from the pastors at nvcf

in my reading this morning, i decided to go through the book of john, not all in one morning, but i decided to take a chapter per day. day one, working out so far. for those that are familiar with the goings on ofalbert, you would know that when it comes to reading the bible, i an inconsistent in my frequency and varied in my length…at my best.

im not perfect.

but i am deciding to try and change that…

so, john chapter one.

one of the things i noticed, as our sr. pastor is going through genesis on sunday mornings and i have spent a little time there, is that God does something interesting with the creation process. not only is he creating people from dirt and ribs, but, with all of creation, he is “speaking” it into existence. God is “speaking” creation into existence.

thats significant.

God could have chose to do this any other way, but he chooses to “speak” all of creation into existence. i find this a little interesting because in john chapter one, john describes a glorious scene of Jesus and himself meeting up, and all of Jesus’ actions are in the form of words. Jesus literally “does” nothing until chapter two of john.

in addition to that, in the book of romans, a little later, it describes what it must take to receive eternal saving, or salvation. romans 10:9 says

“If you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is LORD,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”

there is power in words. it is yes, necessary to “believe in your heart…” but it is equally necessary to “confess with your mouth.” so many times, it is presented in church or church-like gatherings, that receiving Christ into your life, the process in which we are saved, is a “private” or “personal” thing. while it is a individual decision we must make, it is described in romans that it is also a public declaration, worthy of celebration!

the bible described our tongue a double edged sword and the steering wheel for the rest of our body… so i suppose “watch what you say” might have a new meaning in light of all this.

If we are created in the image of God (genesis 1:27), and God “spoke” creation into existence, i believe it is not beyond the realm of possibility that our words carry much farther and much deeper than we imagine. i believe that our words, when let out of our mouths, carry the weight of the divine, and something mystical, beyond our comprehension, happens when we form those words according to “God’s perfect and pleasing will.”

-A