WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.100 Well, today I was thinking we would look at the book of Jeremiah. 2 00:00:05.100 --> 00:00:10.960 If we turn to the book of Jeremiah, chapter 23. 3 00:00:10.960 --> 00:00:25.640 I want to read Jeremiah 23, verses 16 through 32. 4 00:00:25.640 --> 00:00:37.320 Jeremiah was a prophet immediately before and during the Babylonian captivity. 5 00:00:37.320 --> 00:00:43.960 He started his prophetic ministry at the end of King Josiah’s reign. 6 00:00:43.960 --> 00:00:49.400 King Josiah was the last good king of Judah. 7 00:00:49.400 --> 00:00:53.300 The kingdom had split between Judah and Israel. 8 00:00:53.300 --> 00:00:55.220 The kingdom of Israel was no more. 9 00:00:55.220 --> 00:00:57.760 It had already been conquered. 10 00:00:57.760 --> 00:01:05.420 The kingdom of Judah still had some kings, and King Josiah was the last of the good kings. 11 00:01:05.420 --> 00:01:23.120 There was a revival that happened in Judah when Josiah was king, but Josiah was killed in battle, and when the next king took the throne, the kingdom of Judah again did evil in the sight of God, and there was no good kings after Josiah. 12 00:01:23.120 --> 00:01:29.140 The kingdom at that time after Josiah was filled with highly religious people. 13 00:01:29.140 --> 00:01:39.120 They were filled with prophets who claimed that they spoke from God but were in actuality speaking their own thoughts, their own desires, their own wills. 14 00:01:39.120 --> 00:01:40.920 They ignored God’s Word. 15 00:01:40.920 --> 00:01:44.100 They ignored God’s calls for repentance. 16 00:01:44.100 --> 00:01:48.640 They ignored the prophet Jeremiah who spoke the words of God. 17 00:01:48.640 --> 00:01:57.740 So although they were a deeply religious people, they pursued their own sinful wants and desires. 18 00:01:57.740 --> 00:02:21.580 And so as we read this portion of Jeremiah 23 this morning, I want us to focus on the true Word of God, the preciousness of God’s Word, how the Word of God is unlike anything else that we read or know, and how the true Word of God is powerful, how it can effect change in the hearts and minds of people. 19 00:02:21.580 --> 00:02:24.520 So as we read this, I want us to remember the context. 20 00:02:24.520 --> 00:02:28.500 God is speaking to the shepherds. 21 00:02:28.500 --> 00:02:38.760 If you look at the very beginning of chapter 23, it says, Woe to the shepherds who are destroying and scattering the sheep of My pasture, declares the Lord. 22 00:02:38.760 --> 00:02:48.820 So this whole chapter is to the people who are supposed to be the spiritual leaders of Judah, but who are leading the people astray. 23 00:02:48.820 --> 00:02:51.560 So that’s the context. 24 00:02:51.560 --> 00:03:05.060 And so we’re probably already turned to the book of Jeremiah, but before we read it, I want you to realize how blessed you are that you can turn to this book of Jeremiah. 25 00:03:05.060 --> 00:03:07.440 A few days ago I got back from Peru. 26 00:03:07.440 --> 00:03:10.820 I was there for 10 days. 27 00:03:10.820 --> 00:03:23.640 What we were doing there is we were interviewing in length pastors who were in various parts of the country, jungle pastors, some pastors in the city of Lima. 28 00:03:23.640 --> 00:03:34.880 We were interviewing them for about an hour each just to hear their stories, their testimonies, to see how God has worked in their lives. 29 00:03:34.880 --> 00:03:39.020 And one of them, his name is Martin. 30 00:03:39.020 --> 00:03:40.920 He was very long-winded. 31 00:03:40.920 --> 00:03:45.700 His interview lasted 100 minutes, exactly. 32 00:03:45.700 --> 00:03:56.120 He told the story about his conversion, and as he told the story of his conversion, he talked about what his life was like before Christ. 33 00:03:56.120 --> 00:03:59.240 He talked about how he was angry all the time. 34 00:03:59.240 --> 00:04:15.860 He was abusive to his wife and to his daughter, even hitting his daughter in the face when she was just two years old, and it left a mark on her face that didn’t heal for years. 35 00:04:15.860 --> 00:04:23.820 This was before he heard about the gospel, but God saved him out of that. 36 00:04:23.820 --> 00:04:29.080 It’s a hundred-minute testimony, so I can’t tell you how he was saved out of that, but God saved him. 37 00:04:29.080 --> 00:04:33.340 His life was transformed, but they were extremely poor. 38 00:04:33.340 --> 00:04:37.080 They were so poor that they could not afford a Bible. 39 00:04:37.080 --> 00:04:50.820 Someone had given them a New Testament, and when he would go to church, he would sit in the pew, and he would open his New Testament, and the pastor would say, “Please turn to the book of Jeremiah.” 40 00:04:50.820 --> 00:04:53.100 And he would weep. 41 00:04:53.100 --> 00:05:00.760 He would sit in the pew, and he would weep because his New Testament did not have the book of Jeremiah. 42 00:05:00.760 --> 00:05:10.020 He would watch everyone else open their Bibles to Jeremiah and read God’s Word, but he could not because he had no Jeremiah. 43 00:05:10.020 --> 00:05:11.200 He would pray. 44 00:05:11.200 --> 00:05:14.580 He would continually pray, “Lord, I want a Bible.” 45 00:05:14.580 --> 00:05:18.000 He would pray that prayer every week. 46 00:05:18.000 --> 00:05:36.480 So as we read this passage, we can be extremely thankful that your Bible has this passage of Scripture in it to help us, to encourage us, and to teach us what the Lord would have for us. 47 00:05:36.480 --> 00:05:39.460 So let’s read from verse 16. 48 00:05:39.460 --> 00:05:47.540 Jeremiah 23:16 says, Thus says the Lord of hosts, “Do not listen to the words of the prophets who are prophesying to you. 49 00:05:47.540 --> 00:05:54.260 They are leading you into futility; they speak a vision of their own imagination, not from the mouth of the Lord. 50 00:05:54.260 --> 00:06:06.400 They keep saying to those who despise Me, ‘The Lord has said, “You will have peace”‘; and as for everyone who walks in the stubbornness of his own heart, they say, ‘Calamity will not come upon you.’ 51 00:06:06.400 --> 00:06:12.220 But who has stood in the council of the Lord, that he should see and hear His word? 52 00:06:12.220 --> 00:06:15.220 Who has given heed to His word and listened? 