It is a great honor and privilege to stand here before you
men and to be given an opportunity to share the Word
of God with you. But while that
is true, I also want to emphasize what a terrifying
and humbling experience it is as well. It is no light matter to handle the Word of God.
It is no small thing to stand here and say, “Thus says the Lord.” No it
is terrifying! For if I err, or make a mistake, the burden
of guilt lies with me. Hebrews 10:31 says “It is a fearful
thing to fall into the hands of the living God.”
That is precisely why God says in His Word in James 3:1 “My brethren, be not many masters, knowing that
we shall receive the greater condemnation.” If I stand up here and mislead you or tell
you lies, I will have to answer to God and in a MOST severe way! Galatians
6:7 “Be not
deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also
reap.” Nor will He tolerate
being misrepresented. So I stand here in
fear and trembling and I beg you to TEST the things I say. If I err or make a mistake, PLEASE CORRECT
ME, and I will publicly repent and try to correct the wrong. Examine the things I say and see if they are
true.
The other thing that
I would ask of you is very personal. I have examined my heart and I know who I
am. I know the faults
and temptations that lie in my heart.
I see the wickedness that lurks deep
in the recesses of the heart. And one of
my areas of vulnerability is pride. I know that I am susceptible to pride. If I stand up here and deliver a good sermon,
please, for my sake, please don’t thank me for it. It will only cause my ego to swell up and my pride to
overwhelm me. I will feel as if I have
accomplished some great feat. If God
speaks to your heart through this message (which I believe He will) and motivates you and
spurs you on to good things (which I believe
He will), or even if the Lord is so gracious to save your souls
tonight (which I beg that He might!) PLEASE give the glory to
Him. Thank Him for sending a preacher to bring
that Word to you. Don’t thank me. For I am just a broken vessel. A clay pot that has been blessed by God to present His Holy Word to
you. I thank God that He has granted me
this terrible (and when I use that word, I mean that in the original sense of the
word…Not bad, but full of terror, fear, and awe), I thank God that He has
granted me this terrible
privilege of preaching His most
precious and beautiful Holy Word. And I praise God that He has opened your ears
to hear it.
So again, in fear and trembling,
knowing my own sinful heart and vulnerability to
pride, I present this sermon to you.
I am calling it: “The Word of God: A Matter of Life and Death.” Please pray with me:
I will be quoting from numerous texts within the Scriptures.
Feel free to try to keep up and read along, but for the sake of time, I
will quote them in their entirety. I heartily recommend writing
them down and examining them at your
own leisure. But if I had to select a “central”
text, I think it would have to be John,
Chapter 6, verses 35 and then skipping ahead to verses 48-63. So, if you
want to open your Bibles to John 6, verse 35.
This is kind of like the headline on the sermon.
6:35 “And Jesus said unto
them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he
that believeth on me shall never thirst.”
And then skip ahead and look at verses 48-63. Starting on 48 and ending on 63 it reads:
6:48-63 “ I am that bread of
life.49 Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and are dead.50 This is
the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not
die.51 I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of
this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh,
which I will give for the life of the world.52 The Jews therefore strove among
themselves, saying, How can this man give us his flesh to eat?53 Then Jesus
said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the
Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you.54 Whoso eateth my
flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the
last day.55 For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed.56 He
that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him.57 As
the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father: so he that eateth me,
even he shall live by me.58 This is that bread which came down from heaven: not
as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead: he that eateth of this bread shall
live for ever.59 These things said he in the synagogue, as he taught in
Capernaum.60 Many therefore of his disciples, when they had heard this, said,
This is an hard saying; who can hear it?61 When Jesus knew in himself that his
disciples murmured at it, he said unto them, Doth this offend you?62 What and
if ye shall see the Son of man ascend up where he was before?63 It is the
spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak
unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.”
Jesus said, in Matthew 4:4 “But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live
by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.” He said in Psalms 138:2 “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.” And in Joshua 1:8 He said, “This book of the law
shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and
night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein:
for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good
success.”. The importance of
the Word of God is so vital that all of life
depends on it.
