And the different things spoken of it in the text are far more suited to the written word, than to the Lord Jesus Christ. To that, therefore, we limit the de- scription before us. Its properties are set forth,
1. In figurative terms — [It is " quick," that is, a living word. Our blessed Lord represents it in the same view : " The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life^." And it is the very same term which Stephen also makes use of, when he calls the Scriptures " the lively oracles s." The word is not a mere dead letter, that will soon vanish away : it lives in the mind of God : it lives in the decrees of heaven : it liveth and will live for ever: nor will millions of ages cause it to be forgotten, or in the least enervate its force. AH besides this shall wax old, and decay: but this shall endure, without the alteration of one jot or tittle of it, to all generations'^.
It is also " powerful." ear the appeal which God himself makes to us respecting it : " Is not my word like as a fire ? saith the Lord: and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces'?" Yes: there is nothing that can resist its force.
But in the text it is compared with " a two-edged sword," which, how sharp soever it may be, cannot penetrate like that. Frequently is it characterized by this image, especially as pro- ceeding from the mouth of the Lord Jesus Christ''. Yet does that image give but a very faint idea of its power : for a sword, though it may inflict a mortal wound, would be utterly in- capable of dividing, with accuracy, the almost imperceptible organs of the human frame : but the word can " pierce to the dividing asunder the joints and marrow, yea, and the animal soul also from the rational spirit." By this is meant, that there is nothing so hidden, which it cannot detect ; nothing so blended, which it cannot discriminate.
This the Apostle proceeds to set forth,]
2. In plain language —
[The word is " a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart." Of the unregenerate man it is said, that " every imagination of the thoughts of his heart is only evil continu- ally V The regenerate are " renewed in the spirit of their minds." But still they are not so renewed, but that some imperfection cleaves to all which they do : there is something in every thought and every purpose of the human heart, some- thing which still shews that man is a fallen creature, and which
f John vi. 63. « Acts vii. 38. ^ 1 Pet. i. 23—25.
» Jer. xxiii. 29. ^ Isai. xlix. 2. Rev. i. 16.
1 Gen. vi. 5.