Nothing you do in life is as important as being a carrier of God’s word. Every job you have is just tent-making so you can have opportunities to preach God’s word. Nothing we do has any value unless we use it as a platform from which to launch the word of God.

Some time ago I had a wonderfully full week of ministering God’s word. Besides preparing for the Sunday sermons, I also taught a home fellowship group, a young adults group, a men’s meeting, had six counseling appointments, and a hospital visit. While I love all of these aspects of ministry, they can be draining.

I felt like I needed some inspiration from a preacher friend of mine. Many of my best preacher friends are dead, but still live on in my library. I poured a cup of coffee, summoned my good friend Martin Luther from the shelf, and settled down for some inspiration. Instead, I found conviction about what a slacker I had been!

It was Luther’s study of the New Testament that led to his conversion. When he realized that the word of God was the seed of his own salvation, and that of others, he felt compelled to preach. And preach he did. While working fulltime as university professor, raising six children, he preached a bit too.

He began preaching four times a week along with preparing a separate sermon every Sunday for his own children, and their friends.

His typical week consisted of three sermons on a Sunday – on an Epistle, a Gospel, and the Old Testament, and then once a day throughout the week. For a period of three years he wrote a publishable theological work, once every other day!

Feeling like a repentant couch potato, I closed the book, opened my laptop, and got right back to working on my sermon. Why did Luther feel so compelled to write, teach, and preach? Because he believed God’s word is the seed of salvation.

And so does Peter, as we see in 1 Peter 1:23-25.

Last week we started looking at 5 CHARACTERISTICS OF THE BIBLE SO THAT YOU WILL EFFECTIVELY EMPLOY IT IN WORKING OUT YOUR SALVATION, today we will see…

 Two More Characteristics of the Bible so That You Will Effectively Employ it in Working Out Your Salvation

4. Eternality

1 Peter 1:24-25 “All flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls, but the word of the Lord remains forever.” And this word is the good news that was preached to you.

All good things come to an end. We live in a world where everything has an expiry date. The concept of something that survives forever is difficult for us to wrap our finite minds around. But Peter informs us that the word of God remains forever. He does so with a poetic contrast.

a)      The transience of human lives … versus …

b)      The permanence of God’s word

a)      The transience of human lives

1 Peter 1:24 “All flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls…

Peter is quoting from Isaiah 40 and the metaphor is simple. What is grass like? It’s functional, it is beautiful, but it is really temperamental.

It needs watering, compost, and attention to just keep it alive.

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