53 00:06:15.220 --> 00:06:22.620 Behold, the storm of the Lord has gone forth in wrath, even a whirling tempest; it will swirl down on the head of the wicked. 54 00:06:22.620 --> 00:06:31.980 The anger of the Lord will not turn back until He has performed and carried out the purposes of His heart; in the last days you will clearly understand it. 55 00:06:31.980 --> 00:06:36.100 I did not send these prophets, but they ran. 56 00:06:36.100 --> 00:06:39.540 I did not speak to them, but they prophesied. 57 00:06:39.540 --> 00:06:49.340 But if they had stood in My council, then they would have announced My words to My people, and would have turned them back from their evil way and from the evil of their deeds. 58 00:06:49.340 --> 00:06:54.300 Am I a God who is near,” declares the Lord, “and not a God far off? 59 00:06:54.300 --> 00:06:58.860 Can a man hide himself in hiding places so I do not see him?” 60 00:06:58.860 --> 00:06:59.940 declares the Lord. 61 00:06:59.940 --> 00:07:02.700 “Do I not fill the heavens and the earth?” 62 00:07:02.700 --> 00:07:04.100 declares the Lord. 63 00:07:04.100 --> 00:07:11.820 “I have heard what the prophets have said who prophesy falsely in My name, saying, ‘I had a dream, I had a dream!’ 64 00:07:11.820 --> 00:07:12.860 How long? 65 00:07:12.860 --> 00:07:31.040 Is there anything in the hearts of the prophets who prophesy falsehood, even these prophets of the deception of their own heart, who intend to make My people forget My name by their dreams which they relate to one another, just as their fathers forgot My name because of Baal? 66 00:07:31.040 --> 00:07:39.080 The prophet who has a dream may relate his dream, but let him who has My word speak My word in truth. 67 00:07:39.080 --> 00:07:42.120 What does straw have in common with grain?” 68 00:07:42.120 --> 00:07:43.700 declares the Lord. 69 00:07:43.700 --> 00:07:46.200 “Is not My word like fire?” 70 00:07:46.200 --> 00:07:51.800 declares the Lord, “and like a hammer which shatters a rock? 71 00:07:51.800 --> 00:07:58.040 Therefore behold, I am against the prophets,” declares the Lord, “who steal My words from each other. 72 00:07:58.040 --> 00:08:04.760 Behold, I am against the prophets,” declares the Lord, “who use their tongues and declare, ‘The Lord declares.’ 73 00:08:04.760 --> 00:08:24.700 Behold, I am against those who have prophesied false dreams,” declares the Lord, “and related them and led My people astray by their falsehoods and reckless boasting; yet I did not send them or command them, nor do they furnish this people the slightest benefit,” declares the Lord. 74 00:08:24.700 --> 00:08:29.960 Let me pray for us as we look at this passage of Scripture. 75 00:08:29.960 --> 00:08:41.540 Father, we ask you this morning, as we have just read your words, that they would be illuminated to us through the work of the Holy Spirit. 76 00:08:41.540 --> 00:08:46.000 We ask you, as we look at this, that you would teach us. 77 00:08:46.000 --> 00:08:48.260 We ask in Jesus’ name. 78 00:08:48.260 --> 00:08:51.340 Amen. 79 00:08:51.340 --> 00:09:03.020 This is a lengthy passage that shows the context of where Jeremiah is teaching, of what Jeremiah is prophesying against. 80 00:09:03.020 --> 00:09:11.740 You have these prophets who are prophesying, but they’re prophesying and teaching something that is contrary to the Word of God. 81 00:09:11.740 --> 00:09:15.760 What I want to do this morning is focus on verse 29. 82 00:09:15.760 --> 00:09:19.180 Verse 29 says, “Is not My word like fire?” 83 00:09:19.180 --> 00:09:26.300 declares the Lord, “and like a hammer which shatters a rock?” 84 00:09:26.300 --> 00:09:31.480 Another one of the pastors that I interviewed, his name is Luis. 85 00:09:31.480 --> 00:09:35.700 Luis is 68 years old. 86 00:09:35.700 --> 00:09:41.080 And like most people in Peru, he grew up a Roman Catholic. 87 00:09:41.080 --> 00:09:45.380 His parents were not believers, even though they were deeply religious. 88 00:09:45.380 --> 00:09:50.500 When he was six years old, his father abandoned him and his mother and went off. 89 00:09:50.500 --> 00:09:53.200 He was raised as a very religious Catholic. 90 00:09:53.200 --> 00:09:56.980 He would go with his mother to Mass each week. 91 00:09:56.980 --> 00:10:00.540 He would bow down before the statues every Sunday. 92 00:10:00.540 --> 00:10:07.180 He would even carry one of the idols in the processions. 93 00:10:07.180 --> 00:10:11.860 He did all of that, he said, as a way of proving his faith. 94 00:10:11.860 --> 00:10:14.060 And yet inside he was empty. 95 00:10:14.060 --> 00:10:18.280 Even though he attended the Catholic Church, he did not have any peace. 96 00:10:18.280 --> 00:10:28.380 He would leave church on Sundays and immediately go dancing and drinking, pursuing his own sin immediately after the service. 97 00:10:28.380 --> 00:10:35.040 As he grew older, evangelists would try and tell him about the true gospel of Jesus Christ. 98 00:10:35.040 --> 00:10:41.920 They would preach to him again and again and again, but every time, Luis rejected their message. 99 00:10:41.920 --> 00:10:46.200 He believed in his own Catholic convictions, and he believed in his own righteousness. 100 00:10:46.200 --> 00:10:48.980 He was good enough before God. 101 00:10:48.980 --> 00:10:51.040 He was deeply religious, after all. 102 00:10:51.040 --> 00:10:52.220 He was a good Catholic. 103 00:10:52.220 --> 00:10:55.240 He did everything that he was supposed to do. 104 00:10:55.240 --> 00:11:02.540 He told me how he joined the Peruvian army and how a man preached the gospel to him there, and he rejected it. 105 00:11:02.540 --> 00:11:08.340 After the army, he started work for a mechanics company, and there he met his wife. 106 00:11:08.340 --> 00:11:13.840 They lived together unmarried at that time, but he did not love her. 107 00:11:13.840 --> 00:11:18.260 He told me that he pursued her just to have her, but he did not love her at all. 108 00:11:18.260 --> 00:11:21.300 They would fight all the time. 109 00:11:21.300 --> 00:11:23.800 Eventually, he wanted to be rid of her. 110 00:11:23.800 --> 00:11:28.860 She became pregnant with her daughter, and the fights got worse after she was born. 111 00:11:28.860 --> 00:11:31.300 He wanted to be free of them. 112 00:11:31.300 --> 00:11:39.640 And one night, after two years of constant fighting, she couldn’t take it anymore and left with her daughter to live at her mother’s house. 