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I. THE WORD OF GOD HAS POWER IN IT.

1. It is like a fire.

(1) You who are the people of God must often have felt greatly comforted, encouraged, and cheered, when you have been hearing the Gospel, just as when, on a cold day, and you are half benumbed, if your eyes arc blindfolded you know when you are coming near a fire by the genial glow which you feel You delight yourself in the Word of the Lord as you warm your hands at a bright cheery fire.

(2) But, next, fire is only at work very moderately when it yields us comfort; it has also the effect of paining, awakening, arousing. So, even if you are an unconverted man, if you have as yet no knowledge of the power of the Gospel of God, yet if you come in contact with it, I will warrant you that you will know it. Very likely you will show that you know it by getting very angry, growing very indignant. Men do not like being singed and scorched by the Gospel(3) Fire also has a melting power, and so has the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Oh, that we could get the hearts of many hardened ones into the very centre of the blessed flame, till the holy heat should make them flow like melted wax before the presence of the God of Israel!

(4) More than that, the Gospel has a consuming power. When it first comes into a district, it finds people indifferent to it; but possibly it begins by burning up some one of their vices. There have been old systems of iniquity that have been hoary with age, but when, at last, they have been attacked by the Church of God, with the sword of the Spirit, and the Gospel of Christ, they have been utterly destroyed.

2. God's Word is like a hammer: "and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces." So that, whenever a minister has the Gospel to use, this simile should teach him how he ought to use it; with his whole might let him strike with it mighty blows for his Lord. Hammer away, then, brethren, hammer away, with nothing but the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The heart that is struck may not yield even year after year, but it will yield at last.

3. Now put the two together, — the fire and the hammer, — and you will see how God makes His servants who are to be instruments for His use. He puts us into the fire of the Word; He melts, He softens, He subdues. Then He takes us out of the fire, and welds us with hammer-strokes such as only He can give, till He has made us fit instruments for His use; and He goes forth to His sacred work of conquering the multitudes, having in His hands the polished shafts that He has forged with the fire and the hammer of His Word.

II. ILLUSTRATE THIS STATEMENT by noticing certain parts of God's Word which have, to our personal knowledge, operated both as a fire and a hammer upon the hearts of men.

1. A large part of God's Word is taken up with the revelation of His law, and you cannot fully preach the Gospel if you do not proclaim the law of the Lord. Men will never receive the balm of the Gospel unless they know something of the wounds that sin hath made. If the law of God is faithfully and fully preached, what a fire it is! What a hammer it is!

2. But have you not also felt that there is fire-work and hammer-work in the teaching of the Gospel? The Gospel of redemption through the precious blood of Jesus, the Gospel which tells of full atonement made, the Gospel which proclaims that the utmost farthing of the ransom price has been paid, and that, therefore, whosoever believeth in Jesus is free from the law, and free from guilt, and free from hell, — the telling out of this Gospel has made men's hearts burn within them, and has dashed out the very brains of sin, and made men joyfully flee to Christ.

3. Above all, what fire-and-hammer power there is in the doctrine of the Cross! Man must yield when the power of the Spirit of God applies to his heart the doctrine of the precious blood.

III. PUT THE STATEMENT OF THE TEXT TO A PRACTICAL TEST. "Is not My Word like as a fire, saith the Lord; and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces?"

1. Let us, first, try it upon ourselves. When you are sad, do not run into your neighbour's house, do not sit down alone, and weep in sullen despair; get you to the Word of the Lord. There is such sweetness in it, there is such power in it, that in a short time you shall have beauty instead of ashes, and songs instead of sighs. You say that you are not sad, but you are very sleepy; you have become very drowsy and dull in the ways of God; you have not the earnest spirit you used to have, nor half the spiritual life and vigour you once felt. Very well, then, come to God's Word; read it, study it, listen to it, find Out where that Word is faithfully preached, and go there. Oh, how quickly the Lord has blessed some of us in times of great barrenness! Perhaps another says, "I have lost so much of my comfort, and assurance, and joy, that I feel as if I had grown quite cold and hard and insensible." Why need you be cold when God's Word is like as a fire? Why need your heart remain like a rock when God's Word is like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces:

2. Let us try to use it upon others. I have an opinion that there are a great many persons in this world, whom we give up as hopeless, who have never been really tried and tested with the Gospel in all their lives.

( C. H. Spurgeon.)

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KJV: Is not my word like as a fire? saith the LORD; and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces?

WEB: Isn't my word like fire? says Yahweh; and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces?