The Supremacy and Sufficiency of Scripture, Part 2

Lord, thank you, Lord, once again, for all that you do and the opportunity you give us to study the glorious word of God And pray that tonight, Lord, we would grow deep in our understanding of you, that we might better serve you with all of our hearts In Jesus' precious name, amen. I wanna read to you a letter that was written by a 27-year-old lady to a pastor as a result of the power of God's word in her life Listen to what she says Listen to this. I am a 27-year-old female When I was 14, I began to experience depression frequently. I was not a Christian, nor was I raised by Christian parents

My depression continued as I grew older, and as a result, became worse as time passed. I became a chronic suicide case When I was 20, I went to a psychiatrist who diagnosed me as a manic depressive He put me on lithium and told me I would be this way for the rest of my life The drug therapy kept me from going into a severe suicidal depression

However, the deep feelings of depression and despair were still a reality. I finally came so low that there was nowhere to turn but to the Lord. I heard the Christian life was supposed to be the only way to live, but God was not real to me. I decided I was going to seek God with my whole heart, as Jeremiah 29, 13 says, that if I found this to be nothing but an empty endeavor, I would give up living. I fed upon tapes of your Bible teaching The Lord began his work in me Through his word, as you taught, the Holy Spirit showed me just exactly what my problem was and what I needed to do about it

My problem was sin, a heart that would not forgive, and it was making me bitter. I turned to the Lord and asked him to help me forgive. I continued in the word diligently, and the transformation process took place The Lord delivered me from this depressive illness The memorizing of Scripture is renewing my mind This is the only key for anyone suffering any emotional problems, because it is the living word of God It is a supernatural power to transform anyone's life and mind No doctor, no drugs can do what the Bible has done for me in changing my life

Now, I believe that. I believe that God's word is powerful enough to do that. I believe that God sends forth his word for a purpose, and when that word goes forth and that word is digested and that word is read and meditated upon and studied, great things begin to happen. I wish more people believed that. I'm reminded of my father, who was an alcoholic and a continual chain smoker When he gave his life to Christ, it stopped that day He never drank again He never smoked again He just poured his life into the word of God, and God's word transformed his life

You see, either God's word is purposeful and powerful enough to do that, or it's not If it's not, I gotta find another job, because I believe that it is And so we are in the process of talking to you about the sufficiency and supremacy of Scripture We're gonna embark on Psalm 119 Verse by verse, we'll go through that Psalm to help you understand what God's word says about God's word But before we do that, you need to understand why God's word is sufficient and why it is supreme Because we wanna do more than just study Psalm 119

We want you to shake and shudder under the authority of God's holy word, because Isaiah 66, verse number two says that God delights in that kind of man, the one who trembles at my word And if God says, I delight in those kind of people, that's the kind of people we need to be So we need to believe in the authoritative word of God and take it at face value for what it says And therefore, we began last week by telling you that God's word, number one, is purposeful and powerful

Psalm 55, verses 10 and 11 tell us that when God sends forth his word, he does it for a purpose, and it never returns back to him empty It always accomplishes what he intends it to accomplish And we told you, very first of all, that God's word is purposeful and powerful because it crushes the soul Jeremiah 23, verse number 29 God's word is like a fire God's word is like a hammer that shatters the rock And when God's word goes forth, it does an effective work in the soul of an individual It crushes the hard heart It breaks the strongholds

It causes the man, the woman of God, to fall down on their knees before God because the authoritative word of God was preached And so we looked at that last week, Jeremiah 23, 29, that God's word crushes the soul Number two, we said that God's word convicts the soul First Corinthians 14, verses 24 and 25, that when an unbeliever walks into your assembly and God's word's being preached, he is convicted, the text says, he falls down on his face before God, repents of his sin, and truly worships the true God of the universe because God's word does that It convicts the soul It crushes the soul

