Of marrow and joints

Last night I listened to a wonderful lady in our church give testimony to the fact that the Word of God is powerful.  As she told us how she has been reciting Scripture  outloud to combat some struggles she has been having and how it has been really helping I couldn’t help but thinking of what the writer of Hebrews jotted down for us centuries ago: “For the Word of God is quick (ALIVE !) 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.” (Heb.4:12).

This was not written as some pleasant platitude to make us like our Bibles and think how nice they are. It is a serious, accurate assessment of the Scriptures and the impact they can have as we avail ourselves to them. The Bible truly is God’s Word and being so it is by its very nature going to be powerful !!  It  can help us achieve victory over sin, change our lethargic heart, heal a painful past, or whatever we need to thrive as a child of God !  Like a shiny, sharp sword it is able to cut through all the clutter of our excuses (subtle lies), pierce our impure motives and pentetrate our apathetic heart and once God has done His “surgery” we are on the road to recovery.

Have you ever given much thought to those words “marrow” and “joints” in that verse?   Lets say your helping a kid memorize this or you yourself hear it repeated by the pastor at church.  Why would God insert those words?   Sampson, was a friend of mine from Africa, who was a roommate in college. When we had chicken for a meal, he would always eat the marrow. It was a custom for him and he would flash his very white teeth at me and giggle and say thats why his teeth were so bright !   I’ll resort to strawberries and baking soda (a natural whitener), thank you very much !  But he’d gnaw away at the bones until he got inside them to the marrow.  I know, gross, but that was what he had grown up with, getting all the nourishment in a third world country he could.

God is saying that His Word has the power to hit us very deep, where we need to be hit, so that from the inside out we can be gloriously and genuinely transformed to shine bright for Him !  We are to let the Holy Spirit impact us deep down but so often we are guilty of quenching the Spirit, we are good at controlling the Spirit’s work on us through the Word when we ought to be allowing Him to control us.  When we let Him have His way, great things can happen. This lady was genuinely thrilled and had a different and much happier attitude about her trials  because she was letting God impact her deep down, will you today?