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God’s Word has supernatural power: creative power, commanding power, life-giving power and sustaining power. We activate all this power by faith.
Introduction
In today’s study we’ll be demonstrating the supernatural power of the word of God. When we understand its great power and are fully established in God’s truth, we will know that the Lord can take us safely through the time of trouble that lies just ahead. When we understand the supernatural power of God’s word, our faith increases a hundredfold!
Great evil is coming upon the world and more pointedly upon God’s people. The dragon is out to destroy God’s remnant people. He doesn’t play games. Like a hungry lion, Satan is out for the kill. He’s waging war against the remnant of the woman’s seed (Revelation 12:17) who keep the commandments of God and have the faith of Jesus (Revelation 14:12).
We’re getting ready to face anti-christ head on, just as much as Martin Luther did during the Dark Ages. The beast power will soon try to impose Sunday worship, which is its mark of ecclesiastical authority, above the authority of God’s word. God’s people will need to take a stand for the Sabbath regardless of the consequences to our lives. Even before the Sabbath test, God’s people will face a preparatory test: the Covid vaccine that we absolutely must not allow into our bodies. How can we get the victory in those two tests?
In our study today we’re going to explore four sources of power in God’s word and how that word can help us get the victory in any trial:
- God’s word has creative power
- God’s word has commanding power (authority)
- God’s word has life-giving power
- God’s word has sustaining power
The last generation needs to demonstrate to the world that the word of God is above the pretended or usurped authority of the anti-christ system, and that God’s word is powerful enough to bring us through the greatest tribulation ever seen on the earth. That word is powerful enough to help us pass every test that will come, including the Covid vaccine and the mark of the beast.
Only when we become perfect in Christ and partakers of His Divine Nature will Jesus come. He must have a people that’s a perfect reflection of His purity and holiness in order to bring to a close the Plan of Salvation. God’s word can help us achieve that high calling. That’s why the devil will do anything in his power to keep you away from your bible!
I’ll be sharing with you some of the insights of two pioneers of the Advent Movement, Elders AT Jones and EJ Waggoner, as well as some of the insights that the Holy Spirit has given me, on the amazing and supernatural power of the Word.
These great truths have been some of the most precious and transformational in my own walk with the Lord. If you believe the word of God and receive it fully into your heart, it will change your walk with God forever.
Faith is believing the word of God
There’s a story in the Gospel of Matthew that provides an excellent illustration of how Jesus defined faith. Let’s read in Matthew 8, starting in verse 5:
5 “And when Jesus was entered into Capernaum, there came unto him a centurion, beseeching him,
6 And saying, Lord, my servant lieth at home sick of the palsy, grievously tormented.
7 And Jesus saith unto him, I will come and heal him.
8 The centurion answered and said, Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof: but speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed.
9 For I am a man under authority, having soldiers under me: and I say to this man, Go, and he goeth; and to another, Come, and he cometh; and to my servant, Do this, and he doeth it.
10 When Jesus heard it, he marvelled, and said to them that followed, Verily I say unto you, I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel.
… 13 And Jesus said unto the centurion, Go thy way; and as thou hast believed, so be it done unto thee. And his servant was healed in the selfsame hour.”
What’s astonishing in this story is that we have a Roman soldier, who knew nothing or very little about the Hebrew Scriptures, who seemed to understand that the word of Jesus alone, in itself, had power to perform whatever He spoke. In other words, the word of God has intrinsic power to do or accomplish what it says.
That word which Jesus spoke was the word of God. Jesus says in John 8:49-50 that He didn’t speak of Himself, but that the Father which sent Him gave Him what He should say.
The other fact we need to highlight here is that Jesus says to His followers: “I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel”. Therefore, Jesus is defining faith as believing that the word of God is able to perform that which it says.
Let’s read a very well-known passage in Isaiah 55:
“10 For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater:
11 So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.”
God is explaining two things through the prophet Isaiah:
- That the earth needs the rain and the snow to render it fruitful so that it can yield seed to the sower and bread to the eater. The earth of itself can do nothing, just like we can do nothing without God’s word.
- The word of God doesn’t return to Him void. Just as the rain and the snow never return to heaven without having watered the earth, God’s word doesn’t return to Him until it has accomplished that for which He sent it forth.
Let’s begin to consider the four aspects of the power of God’s word.
The word of God has creative power
The bible says that God “quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were” (Romans 4:17). What exactly does that mean? We’ll understand by going back to the beginning, and reading a few verses in Genesis 1:
3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
6 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
7 And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.
9 And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.
So whenever God said, “Let there be”, there was or it was. Speaking it created it and made it so. God’s word is self-fulfilling.
