Hebrews 4:12-13, “The Word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow…no creature is hidden from His sight, but all are naked and exposed before the eyes of Him to whim we must give an account.”
The word of God as recounted in Scripture is not “dead,” it is not an object to be acted upon. Rather, God’s word is itself the acting subject, it is living, it is active it is powerfully present in the moment it is received (even as you’ve just received it in reading the reference above).
The instruction of the Scriptures (3:7-11), the hope of the Gospel (3:6), the call to enter Rest and the warning against unbelief (4:1-3)—these things are not mere human words. Human words are like stones: they are spoken, they fall to the ground, and they can then be picked up, examined, re-arranged, etc. The Divine word is like running water: it is ever new, ever fresh, ever moving and acting, ever giving life and breaking down the earth around it and never mastered by human hands.
But this analogy falls short, because (and here is, as it were, the “prestige” moment in the author’s argument) because this word is supremely *The Word*—the living, seeing, judging *Person* of Jesus Christ. Every word of God points toward and finds its telos in the Crucified Jesus Christ who is Risen, whose resurrection-illumined flesh is the articulation and seal of everything God ever says (or does, or is). The word is not finally a “what,” but a “who.”
This transition from “What” to “Who” is made explicit in v.13, where the author reveals that the “Word” is, in fact, the PERSON before whom we will all stand and give account. The Word that comes to us as we hear the Gospel from the Scriptures IS the slain and living Word in whom is all our hope and before whose all-consuming, soul-searching, heart-judging, un-erring eyes we will one day stand.
For this reason, let us take seriously what we hear and let us strive—exhorting one another to hold fast to the hope of the Risen Lord—to enter into His Rest.