It convicts the soul It converts the soul Psalm 19, verse number seven, the law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul We looked at it last week, Romans 1, verse number 16, 1 Peter 1, verse number 23, James 1, verse number 18, all talks about how God's word is instrumental in the saving process God's word is that which saves the soul of a man Faith cometh by hearing, hearing by the word of God Therefore, God's word needs to go forth or people will not get saved God's word crushes the soul God's word convicts the soul God's word converts the soul And God's word corrects the soul

Second Timothy three, verse 16, tells us that all scripture is inspired by God and is profitable for correction In other words, God's word corrects the soul It takes that which is crooked and makes it straight And only God's word can do that No amount of ingenuity, no amount of creativity, no amount of expertise that I think I have can make the crooked person straight, but God's word can, because God's word is designed to correct the broken or the bent soul and make it right God's word is powerful enough to cleanse the soul

John 15, verse number three, tells us that we have been made clean through the word of God Ephesians 5, 26 also speaks about the cleansing work of the word of God God's word is that which cleans the soul It cleanses that which is filthy God's word can do that like nothing else can And then we said that God's word is that which conquers the sins of the soul And we looked at the fact that it was the temptation of Christ where he would quote the word of God as he would combat Satan We looked at first John two, verse number 14, because the young man is strong in the word of God

He's able to overcome the evil one You realize that second Corinthians 10 tells us that we bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ To do that, you need to know what God's word actually says to accomplish that We also realize that the Bible says in James chapter four, verse number 17, that when you resist the devil, he will flee And the way you resist him is as Peter says in first Peter five, that you resist him steadfast in the faith, that is, the written word of God So God's word is purposeful and powerful enough to do that and a whole bunch more

But we need to believe that We need to make sure that we understand that Because that's why we preach the word of God That's why we have a ministry at Christ Community Church that's centered around the teaching and preaching of the word of God. I'm reminded of the words of Charles Spurgeon when he wrote these words He says, I do not look for any other means of converting men beyond the simple preaching of the gospel and the opening of men's ears to hear it The moment the church of God shall despise the pulpit, God will despise her That was written over 100 years ago

And that is the absolute truth One author said it this way In practical terms, the movement to accommodate the world has diminished Christians' confidence in divinely revealed truth If we can trust the preaching of God's word to convert the lost and build the church, how can we trust the Bible at all, even as a guide for our daily living? People are being misled by the example of some of their church leaders They are buying into delusion that faithfulness to the word of God is optional

Furthermore, as biblical preaching continues to diminish, ignorance of scripture grows that further exacerbates every problem that stems from the decline of discernment and the cycle of disaster continues What has happened in our world is that there's a cycle that is on a downward spiral because God's word is no longer being preached, because we don't believe in the sufficiency and supremacy of scripture We don't believe that God's word is powerful enough to convert a soul, to convict a soul, to cleanse a soul, to conquer the sins of the soul We don't believe that

And so we begin to engage in other methods Dr John MacArthur's written a new book called Truth War If you haven't gotten that book, you need to get it, you need to read it Let me quote from him in what he says concerning evangelicalism today He says these words Evangelical church leaders desperately want their churches to stay on the leading edge of whatever is currently in vogue in the evangelical community For a while, any church that wanted to be in fashion had to sponsor seminars on how to pray the prayer of Jabez

But woe to the church that was still doing Jabez when the purpose-driven life took center stage By then, any church that wanted to retain its standing and credibility in the evangelical movement had better be doing 40 days of purpose And if your church didn't get through the 40 days in time to host group studies or preach a series of sermons about the Da Vinci Code before the Hollywood movie version came out, then your church was considered badly out of touch with what really matters It is too late now if you missed any of those trends

To use the language of the emergent church movement, they are all so five minutes ago If your church is not already experimenting with emerging-style worship, candles, postmodern liturgy and the like, or better yet, anticipating the next major trend, then you are clearly not in a very stylish church He goes on to say this Contemporary evangelicals have been conditioned to anticipate and follow every fad with an almost mindless herd mentality

