“Is not my word like as a fire? saith the LORD; and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces?” (Jeremiah 23:29).

The power resident in the word of God—both His spoken word and His written word, the holy Scriptures—is so great that the Biblical writers almost exhaust their resources of language in trying to describe it, using many and varied figures of speech to illustrate its wonders.

It is the word which produces and maintains life. “Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart” (Jeremiah 15:16). It is both “milk” for the babe and “strong meat” for the mature in Christ (Hebrews 5:12), and our daily bread. “Man shall not live by bread alone,” said the Lord Jesus, “but by every word of God” (Luke 4:4). “How sweet are thy words unto my taste! yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth!” (Psalm 119:103).

The word of God is also our daily light. “We have also a more sure word of prophecy; . . . A light that shineth in a dark place” (II Peter 1:19). “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path” (Psalm 119:105).

We also are admonished to take “the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:17), for “the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword” (Hebrews 4:12). In our text, it is like a “hammer” that can break any resistance to God’s will.

There are many other wonderful metaphors of the word, for it so consumed Biblical writers that they could not help but write of its praises and powers. It was also Jeremiah who testified, after having decided no longer to preach the word to those who disbelieved, “His word was in mine heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay [literally, refrain]” (Jeremiah 20:9). The word of God will not be silent. Let us pray for such a burning fire in our own souls. HMM