We read in the book of Hebrews: “Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.” (Hebrews 11:5)
Psalms 33:6 also describes the creative power of God’s word:
6 By the word of the Lord were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth.
We understand from these passages that when God speaks, it is. Why? Because His word creates that which He speaks. God can never lie because whatever He says, His word makes it true.
There’s only one thing that the bible says is impossible for God to do, and that is to lie. And this is the reason why it’s impossible for Him to lie. His word itself actually creates or generates or produces whatever He has spoken. His word carries the very substance of that which is spoken.
For example, when you read the apostle Paul’s greetings to the various churches such as “Grace be to you and peace from our Lord Jesus Christ”, and you believe that this is God’s inspired word, you actually receive that grace and that peace as much as they did. The grace and the peace are actually contained in the words.
Only the word of God has that creative power. This fact alone makes God worthy of reverence and worship: He is the Creator. The Three Angels’ end time messages of Revelation 14 begin with a command to worship the Creator:
“Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come: and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters.” (Revelation 14:7)
I hope you’re beginning to understand how powerful God’s word is! It’s a rock on which we can safely establish our lives. As we read in Numbers 23:19: “God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?”
Furthermore we read in 2 Corinthians 1:20: “For all the promises of God in Him (Christ) are yea, and in Him Amen, unto the glory of God by us.” Hallelujah! Your only work is to believe, and to rest on those promises.
The word of God has commanding power
Let’s consider again the words of the Roman centurion to Jesus in Matthew 8:8-9:
8 “The centurion answered and said, Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof: but speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed.
9 For I am a man under authority, having soldiers under me: and I say to this man, Go, and he goeth; and to another, Come, and he cometh; and to my servant, Do this, and he doeth it.”
What the Roman soldier understood is that the word of God not only has power, it also has authority. When the word of God commands that something be done, it gets done!
Psalms 33:8-9 also alludes to the authority of God’s word:
8 “Let all the earth fear the Lord: let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him.
9 For He spake, and it was done; He commanded, and it stood fast.”
We know that God has command of the heavenly host, the holy angels who remained faithful after Lucifer fell and took down with him a third of the angels. When Jesus was arrested and brought before the chief priests and the elders, He said to them: “Or do you think that I cannot now pray to My Father, and He will provide Me with more than twelve legions of angels?” (Matthew 26:53)
But there’s another powerful reason why the word of God has authority. Let’s highlight another aspect in the account of Creation in Genesis 1 that we read earlier.
4 “And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
6 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
7 And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.
8 And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.
9 And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.
10 And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called He Seas: and God saw that it was good.” (Genesis 1:4-10)
What we notice here is that God named His creation. He called the light day. He called the firmament heaven. He called the dry land earth.
By naming the things He created He affirmed His lordship or His rulership over them. This is why Jesus could calm the seas and the winds when the disciples were on a boat and got caught in a storm. The elements of nature are in submission to Him.
Is there a second witness to this? Absolutely! In Genesis 1, after God created Adam and Eve, we read in verse 28: “And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.”
God gave Adam and Eve dominion and made them lords over the created beings: the fish, the birds, the beasts of the field and the creeping things.
Then we read in Genesis 2 that after God created Adam on the 6th. day and gave him dominion and the lordship over the earth, He invited Adam to name all the animals as a sign of his authority over them. God delegated to Adam the authority over the animals and it was expressed or established through the naming of those creatures which were now subject to him.
Sadly, as we know, Adam lost his dominion when he sinned. From that point onward, he was no longer able to subdue the animals and the perfect order that God established at creation was disturbed. As a result, there are wild beasts that are filled with Satan’s spirit and are in rebellion against man.
Clearly then the act of naming is a sign of dominion over the thing named. God is and has the ultimate authority in the universe because as the Creator He named His creation either Himself directly, or indirectly through His steward Adam.
In Philippians 3:21 we read, speaking of Jesus: “He is able to subdue all things unto Himself”. Why? Because Jesus received absolute delegated authority from the Father and has never lost it.
Our kingship as sons and daughters of God and heirs of the new heaven and the new earth is based on the authority of God’s word which declares: “5 Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people: for all the earth is mine: 6 And ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation.” (Exodus 19:5-6)
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So here we have two of the four pillars of the power of God’s word: 1) it has creative power to create that which is spoken, to make things as it says, and 2) it has authority to command because it comes from the Supreme Ruler of the universe who affirmed His rulership over all creation by naming and establishing it. How did He establish His creation? When the bible says in Genesis 1: “and God saw that it was good” and “and God saw that it was very good”.
Now let’s add a couple more layers to the power that’s in the word of God and you’ll understand that the best choice you can ever make is to live by every word that proceeds out of His mouth!