They sometimes seem to move from fad to fad with an uninhibited and undiscerning eagerness that does leave them exposed to things that may well be spiritually lethal In fact, the question of whether the latest trend is dangerous or not is not a welcome question in most evangelical circles anymore Whatever happens to be popular at the moment is what drives the whole evangelical agenda Now think about that for a moment You see, it's no longer theology that takes center stage, but methodology that takes center stage It's not what's true that matters, it's what works that matters

It's not whether or not I'm gonna preach the gospel, it's how I'm going to package the message That's what has become the most important element in evangelicalism Listen to this The mad pursuit of non-doctrinal relevancy, even at the very heart of the evangelical mainstream where you might expect to find some commitment to biblical doctrine and at least a measure of concern about defending the faith, what you find instead is a movement utterly dominated by people whose first concern is to try to keep in step with the times in order to be relevant

Sound doctrine, too arcane for the average churchgoer Biblical exposition, that alienates the unchurched Clear preaching on sin and redemption, let's be careful not to subvert the self-esteem of hurting people The Great Commission, our most effective strategy has been making the church service into a massive Super Bowl party Serious discipleship, sure, there's a great series of group studies based on I Love Lucy episodes Let's work our way through that Worship where God is recognized as high and lifted up, get real We need to reach people on the level where they are

Evangelicals and their leaders have doggedly pursued that same course for several decades in spite of many clear biblical instructions that warn us not to be so childish But we are We are The seeker-sensitive church movement and their methodologies MacArthur goes on to say, as churches have tailored their Sunday services to suit the tastes of seekers, for example, there is less and less emphasis on edifying the saints and more and more stress on entertaining unbelievers

Drama, music, comedy, and even forms of vaudeville have often replaced preaching in the order of service that strips Christ of his headship over the church by removing his word from its rightful place and thereby silencing his rule in the life of his people In effect, it surrenders the headship of the church to unchurched seekers Furthermore, anytime a preacher squelches or softens a hard truth of scripture to make the message more palatable, that preacher has suppressed Christ's true message and therefore usurped his rightful authority as Lord over the church

Folks, those are some harsh words, but those are some true words We got major problems in evangelicalism today We got major problems in churches all across our country because to them, methodology is what counts Theology is irrelevant anymore Nobody wants to know who God is and what God said They just wanna make sure that people who come enjoy what they hear That just isn't the way it's supposed to be accomplished That's not what's supposed to happen Remember the question in Luke 13 when Christ was asked, are there many being saved? That was the question

And Jesus would tell that individual to strive to enter for narrow is the gate and straight is the way and few there be that find it My wife this morning was reading through the commentary or MacArthur's one-year Bible study And in there he comments on the fact on Luke 13 what Christ's mission was And Christ's mission was to discourage the half-hearted from following him He only wanted people who were totally committed to following him And she looked at me and she said, honey, now I get it Now I know why you preach the way you preach. I understand it now. I said, great

It took J-Mac to tell it to you in his commentary Go to his church if you want to So the bottom line is Jesus wasn't into gathering lots of people He kept telling them as they gathered around, I'm glad you're here, but listen, if you wanna follow me, you gotta take up your cross and follow me You gotta deny yourself You gotta hate mother, father, brother, sister more than me You gotta hate even your own life See, that message just isn't preached anymore today Doesn't go over well People don't come to your church They don't wanna hear that message anymore

They wanna hear something that's gonna soothe their soul They're gonna hear something that's not gonna confront their sin Yet God's word is that way because God's word is powerful Because God's word has a purpose behind it And that's to touch the deepest part of a man to transform their soul from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light And woe be to the preacher who does not preach the word of God Woe be to the church who now has gone from preaching the word of God to entertaining the people and giving them what they want

Why? Because God's word not only conquers the sins of the soul, not only cleanses the soul, not only corrects the soul, not only converts the soul and convicts the soul and crushes the soul, it condemns the soul It condemns it Turn with me in your Bible to Revelation chapter one for a moment Revelation chapter one Revelation one, John gets a firsthand glimpse of the glorified Christ And as the text describes, it says this, verse 12, and I turned to see the voice that was speaking with me and having turned, I saw seven golden lampstands