113 00:11:39.640 --> 00:11:41.420 And Luis was happy. 114 00:11:41.420 --> 00:11:43.560 He was finally free of them. 115 00:11:43.560 --> 00:11:48.760 He thought that he had won, but he wasn’t free. 116 00:11:48.760 --> 00:11:55.200 About ten days later, he started to feel the absence of his daughter. 117 00:11:55.200 --> 00:11:57.260 He started to feel a deep sadness. 118 00:11:57.260 --> 00:12:08.480 He started to feel deep regret, and he started to remember some of the things that the evangelist had told him years before. 119 00:12:08.480 --> 00:12:16.120 One of them, years ago, had given him his own personal Bible and said, “Luis, I’m giving you this Bible, and I want you to read it.” 120 00:12:16.120 --> 00:12:17.700 But Luis never opened it. 121 00:12:17.700 --> 00:12:23.540 He put it on the top of his wardrobe and forgot about it, forgot it was there. 122 00:12:23.540 --> 00:12:32.660 But in this deep regret that he started to feel, one night he was laying on his bed smoking his cigarettes that he had just bought. 123 00:12:32.660 --> 00:12:43.620 And he remembered the words of one of the evangelists who told him, “The day that you start reading that Bible,” the Bible that he gave him, “begin with the Gospel of John. 124 00:12:43.620 --> 00:12:49.140 It’s written for the whole world, and it has a message in it for you.” 125 00:12:49.140 --> 00:12:50.720 So he remembered that. 126 00:12:50.720 --> 00:12:57.020 And so he remembered the Bible was up there, and so he gets it down, and he starts reading it. 127 00:12:57.020 --> 00:13:02.200 He turns to the Gospel of John because that’s what the evangelists had told him to do. 128 00:13:02.200 --> 00:13:07.900 He reads the first chapter, and it doesn’t make any sense, and so he puts it down. 129 00:13:07.900 --> 00:13:12.160 But he picks it back up, and he reads the second chapter, and then he reads the third chapter. 130 00:13:12.160 --> 00:13:22.480 And then when he gets to verse 16 of the third chapter, he took the cigarette out of his mouth and he crushed it, and he tore up all the other ones that he had bought, and he starts to weep. 131 00:13:22.480 --> 00:13:23.760 He couldn’t stop. 132 00:13:23.760 --> 00:13:29.900 He couldn’t stop crying, and he started to pray, and he prayed, “Jesus, if you love me, forgive me. 133 00:13:29.900 --> 00:13:32.380 Save my marriage.” 134 00:13:32.380 --> 00:13:35.660 And he said that God did something incredible. 135 00:13:35.660 --> 00:13:44.980 He gave him repentance, and he gave him a love for his wife that he never had before. 136 00:13:44.980 --> 00:13:47.300 He threw out his cigarettes. 137 00:13:47.300 --> 00:13:55.380 He took all of the framed pictures of the Catholic saints that he had accumulated, that he prayed to in his house, and he smashed them. 138 00:13:55.380 --> 00:14:01.420 And although he had attended the Catholic Church all of his life, he had no knowledge of the Bible whatsoever. 139 00:14:01.420 --> 00:14:10.040 He had no knowledge of the Scriptures, but what he had just read in the Gospel of John for the very first time, he believed. 140 00:14:10.040 --> 00:14:26.600 Luis’s heart was hard as a rock and wouldn’t accept the things of God all of his life until he read the Scriptures and his heart was opened. 141 00:14:26.600 --> 00:14:30.290 A man’s heart is a rock of stone. 142 00:14:30.290 --> 00:14:42.600 We read in Ezekiel 36:26, but the Word of God, as we read in this chapter, Jeremiah, is a hammer which shatters the rock. 143 00:14:42.600 --> 00:14:52.680 Ezekiel 36:26 says, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and will give you a heart of flesh. 144 00:14:52.680 --> 00:15:01.860 The natural man, the unbeliever’s natural state before God, is that of someone who is dead. 145 00:15:01.860 --> 00:15:05.280 His heart is not beating. 146 00:15:05.280 --> 00:15:07.740 It’s as cold as a rock. 147 00:15:07.740 --> 00:15:09.400 That man is in a hopeless condition. 148 00:15:09.400 --> 00:15:11.320 He does not desire God. 149 00:15:11.320 --> 00:15:13.120 He does not seek after God. 150 00:15:13.120 --> 00:15:17.960 He is dead in his transgressions and his sins. 151 00:15:17.960 --> 00:15:39.140 And so when we’re thinking about this passage, that the Word of God is like a hammer which shatters the rock, the first question is, how does God’s Word shatter a rocky heart of stone like Luis’s heart, who rejected the gospel over and over and over again? 152 00:15:39.140 --> 00:15:49.040 Well, first of all, the rock is shattered by God’s Word because God’s Word is completely unlike any other word uttered by man. 153 00:15:49.040 --> 00:15:52.240 Think about the prophets in Jeremiah’s time. 154 00:15:52.240 --> 00:15:58.000 They often began their prophecies with the phrase, “Thus saith the Lord.” 155 00:15:58.000 --> 00:16:00.820 But the Lord did not speak. 156 00:16:00.820 --> 00:16:04.920 The Lord did not give them those words to say. 157 00:16:04.920 --> 00:16:07.760 They proclaimed their own words without power. 158 00:16:07.760 --> 00:16:27.220 But when God speaks, as he has spoken to us today in this passage of Scripture, when God speaks, it’s the same powerful word, just like the same word that he said in the very beginning when he said, Let there be light, and there was light. 159 00:16:27.220 --> 00:16:29.380 It effects change. 160 00:16:29.380 --> 00:16:32.920 Something happens. 161 00:16:32.920 --> 00:16:47.100 There’s no difference in the authority of God’s Word between the words that you read on this page and the words that God says audibly when he said, “Let there be light,” when he spoke creation into existence. 162 00:16:47.100 --> 00:16:48.680 Both are God’s words. 163 00:16:48.680 --> 00:16:52.300 And so, first of all, God’s words are powerful. 164 00:16:52.300 --> 00:16:54.780 They have divine authority. 