The War of the "Words"
In popular parlance the culture often draws a distinction between words and actions. Talk is cheap, we are told. Actions count. "Sticks and stones will break my bones, but names (words) will never hurt me." "He's all talk", is another common epithet, as is, "hot air". And we are all familiar with the proverb, "actions speak louder than words."
Common to these expressions is the idea that words and speech are weak and of little significance. The really important thing is what one does. But does this idea capture reality? Maybe the Bee Gees had it right when they sang, "It's only words, and words are all I have, to take your heart away."
It turns out that from the beginning of time there has been a relentless war of words and that words are powerful. Words shape creation, history, and culture. Words or speech actually "makes things so"; words call reality into existence. True words call truthful reality into existence. False words, or lies, call falsehoods into existence. Words have an intrinsic power, either for good or evil, and they always will. How do we know this? Because that is how the world came into existence in the first place.
We see in the creation account of Genesis 1-3 that the Bible emphasizes over and over that the Creation took place by the spoken Word of God. The refrain “Then God said, . . . and it was so” occurs repeatedly in Genesis 1. The way God created and made the world becomes constitutive of its existence. Just as God created space and time, and those two dimensions influence and shape everything thereafter, so His creating by uttering Words has made words and speech to be influential and powerful throughout the warp and woof of human existence.
This is a fundamental theme not just in Genesis: it runs throughout the Scripture; it is a theme which refers to one of the fundamental constitutive realities of the world, of history, and of our existence. In developing the Christian Mind, it is vital that we pick up on this fundamental importance of the Word of God—for this is how the world “works”, as it were; this is how the world is constituted.
We see in Genesis 1 that God “speaks” the Creation into existence. Thus His Word is not merely an authoritative declaration amidst a dispute—that is, not merely that God is the highest authority, and therefore what He says is right—which, of course, is very true. It is much more than that. The Word calls into existence the very things of which it speaks. It is a powerful, constitutive, creative Word.
From the very beginning this "power-word" for ruling and constituting the Creation is reflected within man--who of course bears the image of God. Not only can Adam speak, but he can speak in a way that constitutes and shapes the very creation. This is what it means in part to be in the image of God. In Genesis 2:19,20 we find Adam naming the animals. His word reflects the creative Word of God; “whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name.” Adam’s word was powerfully shaping and constituting the creation, after God. Adam’s word was a reflection of God’s Word—that is part of the power, dignity, authority, and glory given to Man in God’s image. He has a power-word, like God. He is a servant of God’s Word. His words are to reflect God's Words, and as man speaks in a way that is in accordance with God's Word, so rules powerfully and effectively over the creation, shaping it with his derived "power-word." It may be true that, "words are all I have . . .", but what a Word!
A second instance of the theme is God’s dealing with Noah. (Genesis 8:20 & 9:8—17). Firstly, God declares that mankind will never be wiped out again, as happened at the Flood. That Word has governed human history to this day; we live within it at this time; it will govern all history in the future.
Again, God establishes the seasons with a covenant. This Word, in a similar fashion, is constitutively powerful to the ordering of our lives daily—and it will always be so. "While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night, shall not cease!" (Genesis 8:22) As the seasons turn, so our lives and their activities are shaped and conditioned, made and moulded by a Word spoken millennia ago--global warming not withstanding. Let all climate apocalytics and millennarians stand warned. False words create a powerful false world--for a time--before its false words and fabricated existence are broken upon the rock of the one true Word.
After the Flood we indeed see just such a demonic inversion of this "power word" theme in the account of the Tower of Babel (Genesis 11). The power-word of man had become demonic, and the word of man was being uniformly deployed for evil purposes. The account of Babel is framed as a confrontation and clash between two "words"--and, therefore, two worlds.
"Now the whole earth used the same language, and the same words (verse 1). . . . And they said to one another, 'Come, let us build for ourselves a city . . . and let us make a name for ourselves "(verses 3-4). When the Lord came down, the text explicitly records His counter-action, "And the Lord said . . . " (verse 6). The magnitude and extent of the destructive threat of mankind against God derives from their common purpose, forged through a common language or word. "Behold, they are one people, and they all have the same language. . . . (N)othing which they purpose to do will be impossible for them" (verse 6). This is a signal demonstration of how the creation and human society is constituted by and around words--in this case, for evil.