And in the middle of the lampstands, one like a son of man, clothed in a robe, reaching to the feet and girded across his breast with a golden girdle And his head and his hair were white like white wool, like snow, and his eyes were like a flame of fire His feet were like burnished bronze when it has been caused to glow in a furnace His voice was like the sound of many waters And in his right hand, he held seven stars And out of his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword And his face was like the sun shining in its strength Here, John sees the vision of the glorified Christ

And people read the book of Revelation and say, well, you got seven lampstands, you got seven stars You know, what does all that mean? We don't get it Well, the Bible tells you what it means Listen to what it says in verse 20 As for the mystery of the seven stars, which you saw in my right hand, and the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches So what John sees in Revelation one is a vision of the glorified Christ right in the middle of the seven golden lampstands because he is a central focus of the church

And in his right hand are seven stars Those seven stars represent the leaders of those seven churches In Revelation two and three give us seven churches, that those churches, although they are literal churches that did exist in Asia Minor, they are seven churches that represent every church that's ever existed in the history of the church age And what he's trying to help John understand that Jesus Christ is the one who is the judge and critic of the church And he's gonna judge the church with the sword that comes out of his mouth, and that sword is the word of God

Every church is measured by a standard, and that standard is not put out by Barner Research That standard is put out by God himself Every church is measured by a standard, and it's not Fuller Seminary and the Church Growth Movement It is the word of God That is the standard And so no matter what books you read or no matter how many seminars your church has about what you should be doing next, Jesus Christ says, I stand central in the church, and I will judge every church based on my word and what I have said in my word, everything Go on to Revelation chapter two, verse number 16

Repent, therefore, or else I am coming to you quickly, and I will make war against them with the sword of my mouth The sword of my mouth is the word of God, that the word that God speaks, by which he will condemn those who do not follow his word If you go to Revelation chapter 19, it says this in verse number 15, when Jesus Christ returns, and from his mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it he may smite the nations It says in verse number 21, and the rest were killed with the sword which came from the mouth of him who sat upon the horse, and all the birds were filled with their flesh

So it's the sword, which is the word of God, that comes out of the mouth of God that condemns the souls of those who do not meet the standard of the holy scriptures, because God's word is God's son He is the word that was always around He's always existed He is the eternal word, and therefore we realize that God is serious about how we treat him and his word He's even more serious about how the church, the evangelical church, treats his word That's why it's so important that you understand that God's word is absolutely sufficient and absolutely supreme It's above everything else

It's for all things, that everything that pertains to life and godliness is in this book, everything And yet very few people believe that, very few That's why they engage in everything extracurricular outside of the word of God, because they don't really truly believe that God will do what he said he would do, and that God's word is powerful enough to change the soul of a man, to deal with the individual They have a hard time grasping that They have a hard time understanding that, and yet God's word speaks of it over and over and over again God's word is purposeful God's word is powerful

Number two, God's word is also personal and penetrating It's personal, and because it's personal, it's penetrating Hebrews chapter four, verse number 12, says this Hebrews four, verse number 12, and verse number 13 For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit of both joints and marrow, and able to judge or discern the thoughts and intentions of the heart And there is no creature hidden from his sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of him with whom we have to do

God's word is so personal and so penetrating that number one, it critiques the soul It critiques the soul The word judge in verse number 12 is the word where we get our English word critic God is the critic of your soul God's word criticizes the soul In other words, God's word discerns the motives of the heart It examines every aspect God's word is like a dagger It's able to pierce with extreme precision to get to the heart of the matter Only God's word can do that Only God's word can critique the soul Only God's word can get to the depths of your heart

And therefore, we realize how personal and how penetrating God's word is It goes so deep into the heart of a man that it really dissects everything that's there And it exposes it so it's laid bare before God God sees it all That's why I love Psalm 90, verse number eight, when it says, thou hast placed our iniquities before thee, our secret sins in the sight of thy presence You see, there's nothing that can be hidden from God And God uses his word to expose all those secrets, all those hidden agendas, all those hidden motives That's what God's word does

