to me is verse 2, "they were very dry."  There have been many times in the addiction when I have felt like I was little more than a dusty skeleton shambling aimlessly along. But God promises us here that if we will allow his Word and his Spirit to fill us, he will give us new life. The primary way he does this is through his Word. If we are diligent to read and study his Word, to fill our hearts and minds with it, we will find new life and new strength to move out of sin and addiction and into a life of peace, joy, and flourishing. We will know the Truth and the Truth will set us free.