The word of God is life-giving
Something else happened during creation week that we need to take note of. We read in Genesis 2:7: 7 And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul. The Hebrew word for breath is neshamah (H5397), which means breath, spirit, or inspiration.
So already in the Garden of Eden we discover that the breath of God contains life, it’s life-giving. Jesus told us in John 6:63: 63 “It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.” His words give life because His breath gives life.
Jesus, the word of God, said in John 6: “For the bread of God is He which cometh down from heaven, and giveth life unto the world”. Jesus was referencing the life-giving, life-sustaining power of God’s word that He Himself embodied.
Let’s highlight one more aspect of the life-giving power of God’s word. We know that Jesus said of Himself “I have power to lay down My life and I have power to take it again” (John 10:18). All His resurrections were performed only by the spoken command. At the last trump, Jesus will call His people forth from their graves.
So let’s start to put this all together now and you’ll understand the absolute awesomeness of the doctrine of righteousness by faith on which the true Christian faith is based.
Redemption is Creation
The power of creation is the power of redemption. In other words, the power to create which is contained in the word of God is the same power that redeems us from our sins. When we read in Romans 1:16 that “the gospel of Christ is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth”, it’s telling us that:
- The same power that created the entire universe is contained in the gospel of Jesus Christ: that is to say, it’s contained in the scriptures of both Old and New Testaments. How do we know that power is in both Old and New Testament? Because the burden of every verse of scripture, the central theme of the bible, is the Plan of Redemption (Ellen G. White – Education 125.2). “Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me. … 46 “For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed Me; for he wrote of Me.” (John 5:39, 46).
- The creative power of God that is found in His word is deployed on behalf of every repentant sinner. God re-creates us in the pattern of Jesus, who in turn is the express image of the Father: 24“And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.” (Ephesians 4:24)
Why do we need to be recreated? Because as a result of sin we’re no longer fashioned in the image and likeness of God. God must intervene to restore in us His image and likeness. The bible says in Genesis 5:1-3:
“This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made he him;
2 Male and female created he them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day when they were created.”
Then Adam and Eve sinned, and listen to what happened to their children born after sin:
3 “And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, and after his image; and called his name Seth:”
The good news is that when we receive the gospel in faith, the seed of the gospel which is the word of God causes us to die to sin and come alive again in the Spirit. There’s a death and a resurrection, a process we call “being born again”.
17 “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” (2 Corinthians 5:17)
God helps us put to death the “old man” and recreates us as a “new man”, “which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness” (Ephesians 4:24). The new birth begins the process of restoring us back to God’s image and likeness.
Let’s get a couple of additional witnesses from the bible, starting with King David in Psalms 51:10-12:
10 “Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.”
Clearly King David understood that the Lord had power to create in him a clean heart and renew His Holy Spirit within him.
Our last witness on this point is found in Ephesians 2:10, short and sweet: “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.” God creates us in His Son, who is the Author and Finisher of the masterpiece that we become by faith when we believe God’s word and receive it fully into our hearts.
This great work is not ours to do. We can’t save ourselves no matter how hard we try. We also can’t change ourselves no matter how hard we try. Only God can accomplish this great work In us. The culmination of the Plan of Salvation is when God has a people – the 144 000 of the book of Revelation – that resemble Jesus perfectly and are sealed with the Father’s name (i.e. character) in their foreheads.
Righteousness by Faith
There are two equally important sides to righteousness by faith:
-God’s part: God declares us righteous. His declaration is not an empty declaration. His word will not return to Him void. If and as long as we allow Him to work in us He makes us righteous by His word. His word makes us righteous.
-Our part: Our part is to believe. “For what does the Scripture say? Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.” (Romans 4:3). We simply need to believe that God is able to do what He says He will do. And we need to keep on believing that despite any temporary setbacks or lack of visible progress.
Righteousness is a gift of God that brings with it eternal life. Let’s read in Romans 5:17-18:
17 For if by one man’s offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ.
18 Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life.
Jesus died for our sins. “And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.” (1 John 2:2)
He then resurrected, and as our High Priest in heaven Jesus applies His blood to our sins. His blood washes away our sins and our guilt.
The blood of Jesus also carries with it His perfect life. How is that? The bible says that “The life is in the blood” – Leviticus 17:11. When Jesus applies His blood to our sins, He is crediting His perfect life to us. We’re forgiven by His blood, but we’re saved by His life which is accounted to our credit.
We find that summarized in Romans 5:10: “For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.”