You see, that's why people don't like to go to a church that preaches the Bible Because you see, God's word is very personal And it penetrates the heart of an individual And it critiques the soul of a man And they really don't want to be cut open and laid bare before God so he can see everything that's there They really don't want to have that happen to them And so they can go to a church where God's word is not preached and feel really, really good And God's word was never designed to make you feel good

God's word was designed like a sword to cut to the heart of the matter so that it can be exposed to God so God will deal with the heart of a man whenever you have surgery It's a painful experience. I'm sure if you go to the doctor and say, you know, doctor, I wish you wouldn't cut so deep Maybe you can just do a little surface procedure He would say, well, I could do a surface procedure, but I gotta get to the root of it. I gotta go all the way down. I gotta go inside to get it out

We don't want to experience the pain, but that's the only way to get out that which is hurting us and so that we can be made whole again Well, same thing is true spiritually God digs down deep and he uses the sword of his word to do so so that he can dissect those things that need to be dissected so that he can rid you of those things that keep you from being what he wants you to be See, God's word critiques the soul James says it this way over in James chapter one He says this, for if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror

For once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man shall be blessed in what he does James says the word of God is like a mirror And when you open it up, what do you see? Well, you see, number one, God And when you see God in all of his holiness, you see you in all of your sinfulness If you open the Bible and don't see God, there's a problem because God is the subject of the text

It's all about who he is It's a revelation of God himself And therefore, when you see God for who he really is, you see yourself and you see your sin And James says that when you look into the perfect law of liberty and you see the blemish that's there, you need to deal with it before you leave It's like going to the mirror in the morning when you wake up and you see what you see And you're glad that we don't see what you see And you say, oh, I gotta change it. I gotta do something. I gotta make it right

And so you do all you can to make it right so that when you show up on Sunday, you look halfway decent, right? But if you didn't change anything when you looked in the mirror, you sought for what it was and you came to church, we'd say, yo, hey, man, what are you doing? Did you shower this morning? Did you brush your teeth? Did you shave? How come you didn't get cleaned up to come to church? What's wrong with you? Didn't you look in the mirror? Well, the same was true spiritually

We ask the question to those who live in sin, did you not look in the mirror? Did you not see the blemish? Did you not see what God sees? You need to deal with that And James says that when you look into the perfect law of liberty and you see what's there and you do it right, you become a doer of the word of God That man is blessed in all that he does But the one who sees and doesn't do anything about it, he becomes a forgetful hearer, he's not blessed

In other words, you go to church, you open the word of God, the pastor preaches, you see God, you see your sin, and then you say, okay, I'll deal with it tomorrow You close your book, you go home, and you become a forgetful hearer That's why when you read the word of God and you know what you need to do, you do it now Don't wait till tomorrow Don't wait till the next day, do it now Why? Because you become a forgetful hearer If you do it now, you're blessed in all that you do because you are a doer of the word of God

You see, God's word is so personal and so penetrating that it critiques the soul of a man But I love the word of God, I love it, I love reading it, I love studying it, I love preaching it, I just love everything about the word of God And you know, I open the word of God and I see lots of blemishes in my life, and I realize things gotta change And if I don't change them when I see them, I'm in trouble Throughout the week, when I study the word of God, I realize I gotta change things before I get up to preach them

Because it doesn't do me any good to preach in a hypocritical kind of manner, does it? To live one way and preach another way So I'm constantly looking at my life in light of what God's word says and trying to honor the Lord with my life and to seek forgiveness and to do the right thing based on what God's word says so that I will be blessed in all that I do But I know that God's word critiques the soul, unlike anything else, and cuts to the heart of every issue God's word's personal and penetrating Not only to critique the soul, but also to challenge the soul

