The word is the essential building block of communication. Written communication can take what is thought and spoken and record it permanently. Our facial expressions and other non-verbal communication add further to the power and impact of communication.
Yet there is still a fuller way to communicate. The Life. The life pulls all these forms of communication together and fully expresses the heart. And this is exactly what God has done for us in Christ. God spoke to man and woman. Then, He wrote it down for us through those He inspired to write the Bible, the written word. Then, He lived it out for us in Jesus Christ. The spoken word became the written word and then was fully communicated in the eternal, Living Word, Jesus Christ. Christ’s life reveals the full force and interpretation of God’s heart.
Our response to God’s word reveals our heart. Adam and Eve didn’t believe God’s spoken word, but believed the word of the serpent – and thus sin and rebellion were born in the heart of mankind. The full and final expression of God and His word is Jesus Christ – and the ultimate statement of our belief is how we respond and relate to Jesus Christ, the Living Word, God’s Son. For us, it is by believing this word of Christ that we are saved from the penalty of our sin.
And what is sin? It is unbelief. Not believing what God has said and out of that unbelief, an unwillingness to submit ourselves to Him and relate to Him on His terms. It is thinking too highly of ourselves and woefully short of Him. Ultimately, it is putting ourselves in what should be His place in our thoughts and decisions. The out-workings of this rebellion range from the subtle choosing of one’s own way to the horrific murder of God’s premier creation, a person. This rebellion that we all have taken part in has as its penalty death, or separation from God.
But it is by God’s written word that we are led to the Living Word, Jesus. Through the written word, the Bible, we see God the Son who paid the penalty for our rebellion and the only one with the ability, legal right and authority to be our King and Lord. It is by believing in the Living Word that we are born of the Spirit and learn to know Him on a daily basis by remaining or living in the written word. As we believe God’s written word about the Living Word, Jesus, He makes us a new creation who can once again hear God and walk with Him “in the cool of the day” like Adam and Eve once did. Though now, we have God’s heart fully expressed in His Son, and it is by living in Christ and God’s word about Him that we learn to live and love like God.
Jesus told us to abide or live in Him, His word and His love. They build on each other – we learn about Christ from the written word and believe God’s word about Him and are born again. We go back to that written word to learn about Christ and how to follow Him. As we learn to follow Him, living in Him and His word, we learn to love, bringing Him glory and experiencing His joy.
If we do not spend consistent time in the written word, we won’t know the Living Word very well. When our days are done – our life and how we lived it will have fully expressed what we believed and what we attempted to say. What does our life speak? What does our life speak about how we related to Christ and lived in His word? How much will we utilize God’s gift of the written word to come to know the Living Word, Jesus Christ, living in His joy for His glory?