165 00:16:54.780 --> 00:17:04.500 The Bible that we read does not derive its authority from a church council or from human traditions. 166 00:17:04.500 --> 00:17:09.400 Man did not decide that the Bible is authoritative. 167 00:17:09.400 --> 00:17:14.880 Man didn’t even decide which books of the Bible are authoritative. 168 00:17:14.880 --> 00:17:16.720 It’s self-evident. 169 00:17:16.720 --> 00:17:23.860 The Bible is self-evident in its authority. 170 00:17:23.860 --> 00:17:27.680 God’s Word is recognizable, and that’s the point. 171 00:17:27.680 --> 00:17:31.960 That’s the point of the previous verse. 172 00:17:31.960 --> 00:17:42.760 If you look at verse 28, so before our verse 29, verse 28 says, “The prophet who has a dream may relate his dream, but let him who has My word speak My word in truth. 173 00:17:42.760 --> 00:17:45.280 What does straw have in common with grain?” 174 00:17:45.280 --> 00:17:46.600 declares the Lord. 175 00:17:46.600 --> 00:17:52.380 If you think about straw and grain, they’re very similar if you look at them from a distance. 176 00:17:52.380 --> 00:17:54.280 Jackie’s the expert on this. 177 00:17:54.280 --> 00:18:01.760 If you look at straw and grain from a distance, they look very similar. 178 00:18:01.760 --> 00:18:07.780 But as you approach them, as you get closer, one is just a husk of dried grass. 179 00:18:07.780 --> 00:18:09.380 Maybe a cow can eat it. 180 00:18:09.380 --> 00:18:11.920 You can’t eat it and get any sustenance. 181 00:18:11.920 --> 00:18:16.140 But the grain, you can grind into bread. 182 00:18:16.140 --> 00:18:18.420 It provides food. 183 00:18:18.420 --> 00:18:26.340 You don’t have to convene a council in order to determine which of these two things provides food for you. 184 00:18:26.340 --> 00:18:30.000 The straw will never provide food for you. 185 00:18:30.000 --> 00:18:31.420 It’s self-evident. 186 00:18:31.420 --> 00:18:33.600 So the Word of God is self-evident. 187 00:18:33.600 --> 00:18:38.220 It has all of the characteristics of divineness. 188 00:18:38.220 --> 00:18:51.480 So you can compare the text that we just read to any other ancient writing, like the Epic of Gilgamesh, or even the Apocrypha. 189 00:18:51.480 --> 00:18:55.460 You get a Catholic Bible and you turn to the Apocrypha in the middle. 190 00:18:55.460 --> 00:19:06.520 Those things might give you some historical insights, but it does not have the same authority as the Word of God that we just read this morning. 191 00:19:06.520 --> 00:19:07.800 You can read it. 192 00:19:07.800 --> 00:19:14.180 You can maybe get some historical commentary, but it doesn’t speak. 193 00:19:14.180 --> 00:19:21.560 It doesn’t feed in the same way that the Word of God feeds. 194 00:19:21.560 --> 00:19:24.840 What you hold in your hands is the power of God. 195 00:19:24.840 --> 00:19:27.400 The gospel is the power of God. 196 00:19:27.400 --> 00:19:37.360 Romans 1:16 says, For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also for the Greek. 197 00:19:37.360 --> 00:19:45.840 The Word of God is powerful, and it is a hammer that crushes the rocky hearts of the natural man. 198 00:19:45.840 --> 00:19:57.160 And then as believers, we’re to use God’s Word in proclaiming the gospel, to wield it as a hammer, because it is the power of God to break down hearts of stone. 199 00:19:57.160 --> 00:20:00.480 Charles Spurgeon wrote on this passage. 200 00:20:00.480 --> 00:20:05.660 I want to read his quote. 201 00:20:05.660 --> 00:20:20.200 It says, Spurgeon says, whenever a minister, and when he says minister here, he’s talking not just about a preacher, but anyone who administers the gospel, who teaches someone the gospel. 202 00:20:20.200 --> 00:20:28.140 It says, When a minister has the gospel to use, this metaphor of the hammer should teach him how he ought to use it. 203 00:20:28.140 --> 00:20:32.680 With his whole might, let him strike with it mighty blows for his Lord. 204 00:20:32.680 --> 00:20:38.520 I should think that it does not require any great education to learn how to use a hammer. 205 00:20:38.520 --> 00:20:44.360 It seems that to use a hammer correctly, one has nothing to do but to strike with it. 206 00:20:44.360 --> 00:20:56.080 A stonebreaker, for instance, gets a good strong hammer and a heap of stones to strike at, and he has but to hit them as hard as he can, and to keep on hitting till all are broken. 207 00:20:56.080 --> 00:21:01.960 Brethren, when you preach, take the gospel hammer and strike as hard as ever you can with it. 208 00:21:01.960 --> 00:21:06.040 You may say, “Oh, but I must try to improve the look of my hammer. 209 00:21:06.040 --> 00:21:09.140 I must have a mahogany handle.” 210 00:21:09.140 --> 00:21:11.480 Never mind about the mahogany handle. 211 00:21:11.480 --> 00:21:17.960 Use your hammer for striking, for hammers are not for ornament; they are meant to be used for real hard work. 212 00:21:17.960 --> 00:21:22.300 And when you come to use the gospel as it ought to be used, the result is wonderful. 213 00:21:22.300 --> 00:21:24.320 It is a rock-breaking thing. 214 00:21:24.320 --> 00:21:28.940 You may say, “Oh, there is a very stubborn man there.” 215 00:21:28.940 --> 00:21:30.740 Strike at him with the gospel. 216 00:21:30.740 --> 00:21:33.840 “Oh, but he ridicules and scoffs at the truth.” 217 00:21:33.840 --> 00:21:35.320 Never mind if he does. 218 00:21:35.320 --> 00:21:37.440 Keep on smiting him with the gospel. 219 00:21:37.440 --> 00:21:43.200 “Oh, but in a certain district, I’ve wielded this hammer against the rock for years, and nothing has come of it.” 220 00:21:43.200 --> 00:21:47.980 Still go on wielding it, for this is a hammer that never failed yet. 221 00:21:47.980 --> 00:21:49.800 Only continue to use it. 222 00:21:49.800 --> 00:21:54.300 Everything is not accomplished with one stroke, nor perhaps with 20 strokes. 223 00:21:54.300 --> 00:22:02.180 The rock that does not yield the first time, nor the second time, nor the third time, nor the 20th time, will yield at last. 224 00:22:02.180 --> 00:22:06.320 There is a process of disintegration taking place at every stroke. 