The Preacher's Weapon Of Truth

“THE PREACHER’S WEAPON OF TRUTH”

W.Max Alderman

Hebrews 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 preaching of the Word is a manly work of faith. The God called man, who is also the preacher, must believe the Book that he preaches and then he must have such a Book that is worthy of being believed by those to whom he preaches. This Book is the King James Bible. Our entire faith system rests upon having the Truth. Too much cannot be said about the value of the Word of God relative to faith. Christian faith does not just happen apart from the Word of God. The Bible has inspirational qualities much greater than those which are found in the works of a mere human author. Sometimes we say that a particular writer was inspired as he wrote. Such is the case with William Shakespeare. When we speak, describing him this way, we are only describing that ability that can be attributed to human genius. It does not at all describe biblical inspiration. Biblical inspiration means that God has breathed the very Words. The Bible is the only place where the very Words of God may be found.

The Word of God has qualities that produce change; this is so because the Word of God is alive. “For the word of God is quick…” The quick Word of God is lively. It is the lively, living Word because God is alive. The word quick means: active, energizing and manifesting itself actively in the world and in men’s hearts. The reaching hand of God’s Word has the ability to reach way down in grace from the place of grace. How many derelicts have been picked up by God’s Word? Not to mention the drunkards, the harlots, the liars and all others who are the victims of the sin curse. The Word of God could not be alive it were not just that… the Word of God. It would be incapable of reaching into the very heart of man if it were only humanly inspired and not God breathed.

The term inspiration means, the divine influence which renders a speaker or writer of Scripture infallible in the communication of the Scriptures from God to man. “The theological use of the term inspiration is a reference to that controlling influence which God exerted over the human authors by whom the Old and New Testaments were written. It has to do with the reception of the divine message and accuracy with which it is transcribed”. (Chafer, Lewis Sperry; “Systematic Theology, Dallas, TX: Dallas Seminary Press, 1947, Vol. 1, p. 61).

The term inspiration means “God breathed”. The Greek word for inspiration is theopneustos: “Theo; God, pneus; breath, tos; the “tos” ending indicates the end results of what precedes it. The very living, breathing Spirit of God gave us His Words. Speech cannot be spoken apart from ones breath flowing past the vocal cords. My own words are breathed from me. God’s Words are His very own Words breathed out. This fact is documented in 2 Timothy 3:16,17. “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.”

God initiated Truth by speaking His living Word to and through men. These men were Holy men of God who “spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost” (2Peter 1:21) Moved is a word, which means to “bear” or “uphold”. It is used in Acts 27:17, “Which when they had taken up, they used helps, undergirding the ship; and, fearing lest they should fall into the quicksands, strake sail, and so were driven.”

In this verse the term driven is used of a ship driven by the wind. The tense of the term in Acts is passive showing that it was the wind that was driving the ship. The wind was sovereign in respect to the ship; no one could tell the wind when and how to blow. Likewise, God alone blows His breath… Just as the ship was driven by the wind, the authors of the Scriptures were carried along and the Holy Ghost determined their course. Just as the wind will push along a ship with respect to its own style and design, so by the Holy Spirit were the authors chosen to use their own style and language. We refer to this as confluent inspiration. It is the breath of God that makes the words come alive. This is another argument against dynamic equivalency. Dynamic equivalency as it applies to translations says that you take the dynamic equivalent expression from one language or cultural group while moving it to another. No one has the right to tamper with the Words of God by filtering them through his own polluted mind and then restating what he supposes to be the equivalent expression of Truth.