A Pepper Grinder Post

Living and Active

In my last post I mentioned that there was a passage I had been planning to use to illustrate my point that we should not dumb the Bible down, but should bring people face-to-face with it so it can speak directly to them. I mentioned that as I studied the passage, I felt I would have to manhandle it a bit to get it to say what I wanted to say. It would have been very ironic if I had not let a Bible passage speak for itself as I tried to illustrate why we should let the Bible speak for itself. So, here is my translation of the passage I had in mind:

For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates to the division of soul and spirit, joints and marrow, and is able to judge thoughts and intentions of the heart. Nothing in creation is hidden from him; everything is naked and laid bare before his eyes, to whom we must give an account. (Hebrews 4:12-13)

As is so often the case when studying the Bible, context is critical. Paul's letters sometimes feel like a whole bunch of advice and wisdom on widely ranging topics, all stuffed together in one document. The Book of Hebrews is not like that. Instead, it has one theme which the author comes back to again and again, making the same point in many different ways. This is a book addressed to people we might now call Messianic Jews--Jewish people who had come to believe that Jesus Christ was the Messiah. Being a Jew in the time around Christ was not a picnic--they were subject to the Roman Empire. On the other hand, the Romans, in the interest of keeping peace with these troublesome people, had made certain concessions to the Jews. They were, for the most part, given the freedom to practice their religion as it had been handed down to them.

For Christians, however, things were not so simple. In the eyes of both the Jews and the Roman authorities, a Jew who joined the band of Christians was no longer a Jew, but a member of a dangerous sect. A Jew who believed Jesus was the Messiah was hated by many Jews and lost the special freedoms granted by the Romans to the people of his birth. It's no wonder, then, that there was a temptation for Messianic Jews of that day to slide back into standard Judaism, or at least to downplay the beliefs that made them different from their people.

These were the people to whom the author of the Book of Hebrews wrote. His message was very simple: What you have received through Christ is better in every way than what the Jews of the Old Testament had. Don't turn back to what you had before. He says this a number of different ways, using different examples, but the basic message is always there.

Leading up to our passage, he's been talking about God's rest, by which he means the ultimate reward waiting for true believers at the end of their lives. He warns his readers not to become hardened and risk missing that reward, but to make every effort to enter into the eternal Sabbath of God.

Then suddenly, he's talking about the Bible and how great it is? It seems like a strange logical jump. I freely admit that I had always looked at this passage in the standard way, thinking the message was about how awesome the Bible is. And that is a part of the message. But the irony for me is, that if I really trust the Bible, then I have to try to come to grips with the true meaning of every Bible selection I come across, even if it is one I thought I understood, and whose assumed meaning I really liked.

The first challenge in understanding these verses is the phrase "word of God." I mean, let's face it, we all know what that means, right? Even a baby Christian knows what it means if someone asks him, "Have you been spending time in the Word?" Obviously, the word of God means the Bible, usually taken to be the 66 books most of Christendom agrees should be in the Bible. (I mean by this that all Christians I'm aware of agree that the basic 66 books belong in the Bible. Catholics, for example, would also include the books of the Apocrypha, but they wouldn't exclude any of the big 66.)

However, when I started to research this phrase, I ran into a problem: I couldn't find a single place in the New Testament where this phrase is used to mean the Bible. For example, we're told in Acts 6:7 that the word of God spread. Does that mean the Apostles had fired up the first-ever printing press and were sticking Bibles in all the first-century motel rooms? No, it means that the message of the Gospel, that Christ had come to die so those who believe could be saved, was spreading, almost solely by word of mouth. Or think about Titus 2:5, where Paul tells women to behave in a certain way, so "no one will malign the word of God." Is Paul worried that people will start saying bad things about the Bible? No, he's concerned that people not have an excuse to say bad things about Christians, and by extension, the Gospel message. Whenever the phrase "word of God" (logos tou theou) is used in the New Testament, it refers to the message God has communicated and is communicating to his people.