225 00:22:06.320 --> 00:22:12.260 The great mass is inwardly moving, even when you cannot see that it is doing so. 226 00:22:12.260 --> 00:22:24.960 And there will come at last one blow of the hammer which will seem to do the deed, but all the previous strokes contributed to it and brought the rock into its right state for breaking it up at last. 227 00:22:24.960 --> 00:22:30.100 Hammer away then, brethren, hammer away with nothing but the gospel of Jesus Christ. 228 00:22:30.100 --> 00:22:36.580 The heart that is struck may not yield even year after year, but it will yield at last. 229 00:22:36.580 --> 00:22:47.380 So remember the evangelist in Luis’s life who constantly presented the gospel to him, but he rejected it every single time. 230 00:22:47.380 --> 00:22:50.580 Year after year, he heard the gospel. 231 00:22:50.580 --> 00:22:53.920 When he was in the army, he heard it and rejected it. 232 00:22:53.920 --> 00:22:58.480 When he had the Bible in his hand, he rejected it. 233 00:22:58.480 --> 00:23:07.380 But when he read the Word of God, the word was like a hammer that hammered at his rocky heart. 234 00:23:07.380 --> 00:23:18.580 His heart, which was stone cold, collapsed, and he was changed. 235 00:23:18.580 --> 00:23:19.880 His heart was changed. 236 00:23:19.880 --> 00:23:33.660 When he read John 3:16, he read it not as a skeptic, not as one who was self-righteous, but he read it as a child of God whose stony heart had been changed. 237 00:23:33.660 --> 00:23:37.940 Another pastor that I interviewed in Peru, his name is Silvio. 238 00:23:37.940 --> 00:23:48.420 He told a story about how his father and grandfather, both strong believers, they would ride throughout the Peruvian countryside on horseback evangelizing. 239 00:23:48.420 --> 00:23:57.480 One couple that they evangelized was an older couple who had two older daughters, one of which stayed with them to take care of them. 240 00:23:57.480 --> 00:24:00.540 The older couple couldn’t read at all. 241 00:24:00.540 --> 00:24:05.280 Silvio’s father and grandfather would visit this couple and preach the gospel to them. 242 00:24:05.280 --> 00:24:12.280 They told them about man’s state before God, that they needed to repent of their sins and trust in the Lord to be saved. 243 00:24:12.280 --> 00:24:13.140 And they did. 244 00:24:13.140 --> 00:24:16.100 They accepted that message of salvation. 245 00:24:16.100 --> 00:24:21.820 And the daughter comes to them and confronts them and says, “Why have you come to deceive my parents? 246 00:24:21.820 --> 00:24:23.240 They can’t read. 247 00:24:23.240 --> 00:24:25.760 We are Catholics.” 248 00:24:25.760 --> 00:24:31.860 And they answered her and said, Blessed is he that readeth and they that hear the Scriptures. 249 00:24:31.860 --> 00:24:34.180 “And these people have understood. 250 00:24:34.180 --> 00:24:39.220 They can’t read, but they have understood the message of salvation.” 251 00:24:39.220 --> 00:24:44.660 And that daughter was stubborn in her Catholicism and opposed them ever since. 252 00:24:44.660 --> 00:24:48.780 They would oppose them from coming and administering. 253 00:24:48.780 --> 00:24:51.380 After years passed, that couple died. 254 00:24:51.380 --> 00:24:55.180 They died as believers, the older man first and then the woman. 255 00:24:55.180 --> 00:24:59.980 And Silvio, the pastor, preached the gospel at the old woman’s funeral. 256 00:24:59.980 --> 00:25:10.360 And after the funeral, he went to speak to that daughter, and he tells her, “Whoever rejects the gospel of Jesus Christ will be separated from God. 257 00:25:10.360 --> 00:25:13.060 You need to repent and turn to the Lord. 258 00:25:13.060 --> 00:25:16.380 Pray to the Lord that he will soften your heart.” 259 00:25:16.380 --> 00:25:27.540 And the daughter looked at him and said, “Pastor, I have the Bible, the Bible that my mother left here,” she said. 260 00:25:27.540 --> 00:25:45.380 Even though that couple couldn’t read, they had gotten a Bible for their grandchildren to read to them, and apparently the daughter had been reading it, and her heart had been softened by the hammer strokes of the Word of God. 261 00:25:45.380 --> 00:25:52.440 She looks at Silvio and says, “Pastor,” she said, “the Bible truly is the truth. 262 00:25:52.440 --> 00:25:55.680 The Word of God breaks you.” 263 00:25:55.680 --> 00:26:03.380 And Silvio looked at her and said, “The Word of God is a hammer that breaks hard hearts. 264 00:26:03.380 --> 00:26:08.360 It breaks those hearts of stone.” 265 00:26:08.360 --> 00:26:12.640 Silvio told me in that interview, he said, “Thanks be to the Lord, brother. 266 00:26:12.640 --> 00:26:16.400 She and her husband too were converted to the Lord.” 267 00:26:16.400 --> 00:26:19.920 So the Word of God is like a hammer. 268 00:26:19.920 --> 00:26:21.940 It breaks down the heart of stone. 269 00:26:21.940 --> 00:26:26.240 It prepares the heart for God’s grace. 270 00:26:26.240 --> 00:26:37.960 The second picture in this passage is the metaphor, or a simile, the picture of the Word of God as fire. 271 00:26:37.960 --> 00:26:41.240 The Word of God is like fire. 272 00:26:41.240 --> 00:26:49.560 The picture of fire in this passage is directly connected to this imagery of the hammer crushing a rock. 273 00:26:49.560 --> 00:27:00.140 What the Lord is doing here is he’s using a different picture to communicate a very similar thing, or the same kind of thing. 274 00:27:00.140 --> 00:27:03.440 Like how the hammer crushes, the fire consumes. 275 00:27:03.440 --> 00:27:10.220 And so he just mentions straw and grain, and then he mentions fire. 276 00:27:10.220 --> 00:27:16.940 So in your mind, think about how a fire would overtake a barn full of straw. 277 00:27:16.940 --> 00:27:19.800 It would be instantly consumed. 278 00:27:19.800 --> 00:27:23.180 Nothing would be left, just char and ash. 279 00:27:23.180 --> 00:27:26.720 These are two pictures, two symbols of power. 280 00:27:26.720 --> 00:27:28.040 They’re powerful things. 281 00:27:28.040 --> 00:27:30.220 The hammer is a symbol of power. 282 00:27:30.220 --> 00:27:39.400 The fire is a symbol of power. 283 00:27:39.400 --> 00:27:48.180 It’s a picture of the Word of God in order to contrast the soft words, the palliative words of the false prophets. 284 00:27:48.180 --> 00:27:54.900 If you remember what the false prophets are saying, look at verse 17. 