See, once things are laid open and bare before God, there's a great challenge before you And that's to obey and to follow what God says And to risk doing what God says as opposed to what everybody else says That's a big risk, big challenge It's always the right risk to take because it's God's word and it's God's way for your life, but still there's that challenge of fighting my own personal flesh to say, yes, Lord, I will serve you, I will follow you, I will do what your word says Becomes very challenging See, God's word is so personal that it challenges every decision you make

Every decision you make is challenged by God in his word Everything you say is critiqued and challenged by God in his word And if you're sensitive to his leading, you're gonna follow what he says If you don't like what you hear, well, then you'll think of something else to do But you need to understand that God's word challenges the soul Listen to what the psalmist said over in Psalm 119, verse number 37 The psalmist said, establish thy word to thy servant as that which produces reverence for thee. I'm sorry, that's verse number 38

Verse 37, turn away my eyes from looking at vanity and revive me in thy ways Establish thy word to thy servant as that which produces reverence for thee Turn away my reproach, which I dread, for thine ordinances are good Behold, I long for thy precepts Revive me through thy righteousness The challenge of the man of God or the woman of God is to live a godly life To live a godly life The psalmist says, turn my eyes away from looking at vanity Looking at all those empty things Looking at those things that mean nothing And revive me and quicken me in the ways of my God

He wants to live a godly life And he wants to look reverently upon his God He says, turn away or establish thy word to thy servant as that which produces reverence for thee That's a challenge for all of us To look reverently upon our God To see him for who he is And to fear him and him only And to long deeply for him Behold, I long for thy precepts Revive me through thy righteousness Psalm 119, 133 says this Establish my footsteps in thy word and do not let iniquity have dominion over me

Lord, establish my footsteps in your word and don't let there be any sin, any iniquity, any transgression control me or have dominion in my life It's that desire of the psalmist, that challenge to lean dependently upon his God To live godly for his God To be able to look reverently upon his God It's the kind of person who, when challenged, desires to rise to the challenge because he recognizes how personal and penetrating God's word is You see, God's word is, I've told you this a hundred times, a million times, two billion times It's more than just another book It's the word of God

And it personally penetrates to the deepest part of a man The deepest part of a woman And that's why Satan does all he can to keep you out of the word of God

You struggle spending time with God and his word? You struggle paying attention when you read the word? Those are all Satan's ploys and devices to keep you busy, to keep you preoccupied so that you might focus in on who God is so God's word will have that penetrating effect upon your life so that you will see the blemishes that are there and seek to rise to the challenge to change those things so that your testimony for Jesus Christ will bring glory and honor to your Lord Satan doesn't want you doing that He wants to destroy your testimony, right? But God's word is purposeful

God's word's powerful God's word is personal God's word is penetrating to the heart of a man It critiques the soul It challenges the soul And thirdly, it confirms the soul In other words, it strengthens and establishes and sets erect the soul It confirms the soul You know, we all need that confirmation We all need that strengthening We all need that encouragement We all need to be bolstered And the only way that's gonna happen is through the word of God Listen to what the psalmist said in Psalm 119, verse number 28 He said, my soul weeps because of grief Strengthen me according to thy word

The psalmist knew the grief before him and he would weep profusely and yet he knew that the only way to gain strength was through the word of God Then Psalm 119, verse number 116 says this Sustain me according to thy word that I may live and do not let me be ashamed of my hope The psalmist says I need to be strengthened by your word. I need to be sustained by your word It's God's word that confirms the soul. I love Proverbs chapter 24

Proverbs chapter 24, verse number one says, do not be envious of evil men nor desire to be with them for their minds devise violence and their lips talk of trouble You know, every once in a while we get a little anxious about how evil men begin to succeed in life And sometimes there are people that are evil that we desire to be with and Solomon says, you know what, don't do that Don't desire to be with evil men Don't associate with those kinds of people Don't even desire to be with them