This is not just some legal transaction in the heavenly courtroom. Jesus actually lives out His perfect life through us as we yield to His sanctifying presence in our hearts. This is what the apostle Paul was describing when He wrote: “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me.” (Galatians 2:20)
If we’re crucified in Christ, that means we’re dead. Dead men don’t sin, right? Therefore, we can’t sin and thereby we fulfill the prophecies of the Ten Commandments. The Ten Commandments are prophecies because they’re written in the future tense – Thou shall or Thou shall not.
If we fully believe God’s word and receive it in our hearts we won’t sin. Since sin is the transgression of the law, this means that we become commandment keepers and cease to be commandment breakers. God’s word has the power to accomplish that in us.
All we need to do is believe that not only is this possible, this is how it’s supposed to work! As we invite Jesus to sit on the throne of our hearts and submit to Him, He begins to perfect us in the beauty of holiness. Jesus is the living Word, and He’ll fulfill in you His promise of righteousness unto eternal life.
When John 1:14 says that Jesus or the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, it’s referring to His incarnation – He walked on this earth as a man among men. But it’s also referring to the fact that when we’re born again Jesus dwells in our hearts.
God’s Word has holding or sustaining power
In addition to the power of creation, the word of God also has staying power or holding power. We can also refer to it as keeping power. We read in Hebrews 1:1-3:
“God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets,
2 Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds;
3 Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high…”
So Jesus, the word of God, the Creative Agent of the Father, continues to uphold the universe by the word of His power.
What does this mean for us? It means that in addition to making us new creations in Christ, the word of God also keeps our “new man” pure and holy. It means that, once Jesus has re-created us by His word, He continues to keep us.
We read in Jude 1:24: “Now unto Him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy…”
One of my favorite verses is Romans 14:4: “Who art thou that judgest another man’s servant? to his own master he standeth or falleth. Yea, he shall be holden up: for God is able to make him stand.”
When the time of trial comes to every man when our faith shall be individually tested, we can be sure that Jesus is nside of us upholding us by the word of His power, just as He upholds the universe.
You’ll find that the more time you spend in the Word, the more power you have to gain the victory over sin. Jesus prayed to the Father: “Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth.” (John 17:17)
This is why it’s so important to abide in the word. Jesus said to the Jews who believed Him: “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” (John 8:31-32)
The attraction of sin is a huge deception. Eve was deceived because she disbelieved the word of God. God’s word exposes the deception of sin and shows us the tragic reality of sin. This is how God keeps us from sin. But the condition is that we must fully believe that “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). When we believe we’ll stay far away from sin. This is how God keeps us.
God is able to keep us from falling as long as we hold on to our faith in the moment of temptation and believe in His word. Of course, we know that “if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous” (1 John 2:1).
Jesus doesn’t ever let go of us. He never leaves us nor forsakes us. No one can snatch us out of His hand:
27 “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow me:
28 And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of My hand.
29 My Father, which gave them Me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of My Father’s hand.” (John 10:27-29)
Living holy
We said earlier that the word of God contains the very substance of that which is spoken, so that it automatically creates that which is said. However, there’s a condition: we must have faith.
The substance that’s in God’s word is activated by faith. The bible defines faith as “the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen”.
We learned from Jesus’ encounter with the Roman centurion that our Savior also defined faith as believing the word of God and depending on that word to do that which it says. We need to believe God and take Him at His word just as much as the heroes of faith did that we read about in Hebrews 11. We need to believe in God’s word with the simplicity of a child. For children it’s easy to believe without seeing. Jesus said to the apostle Thomas: “blessed are they which have not seen, and have believed”.
Very soon the evil trinity of the book of Revelation – the dragon, the beast and the false prophet – will start to collaborate to bring fire down from heaven and produce many lying wonders and counterfeit miracles.
Our faith needs to be based on the testimony of the word of God and nothing else. The bible must take precedence over our senses. If what our senses perceive is not consistent with the word of God, it’s a deception. There’s no other explanation for it. The word of God is truth and life. God cannot lie. We must believe the bible above the testimony of our senses or above the testimony of any man or spirit (Isaiah 8:20). The bible will never lead us astray.
The bible says in Psalms 37:5-6:
“Commit your way to the Lord
Trust also in Him
And He shall bring it to pass
He shall bring forth your righteousness as the sun
And your justice as the noonday”.
We have great peace when we commit to Him – another word is we submit to Him – and trust completely in His word.
His word rekindles the fire in our hearts, as happened to the disciples on the road to Emmaus. Jesus the Word overtook them and expounded to them in the scriptures the things concerning Himself. Their hearts were ablaze with love for God! If you live by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God, you WILL overcome as the 144 000 overcame. In fact, that victory is so sure that it’s written in the past tense although it hasn’t happened yet!
“And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.” (Revelation 12:11).
The conclusion of the whole matter
12 “But as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:
13 Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.” (John 1:12-13).
