God has been speaking to men since He made him, evidently intending that man come to know Him. Before the Fall Adam could receive God's speaking directly, sensing the mind of God and knowing His will in his own spirit. God did not have to sit down and teach Adam a language, then begin to talk to him in that language. He was able to communicate His mind to Adam directly. But when Adam sinned his spirit died and this communication with God was cut off. All he then knew about God, from prior memory, was then to be supplemented only as he saw with His eyes, heard with his ears, or otherwise picked up the message through his senses. We are not told how soon or how often God may have talked with him or sent an angel to convey a message. It seems to be God's way to use instruments in the accomplishing of all that He does since the Fall. But in man's redemption God seems to deal with man as soon as he surrenders himself. His spirit is then quickened to life and God is able to "speak' to him directly again. He can tell him that all is forgiven, that he is accepted, that he has a Savior. From this beginning God is always thereafter communicating His will and mind to man directly, but this depends upon the man's willingness to listen.

But how about the written Word. It is the confirmation of all that we are told and even the means of learning "language" by which God speaks directly to the heart. One reason so many redeemed people do not "hear" God's "speaking" to their heart is because they are so unfamiliar with God's language: the manner of His speaking, the tone of His voice, or even the times of His speaking. Does this sound strange?

Not for a minute would require you believe that the written Word is not God's whole revelation to man. All that man needs to know about God and His ways is found there But the life of that Word - it is living, you know- is lacking for so many. Why is this? Because the life of the Word is thE Holy Spirit's quickening power and this does not occur in ink or on paper-only in the heart of the submitted man. And without that "life" the Bible is something like other books, only more confusing, because it deals with subjects not imagined by men (cf. 1 Corinthians 2:9, 10).

There is little wonder that so many saved people say, "I cannot understand the Bible." There is no wonder that it does not hold their interest. They must needs "gird up the loins of (their) mind" (1 Peter 1:13). The context of this passage tells us that even prophets with the writings before them were not able to understand what they had written; and needed "revelation" even to pass it because it was not written for them.

This tells us that some parts of the Word may not be for us today. We must learn to wait on the Lord for the time when we may need that portion. And then we ought to expect Him to reveal to us the meaning when it is needful.

Men do not know the Scriptures nor the power of God (Matthew 22:29). This word by Jesus to the Sadducees is illustrated in their telling the wise men who sought the baby Jesus just where the King of the Jews should be born (Matthew 2:1-6). The answer of the "chief priests and scribes" seems almost instantaneous, for they were familiar with the letter of the Scriptures and quoted the words of Micah (Micah 5:2).

But not one of them imagined that Messiah was then born in Bethlehem as Micah had said, so none of them accompanied the wise men to investigate. The "power" of Micah's words were utterly lost on them. So even when the "letter" of Scripture is known its power may be missed.

Again, the story which the Sadducees had concocted to catch Jesus illustrates the point. They did not believe in the resurrection of the body and they knew that Jesus did, so they used the language of Moses (Deuteronomy 25) to present what they thought was a dilemma. Since seven brothers had married one woman, one after the other according to the law, whose wife should she be in the resurrection? This brought Jesus' words that they did not know the Scriptures nor the power of God. Had they known the Scriptures they would have known that God raises the dead. Had .they known the power of God they would have believed that He was able to do so.

Then Jesus brought up the Scripture" which should have taught them about the resurrection: "I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." How many times is this phrase found in the Old Testament. These are the words which had been revealed to Moses as God's memorial, His name forever (Exodus 3:15,16). Wherein does this say that there is a resurrection? Jesus manner of explaining it lies in the words, "God is not the God of the dead, but of the living" Matthew 22:32).

This, in effect, says that these fathers are yet living. But I suspect that many Christians will conclude that this only means that they are spiritually alive somewhere. But if it does it is that one day God may reunite them with a resurrected body. The logic of the answer lies in the fact that God had made promises under oath to these fathers that He would give them certain promised blessings as recorded in His covenant with them. But they died without gaining these promises (cf. Hebrews 11:39). So how could God's words be fulfilled to them? He must raise them from the dead.

The written word of God shows us His willingness and His power to raise up dead bodies. But the reality of that message has escaped most people. It is becoming very popular today for men to believe in re-incarnation. This seems to them a more reasonable way for a man to live again than that God should resurrect his body from the grave. A birth in some other body seems reasonable to men, but not the "power of God." Actually, a birth is only by God's power - through the working of His genius set in His creation from the beginning but men are not ready to accept the reality of God's power. They would rather believe in "mother nature."

The Truth of God is set forth in His Word, but not many men see it there. They do not have ears to hear. This is why God set His Son, the Living Word. "He hath declared Him" (John 1:18). This is a whole volume of Truth about God's speaking to human hearts. Where words, even God's own words, do not come through to deaf men with hard hearts it may be possible for them to see His glory in the face of Jesus Christ. Thus did God give His Word - did declare Himself. What a mystery of godliness (1 Timothy 3:16). "God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself (2 Corinthians 5:19). Men must hear!

But now the man Christ Jesus has gone back to the Father and men see Him no more - no more in the body, that is. But did God leave Himself without a witness? No, He left His body here and came to dwell in it. This is what the church is today. In the members of that body which is Christ (1 Corinthians 6:15; 1 Corinthians 12:12) He is set forth before the eyes and hearts of men. This mystery of God's speaking is lost upon most men yet, I fear. We pray and ask that God may show himself in our lives, that some lost man may see Christ in us, but do we ever stop to think that this is, indeed, the very thing which is necessary if the Word of God is to be heard and believed today.

We are assured that God always causes us to triumph in Christ (2 Corinthians 2:14). We are told that we are a sweet savor of his knowledge, the savor of life unto life, and that no man of himself is sufficient for such things (2 Corinthians 2:15-17), but that God makes us able ministers (2 Corinthians 3:6). Paul tells us that this is not a ministering of the letter but of the spirit.

Thus are we taught that the "power" of God's word, by His Spirit, is manifested in us to reveal Him to men. He ministers life in us and by us to others. It will not be a mere matter of our learning right doctrines or correct practices, but it will be a matter of our demonstrating the life of Christ in all of its sweetness and in the savor of his knowledge.

I fear for those of us who have know the letter of the Word and have ministered death to so many thereby (2 Corinthians 3:6). If we are to minister life it must be because the living Lord, by the Spirit, demonstrates His own life in us and by us communicates it to the hearts of others.

Men need Christ. It is not so much the doctrines of Baptists, or of the Bible, that they need; it is the gracious Lord Himself. This we must have ourselves before we can begin to communicate this living Word to others. And we have Him through communion, through fellowship in the Spirit, through prayer and praise, by love and patience, in forgiveness and mercy. What good is scholarship if we lack these others.

One man said he would rather be right than president. Far better still, one ought rather to be spiritually alive and responsive and communicative than be doctrinally right. True, one's doctrines soon become correct when the other factors are in evidence. But setting the doctrines right first only makes Pharisees, not Christians.

If I seem to pluck this one string unduly it is because I truly feel it has been allowed too little effect in the music of the soul.