The Scriptures say that Jesus Christ IS the Word of God
. John
1 reads in verse 1 “In the beginning was
the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” And then in verse 14, “And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we
beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of
grace and truth.” “For in him we live,
and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For
we are also his offspring.” (Acts
17:28) By His Word we are born again
(1st Peter 1:23 “Being born again,
not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth
and abideth for ever.”). And
faith (the
very thing that saves an individual from the pits of hell) comes
from hearing the Word (Rom. 10:17
“So then faith
cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.”). There is nothing more important. It is to be treasured more than gold and fine silver (Psalms 19:9-10 “The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring for ever: the
judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.10 More to be desired
are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold: sweeter also than honey and the
honeycomb.”). It is to be
valued more than rubies and jewels (Proverbs 3:13-15 “Happy is the man that findeth wisdom, and the
man that getteth understanding.14 For the merchandise of it is better than the
merchandise of silver, and the gain thereof than fine gold.15 She is more
precious than rubies: and all the things thou canst desire are not to be
compared unto her.”). It
should be our waking thought and the lingering
ponderings as we drift off to sleep.
Perhaps I am not emphasizing enough how important it
is. Without
the Word of God in your life you will die. Remember when the Jews ate the manna of God in the desert for 40 years? It sustained them and preserved them. It fed
them in a place where starvation was all but guaranteed. And then Jesus
went on to tell us in John chapter 6 that
He is the bread of life. Those
who ate the manna in the desert eventually died. But those who eat THE Bread of Life (Jesus
Christ) will never die.
Jesus went on to say that the Words
He spoke were spiritual, not flesh.
Eating His actual flesh and drinking His actual blood would be sin (for
God said that drinking blood was forbidden-Genesis
9:4 “But
flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat.”). Jesus was speaking Spiritually. We are to Spiritually
eat Him and drink Him. How do we do
that? Remember what we read in Matthew 4:4, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every Word of God.
The Word of God is pure,
undefiled manna from Heaven. The
revelation of Jesus Christ Himself. It is a QUICK and POWERFUL Word
(Heb. 4:12 “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.”).
The Word quick is not the word for speed. It means life. The Word is alive. What LIFE
is it speaking of? Why, the Life of
Jesus Christ (remember, He IS the Word become flesh). And we EAT
and DRINK His flesh and blood. We live and move and have our being in Him.
Who are Jesus’
disciples? Those who ABIDE (which means to “live in,” “stay in”), those who ABIDE
in His Words (John 8:31 “Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, If ye
continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed;”). Remember, after Jesus said these hard sayings about eating His flesh and drinking
His blood, many left off of following
Him. But when He asked the 12 if they too would leave, Peter said, “Lord, to whom shall
we go? thou hast the words of eternal life. (John 6:68)” WHERE ELSE IS THERE SPIRITUAL FOOD
AVAILABLE? Where else are you
going to get it? Is there anywhere else
that it is found? NO! Without the Word of God
you WILL
Spiritually starve and die.
If you do not hunger and thirst
for the Word of God, you would do well to test your heart to see if you really
are born again. Have you ever heard of anyone going without food and not being
hungry? Has there ever been a starving person who did not crave food? So if you are Spiritually
alive, born again, then you ought to crave and
hunger for the Word of God. A lack of this craving is a strong indicator that you have not been born again. Perhaps you are still dead in your trespasses and sins, as
it says in Ephesians 2. I pray that God would grant you life right now and move upon you
causing you to be born again and to hunger for His Word like a new born babe!
Without the Word of God we die. Plain and simple. A fleshly man cannot
live without food and drink and even more so a Spiritual man cannot live without Spiritual food and water.
An amazing thing about our God is that He is merciful.
While a man without food will soon die, I think that often our merciful
God will keep one of His Spiritually starved children alive. But that child KNOWS something is missing.
He or she knows how weak and
frail they are. If you are one of these
children, you perceive how hungry you are! STOP
STARVING YOURSELF!! Turn
to the Word of God. Pick up the pages of
the sweet savory Book and delight yourself on
the Words of life!! FEED your spirit man. He is hungry.
How long will you starve Him? How
long will you deprive Him of His necessary meat? The spiritual man Job says in Job 23:12 “Neither have I gone back from the commandment
of his lips; I have esteemed the words of his mouth more than my necessary
food.”
You must have the Word of God. I cannot state this enough. YOU
MUST HAVE THE WORD OF GOD! Do
you not hear the urgency in this? Do you not see the life
and death repercussions that hang on this? If you don’t hunger, than chances are you are not His. And if you do hunger, stop starving
yourself! FEED YOUR SPIRIT!