285 00:27:54.900 --> 00:27:57.880 They’re saying, You will have peace. 286 00:27:57.880 --> 00:27:59.800 Calamity will not come upon you. 287 00:27:59.800 --> 00:28:09.320 They’re preaching a message of peace when there really was no peace. 288 00:28:09.320 --> 00:28:12.020 Babylon was about to overtake them. 289 00:28:12.020 --> 00:28:17.220 They were all completely dead in their sins. 290 00:28:17.220 --> 00:28:19.680 They were not following the Lord. 291 00:28:19.680 --> 00:28:32.020 They were doing evil in the sight of the Lord, following after false gods, and they were preaching this message of peace. 292 00:28:32.020 --> 00:28:34.480 Jeremiah was not preaching a message of peace. 293 00:28:34.480 --> 00:28:43.960 He was preaching the opposite, that they needed to repent and turn to the Lord, or else they would be swept away. 294 00:28:43.960 --> 00:28:51.080 So the picture here is power over softness. 295 00:28:51.080 --> 00:28:52.960 God’s Word is like a fire. 296 00:28:52.960 --> 00:28:58.010 It’s something that is powerful, that consumes. 297 00:28:58.010 --> 00:29:07.270 So in the middle of this false teaching, this falsehood, was the real message, the real gospel. 298 00:29:07.270 --> 00:29:13.610 And that real message makes these false teachers pale in comparison to reality. 299 00:29:13.610 --> 00:29:15.100 And it’s recognizable. 300 00:29:15.100 --> 00:29:16.560 The difference was recognizable. 301 00:29:16.560 --> 00:29:20.520 That’s why Jeremiah was persecuted. 302 00:29:20.520 --> 00:29:28.140 Verse 30, the Lord says, I am against the prophets who steal My words from each other. 303 00:29:28.140 --> 00:29:30.720 And so what were these prophets doing? 304 00:29:30.720 --> 00:29:31.800 What were these people doing? 305 00:29:31.800 --> 00:29:33.480 Well, they persecuted Jeremiah. 306 00:29:33.480 --> 00:29:39.900 They preached their soft message even harder. 307 00:29:39.900 --> 00:29:53.900 They attempted to steal away God’s words in order for their own words and their own thoughts and desires to be made to the forefront. 308 00:29:53.900 --> 00:30:00.340 One of the other pastors I interviewed was a man named Nico Mendez. 309 00:30:00.340 --> 00:30:03.060 He talked about two brothers. 310 00:30:03.060 --> 00:30:14.320 They were the Garcia brothers, who years ago visited his area up in the mountains in order to bring the true gospel to a highly Catholic town. 311 00:30:14.320 --> 00:30:18.360 If the town is 100% Catholic, it’s highly Catholic. 312 00:30:18.360 --> 00:30:22.100 They were mocked and abused when they got there. 313 00:30:22.100 --> 00:30:28.600 They were dragged to the big square in the center of the village, where they were abused. 314 00:30:28.600 --> 00:30:31.480 Urine and all kinds of filth were thrown on them. 315 00:30:31.480 --> 00:30:37.340 They took the brothers’ Bibles and soaked them in urine. 316 00:30:37.340 --> 00:30:43.380 Think about this passage: I am against those who steal My words from each other, declares the Lord. 317 00:30:43.380 --> 00:30:45.040 Now think about why they would do that. 318 00:30:45.040 --> 00:30:45.800 Why would they do that? 319 00:30:45.800 --> 00:30:49.600 Why would they take their Bibles and soak them in urine? 320 00:30:49.600 --> 00:30:59.940 Well, they wouldn’t do that unless they recognized that the message that they were preaching was made powerful by the Word of God, by those Bibles. 321 00:30:59.940 --> 00:31:06.920 They recognized that that was the source of the power in their message, and they hated it. 322 00:31:06.920 --> 00:31:07.900 They hated it. 323 00:31:07.900 --> 00:31:10.960 They recognized the power of God’s Word, and they hated it. 324 00:31:10.960 --> 00:31:18.860 They did what these old prophets tried to do, to steal away God’s words from anyone who would be willing to hear. 325 00:31:18.860 --> 00:31:20.970 But they were ineffective. 326 00:31:20.970 --> 00:31:38.980 Nico Mendez, the pastor I talked to, told me that that particular story had an ending, but Nico Mendez himself is the pastor of a thriving church in that same area. 327 00:31:38.980 --> 00:31:53.320 So in an area that was 100% Catholic before, persecuted the people who came to bring the gospel to them, now has a church that teaches the truth of God’s Word. 328 00:31:53.320 --> 00:32:01.820 And it’s there because of the bravery and boldness of those two brothers and the tiny flame of the gospel that began in that town square. 329 00:32:01.820 --> 00:32:09.780 So the Word of God is like a fire because it burns and consumes false self-righteousness. 330 00:32:09.780 --> 00:32:12.520 It’s powerful, like a fire is powerful. 331 00:32:12.520 --> 00:32:15.640 It accomplishes all that God desires. 332 00:32:15.640 --> 00:32:22.900 So in comparison, the word of the false teacher and the false prophets is a teaching that, as the Bible says, tickles the ears. 333 00:32:22.900 --> 00:32:28.340 It’s a soft message, and usually the Word of God is absent. 334 00:32:28.340 --> 00:32:36.340 I remember a Bible teacher named, well, he’s with the Lord now, John MacArthur. 335 00:32:36.340 --> 00:32:45.820 Someone asked him a question, showed him a clip of a video of a false teacher teaching something contrary to God’s Word. 336 00:32:45.820 --> 00:32:58.060 He’s standing in front of his church of thousands of people teaching this, and he wanted to see what would John MacArthur say about this, what would his response be. 337 00:32:58.060 --> 00:33:07.020 And his only response was, “I hear what he’s saying, but I don’t see a Bible in front of him. 338 00:33:07.020 --> 00:33:10.920 I don’t see him opening a Bible.” 339 00:33:10.920 --> 00:33:13.500 And that’s very true. 340 00:33:13.500 --> 00:33:20.220 A lot of times when you have false teaching, they can speak very eloquently. 341 00:33:20.220 --> 00:33:34.740 They can amass great followings, but a lot of the time, most of the time, they’re doing it with the Bible closed, not with the Bible open. 342 00:33:34.740 --> 00:33:38.320 Because the Bible, the Word of God, is like a fire. 343 00:33:38.320 --> 00:33:43.620 It burns, it consumes false self-righteousness. 