So wait. Am I saying the Bible is not the word of God? Not at all. We're clearly told that all Scripture (which, at that time, meant the Old Testament) is inspired by God (2 Timothy 3:16). That clearly says to me that the words we find in it are words spoken by God. Then Peter, in 2 Peter 3:16, refers to Paul's writings as Scripture. So, I think it's clear that the Bible is the word of God. The problem comes when we want to say that the Bible and only the Bible is the word of God. It is clear to me that this isn't how the New Testament writers thought of it. Some Christians believe that once the New Testament was done being written, God just sat back and said, in effect, "There, I've said it all in that book. Now I'm going to stop talking." Personally, I think that's a pretty shaky position. At the other extreme are believers who act as though the words they believe God is saying to people now are just as certain and authoritative as the words of the Bible. To me, the best position is one where we are open to God speaking to us in ways other than through the Bible, but we regard extra-Biblical communication with caution, always being sure that what we hear doesn't go against the clear teaching of the Bible.

For the rest of this post, as I talk about the word of God, I will almost solely be speaking of the Bible. This is because it is the way I have most often heard the communication from God. In fact, if I were to rule out words that I am not positive were from God, the Bible would be almost the only way I have heard God speak. I just want you to remember that the Bible itself does not refer to itself as the sole repository of the word of God.

And what is it we're told about the word of God? It is alive. This is where I think we fail in our understanding of God's word, especially as it's found in the Bible. By alive, I don't mean what people sometimes mean today when they say that something like the U.S. Constitution is a "living document." That seems to be a code for saying we can change parts we don't like. When I say the word of God is alive, I mean that it can change parts of me that God doesn't like! God's words are not just inert blobs that my mind can do something with. They have a life of their own. This is why I hate it when preachers and teachers act like they must tame the Bible. They don't seem to want it to speak for itself, but instead just want people to hear what they say about it. They want to put it in a cage. Rubbish! Let it out! It may tear people apart, but it will also put them back together again.

A similar idea is conveyed by the word I've translated as "active." This is the Greek word that the English word "energy" comes from. God's word will move and work in us, if we're willing to allow it.

A single-edged sword could only cut when wielded in one direction. A double-edged sword could cut going either way, and could penetrate flesh more easily on a thrust, so it was a more formidable weapon. The word of God is more powerful and dangerous than that.

I'm sorry if the image of a sword penetrating flesh grosses you out, but this is precisely what Hebrews goes on to say it does. When the book says the word of God "penetrates to the division of soul and spirit, joints and marrow," it is not trying to make a metaphysical or anatomical statement about the unseen parts of a person. The point is that the word of God goes into the very deepest and innermost parts of us, and that it is a very precise and discriminating cutter.

And why does it do this? To judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. Looking at this passage, it suddenly came to me how this verse fits in with the message just before it of not hardening our hearts when we hear God's voice and of striving to enter into his rest. It isn't that the author was going along warning people about following the easy path and straying from the truth, and then suddenly he decided to throw in a verse about how awesome the Bible is. His point is that God's message goes right to the core of our being, and that God sees everything inside us.

I don't think the people whom the Book of Hebrews addressed were necessarily turning their backs on Jesus and their fellow Christians in a dramatic way. Perhaps they were just choosing to subtly downplay the offensive parts of the belief in Jesus as the Messiah. To people like this, the author is saying that God's word cuts through any front they put up and sees what is in their hearts.

This is why the next verse goes on to say, "Nothing in creation is hidden from him; everything is naked and laid bare before his eyes, to whom we must give an account."

I had always thought of Hebrews 4:12 as a verse extolling the Bible. In a way, that's exactly right. It speaks of the power of God's word, though I don't agree with those who would say the Bible is the only place where God's word can be found. The problem comes when we begin to think of God's word as an offensive weapon we can wield. Instead, this passage presents God's word as something which he uses to cut us to our core, to reveal what is there.

May we strive to be people who make the hard choices to follow God, not just in ways that are visible to others, but in our innermost beings. If we strive to be pure inside, we have a great ally. God's word is a sword and a scalpel that can cut through to the evil we don't even admit to ourselves. It is radical but life-saving surgery. May we embrace it.

- Pepper
Posted 2019-03-08

*Image credits: Roman ruins from RGB Stock; Silenced young man from flickr; surgery from hackernoon.com.