Who do you desire to be with, by the way? Oh, better yet, who do your kids desire to be with? Ask that question Do you desire to be with the evil person or the godly people? And then he says this, by wisdom a house is built and by understanding it is established and by knowledge the rooms are filled with all precious and pleasant riches. I mean, if the house is ever gonna be built by God, Psalm 127, verse number one, it's the Lord that builds the house It's gonna be built on wisdom, understanding, and knowledge because those things fortify the house They build the house

They establish the house They make firm the house In other words, the house becomes a strong unit when God's word is the central focus of the home When it's not, it begins to crumble Is your house crumbling, by the way? There's only one answer as to why it is It's because God's wisdom, God's understanding, and God's knowledge doesn't reign supreme in your home Because the text says, and we know that Proverbs two, verse number six, wisdom, knowledge, and understanding are from the Lord, right? They come from God himself And wisdom is that which applies the truth to life

Understanding is that which clarifies the truth to life And knowledge is that which verifies truth to life And so we begin to realize that it's God's word that needs to reign supreme in the house if it's ever gonna be confirmed In other words, if it's gonna be strong You see, as Christians, we have a different home than our neighbors do It might look like all the other houses on the tract, but you know, we have a different home because it's built on wisdom, knowledge, and understanding And in that home are rooms filled with all kinds of pleasant riches and precious riches

In other words, there's acceptance, there's love, there's admiration, there's a building of character, all those things that last forever And that's what makes that home flourish When Solomon says that the house is built, it means to be fortified It means to be put back in a place so that it never shakes again That comes because I apply truth to my life. I take God's word and apply it to my life And then he says, and by understanding, it is established In other words, it is made firm It stands erect, strong, because of the understanding that comes from the word of God

And then it says, and by knowledge, the rooms are filled, overflowing, and overabundance because of the knowledge of God that reigns supreme in the house That's why Daniel said in Daniel 11, 32, that those who know their God are strong and do great exploits Those who know God are strong people And if they're strong, they're gonna do great things for God because God's word confirms the soul Once it critiques the soul and challenges the soul to obey the word of God, once obeyed, the soul is confirmed It stands erect It's unshakable

It's immovable because God's word is personal and penetrating to the depths of one's soul God's word does that That's why in verse number five, it says, a wise man is strong Who's the wise man? That's the guy who applies truth to life He's the strong guy And a man of knowledge increases what? Power, oh, think about that Not only is the wise man strong, but the man with the knowledge of God increases in power That's why it says in verse number 10, if you are slack in the day of distress, your strength is limited

In the day of distress, how do you react? In the day of adversity, in the day of calamity, in the day of high anxiety, how do you act? Do you lack the strength you need? If you do, it's because your soul needs to be confirmed in God's word That's why it goes on to say in verse number 14, know that wisdom is thus for your soul If you find it, then there will be a future and your hope will not be cut off Folks, that's what God's word does That's why it's sufficient That's why it's supreme, because nothing else does it Just God's holy word

So when you come to Acts chapter 20, verse number 32, and Paul's about to depart from Ephesus and leave the Ephesian elders after a ministry of three years with them, he says, and now I commend you to God and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up, which is able to strengthen you, which is able to confirm you, and to give you an inheritance He says, I can't leave you with anything else but God's word, because God's word is the only thing that will build you up It will be the only thing that will sustain you It will be the only thing that will strengthen you

It will be the only thing that will stabilize you It's sufficient It is supreme There is nothing else other than that It's, the question comes, do you believe that? Do you believe that? God's word is personal and penetrating To critique the soul, to challenge the soul, to confirm the soul, and number four, to control the soul, to control the soul Listen to the psalmist in Psalm 119, verse number 97 He says these words, oh, how I love thy law It is my meditation all the day By the way, how do you know you love the law of God? You meditate on it all day long That's how you know you love it

It's like when you fall in love with your wife, or before she's your wife, she's your fiance, or before she's your fiance, she's your girlfriend, and you fall in love with her, you just can't get her out of your mind, right? She's there all the time You're always thinking about her You go to work thinking about her You can't wait to call her at your lunch break, so you're thinking about when you can call her

