In the very first page of the Bible God is revealed in creation. How was His creative work carried out? There is no mention of the strength of His arm nor the skill of His hand. Rather, “he spake, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast” (Psa. 33:9). Nine times in Genesis 1 we have the words, “And God said.” That is why the Psalmist said, “By the word of the Lord were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth” (33:6). God’s work is accomplished and His power made manifest by His mouth.
The Lord Jesus exemplified this same principle in the Gospels. He healed people by His word, not by working. In the case of the centurion’s servant, the Lord’s word healed him even when he was in another place (Matt. 8:5-13). He also said, “He who hears My word...has eternal life” (John 5:24). We are saved, not by the Lord’s working, but by His speaking, by His word.
It is not easy to distinguish His word from God Himself. In fact, John 1:1 says, “And the Word was God.” We may think that the language of John 1:1 is awkward. When I was young, I used to think John 1:1 should read, “In the beginning was God, and God was manifested as the Word”! But by saying, as John does, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God,” he is exalting the Word as the One who was there first before identifying that Word as God Himself.
In the Gospel of John, this book of life, the first vital point concerning life is the Word. When John describes the incarnation in 1:14, he does not say that God became flesh. “And the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us.” That God is called the Word is not a small thing. We cannot separate the Word from God.
Nor can we separate the Word from the Spirit. The Lord said (6:63), “The words which I have spoken unto you are spirit and are life.” If His word is spirit, and the Word is God, these three are one.
The whole Bible is the Word of God (2 Tim. 3:16). Do not take any word other than the Bible as the Word of God; otherwise, you can be led into heresy. Apart from the Bible, you have no sure word of God. Whatever is in the Bible, you may rest assured, is the Word of God.
You cannot say from this that the Bible is God, even though the Bible is God’s Word and the Word is God Himself. It would be superstitious to worship the Bible. Pointing your finger at a random verse and taking that verse as your guidance is superstitious. You need to exercise your spirit and your sober mind when you come to the Word, not your finger! In 1923 a brother who lived in the same county as Brother Nee tried to find the Lord’s will by pointing to a verse on a page he opened to at random. The verse was Matthew 27:5, where Judas “went away and hanged himself”! This is not the way to honor the Word. Do not consider that the Bible is God in any material sense; this is a heresy.
But the Bible is more than a secular book. Your sense when you come to this book differs from what you feel when you handle a secular magazine. I have tried to pick up my Bible after having a disagreement with my wife. The sense was there right away that I should not touch that book, should not come to the Lord’s presence, till I had first gone back to put matters right with my wife. Have you ever had such an experience? If you are stubborn and insist on opening the Word anyway, you get nothing from your reading. This book compels you to make restitution to your wife.
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