verse4today: As the Lord said to Moses may he speak to us: "I have seen..., I have heard..., and I have come to rescue you.... (Exodus 3:7-8).
Posted on 2012-02-01 via Twitter
The One Year Bible recently brought me to the book of Deuteronomy (a book I would seldom, if ever, read without the encouragement of the One Year Bible). In Deuteronomy 5:23-27 I found these words of Moses to God's people, words by which he describes the reception of the Ten Commandments: "When you heard the voice out of the darkness, while the mountain was ablaze with fire, all the leading men of your tribes and elders came to me. And you said, 'The Lord our God has shown us his glory and his majesty, and we have heard his voice from the fire. Today we have seen that a man can live even if God speaks with him. But now, why should we die? This great fire will consume us, and we will die if we hear the voice of the Lord our God any longer. For what mortal man has ever heard the voice of the living God speaking out of the fire, as we have, and survived'?"
Centuries later, the apostle Paul wrote these words to the church of the Thessalonians: "We thank God continually because, when you received the word of God,l which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but as it actually is, the word of God, which is at work in you who believe" (I Thessalonians 2:13).
What happened between the time of Moses and the time of Paul that changed the Word of God from that which destroys to that which is at work giving life to all who believe? How is that we now hear the voice of the living God and, not only survive, but thrive? Clearly, the pivotal event was the crucifxion of Jesus Christ. It was there that his voice cried out of the darkness, "It is finished." It was from the small Mount of Calvary God the Father spoke to us through His Word, Jesus Christ. And the word he spoke in the midst of death, as we discover on Easter, was life.
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