After you call her, you go back to work, but you think about her all day, because you can't wait to get off work to spend time with her, and then when you spend time with her, you think about her, and then when you go home, you can't wait to go to bed to get up so you can see her again That's how she knows you love her, right? How do you think God knows you love him? You meditate on his law all day long All day long It's the sole focus of your attention It consumes your thinking It consumes your conversation It consumes everything you do Someone says, oh, I love your law

It's my meditation all the day Well, I can tell that's just too convicting We gotta move on to verse number 98 Thy commandments make me wiser than my enemies, for they are ever mine. I have more insight than all my teachers. I used to love this in college when I read it. I have more insight than all my teachers, for thy testimonies are my meditation. I understand more than the aged, because I have observed thy precepts. I have restrained my feet from every evil way that I may keep thy word. I have not turned aside from thine ordinances, for thou thyself has taught me

How sweet are thy words to my taste Yes, sweeter than honey to my mouth From thy precepts I get understanding, therefore I hate every false way The word of God was such a part of the psalmist's life that it controlled his day It controlled his day It controlled about what he thought on It controlled about where he went, how it restrained his feet from the evil way It controlled what he knew, because he knew more than his teachers He knew more than the aged, not because he was smarter, but because he was willing to apply God's word to his life and live in light of God's word

See, that's why God's word is just such a controlling aspect of your life That's why Paul says, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly In other words, let it be at home in your hearts Don't let God's word become a stranger to you, because if God's word is at home in your heart and you know it thoroughly and examine it and meditate upon it and shake under its authority, then what happens is that everything around you begins to change, because it's affected by you You begin to sing to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs You begin to give thanks to God

You begin to submit to one another, because God's word just consumes you It consumes you If it consumes you, it controls you Simple as that It just controls you And that's where we need to be And that's why we wanna do more than just study the Bible We want you to shake under the authority of the Bible We want it to just so consume every part of your life that you don't want to go outside without making sure you know God's word for the day And when you go to work, you're gonna speak about the Lord God You're gonna stand strong for God

When you go to school, you're gonna give a word of testimony for the Lord Jesus Christ You're gonna live a godly and holy life, because God's word consumes you See, God is so concerned about his word that he made it in such a way that it penetrates every aspect of your life That's why it's sufficient And that's why it's supreme That's why it reigns above everything else Because what else do you know that will critique your soul like God's word? What else do you know that will challenge your soul? What else do you know that will be what God's word is to your soul? Nothing Nothing

Because this is the word of God It should be the most important thing in your life There should be nothing more important to you than the word of God Nothing It is the main thing And that's why my heart is so grieved when preachers stop preaching the word of God and start telling stories and start showing videos and start doing drama and start giving more time to music and everything and just slowly but surely depreciate the authority of the word of God as if it means nothing Because it means everything

It means everything. I guess the question for you is, does it mean everything to you? Does it mean everything to your family? Is it the most important thing on your agenda each day to spend time in the word of God getting to know your God? Are you the kind of person that loves to not only read the word of God but to hear the word of God preached because you wanna grow when you walk with the Lord? Are you the kind of person that not only wants to hear the word of God preached, not in the areas that you like but in the areas you don't like that confront you on your sin? Because that's what God's word does

And we of all people need to be the kind that say, oh Lord, I love your law It is my meditation all the day. I love it more than anything else It's so sweet to my taste And therefore, Lord, I love you because of what you've given to me in your word. I've realized that it is purposeful It is powerful Nothing else compares to that It is personal and it is penetrating And for that, I thank you because it cuts to the deepest part of me and shows me what needs to be changed And I'm challenged by that, to live in the light of your glorious word Let's pray

Our most gracious heavenly Father, we thank you for the truth of the word of God And we thank you that we have the opportunity to study it. I pray for every man and woman, boy and girl in the room this evening, those who one day will listen by way of radio, that their hearts would be in tune with what your word says That we would be consumed with your authority in our lives And that Lord, we would love, love more than anything in all the world to spend time with you in your word In Jesus name, amen.