Hebrews 4:12,13

Hebrews 4:12

Life a Dialogue.

There is a Word of God to us; there is also a word of ours to God. The Divine word and the human. The word which speaks, and the word which answers and makes reply.

I. The Word of God. There are many such words. There is a word of God in nature. There is a word of God in providence. There is not sound only, but a voice in both of these; a voice implying a personality, and a voice presupposing an auditor. If the definition of "word" is intelligence communicating itself, here twice over is a word of God, and here is an ear to which it makes appeal. The word was a voice before it was a book. The living life wrote itself upon other lives; they, in turn, wrote it upon others, ere yet a page of gospel Scripture was written, on purpose that the distinction between letter and spirit might be kept ever fresh and vital; on purpose that the characteristic of the new revelation might never fade or be lost sight of, how that it is God speaking in His Son God speaking, and God bidding man to make reply.

II. There is also a word of ours to God. The particular point in the view of the holy writer was that of accountability. God speaks in judgment, and we speak to give account. "With Him" directly and personally "we have to do." The two words of which the text speaks are not independent words. This conversation is not between two equals, either of whom must contribute his share to the instruction and the enjoyment of the meeting. The incommensurableness, in nature and dignity, of the two speakers, while it forbids not freedom in the inferior, forbids presumption, nay, precludes it as a tone and a feeling which it would jar upon, and jangle out of tune the very melody and harmony of the converse. The word of the man meets the word of his God on the strength of the Word made flesh, which is the reconciler and the harmoniser of the two. "I looked, and behold, a door opened in heaven, and a voice saying to me, Come up hither!"

C. J. Vaughan, University Sermons,p. 546.