344 00:33:43.620 --> 00:33:48.760 And as a believer, it’s a fire in your life as well. 345 00:33:48.760 --> 00:34:04.090 When the Word of God is applied in the hearts of believers through the working of the Holy Spirit, it acts as a refiner’s fire, setting on fire the combustible material of sin and self, hidden pride, and it makes us more like Christ. 346 00:34:04.090 --> 00:34:11.760 And this was the effect of the Word of God in Luke 24 on the road to Emmaus as the disciples were walking along. 347 00:34:11.760 --> 00:34:21.960 While they were talking and discussing to one another, Jesus himself approaches and begins traveling with them, but if you remember, their eyes couldn’t recognize who he was. 348 00:34:21.960 --> 00:34:27.300 And he said to them, What are these words that you’re exchanging with one another as you were walking? 349 00:34:27.300 --> 00:34:35.710 After they told him, Jesus says, O foolish men and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken! 350 00:34:35.710 --> 00:34:40.900 Was it not necessary for the Christ to suffer these things and to enter into His glory? 351 00:34:40.900 --> 00:34:47.620 Then beginning with Moses and with all the prophets, He explained to them the things concerning Himself in all of the Scriptures. 352 00:34:47.620 --> 00:34:50.580 And so what is he doing? 353 00:34:50.580 --> 00:34:52.540 He’s explaining the Scriptures to them. 354 00:34:52.540 --> 00:34:55.760 He’s giving them the Word of God. 355 00:34:55.760 --> 00:34:59.960 And how did that take effect on them? 356 00:34:59.960 --> 00:35:16.220 After Jesus was revealed to them who he really was, the disciples said to one another, and this is Luke 24:32, Were not our hearts burning within us while He was speaking to us on the road, while He was explaining the Scriptures to us? 357 00:35:16.220 --> 00:35:19.700 And that’s the power of the Word of God on the hearts of believers. 358 00:35:19.700 --> 00:35:23.840 It causes your hearts to burn within you. 359 00:35:23.840 --> 00:35:29.060 This is the result of the application of the Word of God on believers by the Holy Spirit. 360 00:35:29.060 --> 00:35:33.940 If you’re a believer and you hear the Word of God, it should burn within you. 361 00:35:33.940 --> 00:35:36.160 It should convict you of sin. 362 00:35:36.160 --> 00:35:39.000 It should cause you to confess your sins. 363 00:35:39.000 --> 00:35:51.320 If you’re reading about Christ, about his nature, it should burn within your hearts, causing you to rejoice in thanksgiving and to give praise to God and to love him even more. 364 00:35:51.320 --> 00:36:05.060 Jeremiah says this same thing a little bit differently, but in Jeremiah chapter 20, verses 8 through 9, he says, For me the word of the Lord has resulted in reproach and derision all day long. 365 00:36:05.060 --> 00:36:14.640 But if I say, “I will not remember Him or speak anymore in His name,” then in my heart it becomes like a burning fire shut up in my bones. 366 00:36:14.640 --> 00:36:17.340 Jeremiah’s message was not a popular message. 367 00:36:17.340 --> 00:36:23.000 It was in fact the opposite of what everybody wanted to hear. 368 00:36:23.000 --> 00:36:30.820 But if he thought about giving it up, about giving up his ministry, his prophetic ministry, his heart burned within him. 369 00:36:30.820 --> 00:36:32.760 God’s Word burned within him. 370 00:36:32.760 --> 00:36:35.960 He must preach it. 371 00:36:35.960 --> 00:36:38.120 Because there’s no other word. 372 00:36:38.120 --> 00:36:40.420 There was no other word of salvation. 373 00:36:40.420 --> 00:36:46.060 And for us, there is no other name by which we must be saved. 374 00:36:46.060 --> 00:36:49.400 So for the believer, the Word of God is like a fire. 375 00:36:49.400 --> 00:36:53.180 The believer can recognize the Word of God for what it really is. 376 00:36:53.180 --> 00:36:56.140 When you read the Scriptures, it should burn within your heart. 377 00:36:56.140 --> 00:36:59.840 When you hear a passage of Scripture preached, it should do the same. 378 00:36:59.840 --> 00:37:04.160 It should cause you to love the Lord even more. 379 00:37:04.160 --> 00:37:18.700 So when we think about these two metaphors together, the Word is like a fire, it’s like a hammer which shatters the rock, the rocky heart of an unbeliever. 380 00:37:18.700 --> 00:37:31.080 When you think about them together, the hammer hammers at the unbeliever’s rocky heart, breaking it down over and over and over again until there’s nothing left. 381 00:37:31.080 --> 00:37:32.620 It’s disintegrated. 382 00:37:32.620 --> 00:37:34.660 The Lord takes that rubble. 383 00:37:34.660 --> 00:37:36.300 He takes that heart of stone. 384 00:37:36.300 --> 00:37:42.200 He puts in a beating heart of flesh within him. 385 00:37:42.200 --> 00:37:45.480 And he recognizes the Word of God for what it really is. 386 00:37:45.480 --> 00:37:51.960 And then throughout his life as a Christian, Scripture burns away the chaff, the hidden sins, the wrong desires. 387 00:37:51.960 --> 00:38:02.240 It burns into him a greater love for Christ, that he would be sanctified, that he’d be made fit for glory. 388 00:38:02.240 --> 00:38:18.120 Jonathan Edwards wrote of this passage and said, As the heart is subdued by the hammer of the word and prepares the heart for grace, so the subduing of the heart by the fire of the gospel prepares the heart for glory. 389 00:38:18.120 --> 00:38:20.240 And that’s true. 390 00:38:20.240 --> 00:38:24.520 The Word of God, operative in the life of the believer, acts as a refiner’s fire. 391 00:38:24.520 --> 00:38:31.940 It burns away the chaff of hidden sin and pride and fans the flame of love for God in our hearts. 392 00:38:31.940 --> 00:38:47.800 It prepares us for that day when we shall dwell with God in heaven, where there will be no more sin to subdue, no more hardship, no more darkness, only the light of Christ. 393 00:38:47.800 --> 00:38:53.020 One other person that I talked to in Peru, her name is Gloria. 394 00:38:53.020 --> 00:38:55.500 She’s 68 years old. 395 00:38:55.500 --> 00:38:58.580 Maybe she’s older, I can’t remember. 396 00:38:58.580 --> 00:38:59.720 She’s unmarried. 397 00:38:59.720 --> 00:39:02.180 She’s never been married. 