The Banquet Table
April 24, 2024
Extreme surgery
September 06, 2018
For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. – HEBREWS 4:12
Consider what happens in open-heart surgery: the heart is shut down, the blood detoured, the chest laid open and probes and instruments pierce the heart tissue! Not long ago, people would have gasped at such a procedure. It’s not quite ho-hum, but open-heart surgery occurs thousands of times every day. We may not all need a physical cardiac operation, but we all need spiritual heart surgery.
God’s word makes precise, life-saving incisions, like a surgeon’s scalpel. It lays out the heart. The Scripture says “all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.” (HEBREWS 4:13)
God’s word also purifies and cauterizes. “Is not My word like fire?” God asks, rhetorically, through Jeremiah. (JEREMIAH 23:29) Rationalizations leading to heart sickness are burned away through the searing of His truth.
Sometimes, God’s word is an instrument of force. A surgeon may have to strike the chest cavity hard to get a heart going. God’s word is “like a hammer,” says JEREMIAH 23:29. Allow God’s word to do spiritual heart surgery on you daily!
TODAY’S FOCUS
Ask God to help you apply His word to your heart daily.
