“It
is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I
speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.” John 6:63
The Word of God saved my life.
Personal, habitual Bible reading saved my life. During a long space of my teenage years I
relied on the euphoria of meetings (that meaning the emotional experience that
comes from attending church), and the attraction of the “youth group” social
atmosphere to keep me from falling.
Personal Bible reading was a practice, but it was not habitual, and it
did not influence my life. Please let me
pause for just a moment and say that I am not against church or the gathering
of youth, only that like Martha, when you begin to put secondary things
primary……problems arise. Blessings and
emotion that come from attending church are the byproduct of a strong spiritual
experience, but not the very experience itself.
Likewise, the social experience that comes with spending time with your
brothers and sisters in the faith is beneficial to your walk with God (I
believe); however it is not the bread that will sustain the spiritual man. Due to the fact that meetings and
“hanging-out” were the pillars that supported my house of cards, I frequented
both, testifying and preaching not to save the lost, but because it was “what
we did”. However, if you could x-ray my
spiritual man you would find a heart that burned with but a little flame……So,
why am I bringing this up?
I believe that many Christians today are in this same
condition. Salvation is not in the
social, nor is it divorced from it. What
brings about solid soldiers for the cause of Christ is…..no surprise here, a
commitment to God and God’s Word; a commitment to taking time for it, to
studying it, and to living it. If this
is done, I believe it will “iron out” a lot of the fringe issues that plague
the Church- i.e. church attendance, relationship incompetence, gossip, clicks,
church participation, decline in evangelism, watered down preaching, pride,
politics, etc. Not only that, it will do
more for the Church than we probably can imagine. The Word of God saved my life; and the lives
of countless others. The Word
strengthens the inner man, the inner man is the individual, and the individual
is the Church. If your inner man is
strong, the Church is strong, if you’re inner man is weak, the church is weak. “Therefore
whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto
a wise man, which built his house upon a rock: And the rain descended, and the
floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for
it was founded upon a rock.” (Matthew: 24-25)
How do we hear God? We
hear him through the Word (among other avenues). Jesus was the Word and the Word was made
flesh and dwelt among us. He was the messenger
when we hear him, we hear God. He speaks
the will of the Father; through the
vehicle of the Holy Ghost, and when you get the Holy Ghost inside it will open
the scriptures to you and teach you all things (1 John 2:27). But we have to read them, we have to hear
them, we have to do them; or the house will not stand. So I ask you, as I ask myself: What are we emphasizing in our own
lives? What are we standing on? What are we stressing to those that come
behind us? Not with our words, but with
our lives.