398 00:39:02.180 --> 00:39:07.820 She’s an evangelist, and like most others, she grew up Catholic. 399 00:39:07.820 --> 00:39:13.300 She would attend Mass every week, as well as the patron saint festivals, which were the local tradition. 400 00:39:13.300 --> 00:39:24.480 She said, “I thought that was something good, that God forgave me through it, but I was so, so far from the truth the Bible speaks of. 401 00:39:24.480 --> 00:39:28.220 Since I had no Bible, I couldn’t understand anything. 402 00:39:28.220 --> 00:39:31.460 It was like that from childhood through my teens. 403 00:39:31.460 --> 00:39:35.740 I don’t think anyone in my village had a Bible, nobody.” 404 00:39:35.740 --> 00:39:43.940 She said that she lived her life up until that point, until her late teens, completely deceived. 405 00:39:43.940 --> 00:39:59.000 She eventually started attending an evangelical service when she was at school, and during the preaching, the pastor preached on Ephesians 2:8 and 9, For by grace you have been saved through faith. 406 00:39:59.000 --> 00:40:04.880 And she was converted and was immediately hungry for the Word of God. 407 00:40:04.880 --> 00:40:09.900 She got a small Bible, which became extremely precious to her. 408 00:40:09.900 --> 00:40:12.120 She took it with her wherever she went. 409 00:40:12.120 --> 00:40:18.620 She loved to read it and mark things that amazed her in it until it was completely covered in colors. 410 00:40:18.620 --> 00:40:24.700 So since she was an evangelist, I asked her how she goes about evangelizing someone. 411 00:40:24.700 --> 00:40:28.980 She says she usually asks them, “Do you have a Bible?” 412 00:40:28.980 --> 00:40:33.080 Sometimes they say yes, sometimes no, and sometimes yes, but they don’t read it. 413 00:40:33.080 --> 00:40:39.260 She says, “Then I say to them, do you know that you’re missing out on something that is a treasure? 414 00:40:39.260 --> 00:40:46.380 Because if you have it and don’t read it, it’s as if you didn’t have it at all. 415 00:40:46.380 --> 00:40:48.120 So I encourage them to read it. 416 00:40:48.120 --> 00:40:53.260 I tell them that the Bible is the most valuable treasure that we have.” 417 00:40:53.260 --> 00:41:11.180 And as an evangelist, she could have went through all of the different evangelistic methods, talking about the law and the gospel or the Romans Road or any of those things, but what she does is she typically directs them to the Word of God itself, because the Word of God is powerful. 418 00:41:11.180 --> 00:41:12.540 It’s like a hammer. 419 00:41:12.540 --> 00:41:13.800 It’s like fire. 420 00:41:13.800 --> 00:41:18.500 In order for it to do its work in our hearts, we need to read it. 421 00:41:18.500 --> 00:41:22.520 We need to realize that it’s our greatest treasure. 422 00:41:22.520 --> 00:41:25.880 It’s like fire in our hearts. 423 00:41:25.880 --> 00:41:36.400 And as believers, if you’re sad or experiencing coldness to the things of God or you’re depressed, open the Scriptures, because these words are the power of God. 424 00:41:36.400 --> 00:41:40.940 They’re a fire that will warm you, remove doubt and despair. 425 00:41:40.940 --> 00:41:44.280 And then we need to wield it. 426 00:41:44.280 --> 00:41:47.200 We need to wield the hammer of God’s Word. 427 00:41:47.200 --> 00:41:54.020 As Spurgeon said in that quote before, it doesn’t take an expert to be able to wield a hammer. 428 00:41:54.020 --> 00:41:56.700 It just takes someone who’s willing to do it. 429 00:41:56.700 --> 00:42:03.740 We have to be willing to teach the gospel through the Word of God. 430 00:42:03.740 --> 00:42:10.040 At the beginning, I told the story about Martin, who would listen to his pastor each week. 431 00:42:10.040 --> 00:42:20.400 The pastor would ask everyone to turn to the book of Jeremiah, and he would sit in the pew and weep because his New Testament had no Jeremiah. 432 00:42:20.400 --> 00:42:24.240 He would pray that God would give him a Bible. 433 00:42:24.240 --> 00:42:33.440 Well, soon after that prayer, the church hosted a singing contest, and third place was a Bible. 434 00:42:33.440 --> 00:42:36.640 And so he entered that contest. 435 00:42:36.640 --> 00:42:51.320 He made a few mistakes, but with the help of the blind organist, he placed third, and he was awarded the Bible, which he kept for many, many years, well used, until he gifted it. 436 00:42:51.320 --> 00:42:53.240 It was completely worn out at that point. 437 00:42:53.240 --> 00:43:00.060 He gifted it to someone like him who did not own one. 438 00:43:00.060 --> 00:43:05.900 So as we think about this passage this morning, think about that God’s Word is powerful. 439 00:43:05.900 --> 00:43:09.500 If you’re holding a Bible in your hands, you’re blessed. 440 00:43:09.500 --> 00:43:16.220 Revelation 1:3 says, Blessed is he who reads and those who hear. 441 00:43:16.220 --> 00:43:19.990 Let me just read this verse just one more time before we pray. 442 00:43:19.990 --> 00:43:22.040 “Is not My word like fire?” 443 00:43:22.040 --> 00:43:26.000 declares the Lord, “and like a hammer which shatters a rock?” 444 00:43:26.000 --> 00:43:31.960 Let’s pray together. 445 00:43:31.960 --> 00:43:38.220 Father, we do pray for your blessing on this passage that we read and thought about this morning. 446 00:43:38.220 --> 00:44:13.260 We ask that we would be more diligent in the reading of your Word, that we would realize that it is a precious treasure, that as we read it, that the Holy Spirit would apply it to our hearts, that our hearts would be broken down by the hammer of the gospel, that the Word of God would be like a fire that burns away the chaff of sin, that causes us to love Christ even more. 447 00:44:13.260 --> 00:44:21.180 We ask that this would be true of us, that we would read it, that we would study it. 448 00:44:21.180 --> 00:44:26.600 We do thank you for this passage that we read this morning in your Word, this passage in Jeremiah. 449 00:44:26.600 --> 00:44:34.500 We thank you for the blessing that it is, that we can hold it in our hands and read your very words. 450 00:44:34.500 --> 00:44:38.520 We thank you again for it in Jesus’ name. 451 00:44:38.520 --> 00:44:40.520 Amen.