The divine judgement upon this rebellion is to "confuse the language of the whole earth" (verse 9), resulting in the fracturing of mankind into dissolute pieces, thereby nullifying the demonic attempt to pervert the power of God and seize upon the power of words to shape a united rebellion against God. God breaks apart the univocal word of man into a multitude of languages, and so restrains their evil.
Judgement and Illiteracy: the Removal of the Word
The events and revelation surrounding Babel introduce a further, related biblical theme: when God is breaking down a culture and rendering it to a state of greater weakness, He will break down its language. As the Lord judges a culture for idolatry He removes its mastery over its own tongue. Eventually, He removes its ability to read, write, and communicate powerfully and effectively. People become like the idols they worship--deaf and dumb--with the attendant cultural sterility, impotence and primitivistic superstition.
So in our day. It is not by random chance that illiteracy is on the rise and that an increasing number of people can no longer communicate or speak effectively and powerfully. These things have been manufactured by our statist education system. But in so doing they are working our His divine judgements upon the Unbelieving Mind. "Professing to be wise, they have become fools." Claiming to be the Master and Determiner of all truth, the rationalist education system has set itself the task of disembowelling education of all objective truth whatsoever. Inevitably this leads to the deconstruction and destruction of language itself. So pure rationalism relentlessly morphs into its irrationalistic doppelganger.
Theodore Dalrymple's trenchant essay We Don't Want No Education, begins with the wonderfully ironic paragraph: "Education has always been a minority interest in England. The English have generally preferred to keep the bloom of their ignorance intact and on the whole has succeeded remarkably well, despite a century and a quarter of compulsory schooling of their offspring."
He goes on to describe his experience of the state of modern education. "Very few of the 16 year olds whom I meet as patients can read and write with facility; they do not even regard the question as to whether they can read and write as in the least surprising or insulting. I now test the literacy of nearly every such youth I meet, in case illiteracy should prove to be one of the causes of his misery. . . .
"Most of the young whites whom I meet literally cannot name a single writer and certainly cannot recite a line of poetry. Not a single one of my young patients has know the dates of the Second World War, let alone of the First; some have never heard of these wars, though recently one young patient who had heard of the Second World War thought it took place in the eighteenth century. In the prevailing circumstances of total ignorance, I was impressed that he had heard of the eighteenth century. . . .
"Thus are the young condemned to live in an eternal present which merely exists, without connection to a past which might explain it or to a future which might develop from it. Theirs is truly a life of one damned thing after another. Likewise they are deprived of any reasonable standards of comparison by which to judge their woes. . . .
"Clearly, something very strange is happening in our schools. Our educational practices are now so bizarre that they would defy the pen of a Jonathan Swift to satirize them. In the very large metropolitan area in which I work, for example, the teachers have received instructions that they are not to impart the traditional disciplines of spelling and grammar. Pettifogging attention to details of syntax and orthography is said to inhibit children's creativity and powers of self-expression. Moreover, to assert that there is a correct way of speaking or writing is to indulge in a kind of bourgeois cultural imperialism; and to tell children that they have got something wrong is necessarily to saddle them with a debilitating sense of inferiority from which they will never recover." (Theodore Dalrymple, "We Don't Want No Education," City Journal, Winter 1995.)
Life is a succession of one damned thing after another . . . How did it come to this? It has come to pass because God's hand of judgment was firstly upon Babel, and therefore it is now falling upon the (post-Christian) West. For the West sought to unite mankind in a new Babel--a new language of universal scientific rationalism. The very triumph of Athens has mediated its own internal destruction. A growing number of people can no longer even read. The power-word of Athens has been broken down into a swelling cacophany of voices of the irrationally, helplessly ignorant.
This is a great trial and a tribulation, on the one hand; but on the other, it presents a wonderful opportunity for God’s covenant people, or the Believing Mind. Jerusalem, for her part, has inherited the Living and Abiding Word of God through Jesus Christ, the Second Adam. Like Adam, we are now the servants and wielders of that Word. That Word remains meaningful, constitutive and powerful. That Word can rescue even the irrationally and helplessly ignorant. And so, the covenant people, as we are faithful and obey, will grow in power, influence, destiny, and significance, in our culture and in generations to come.
Redeemed by the Word
We have seen that the universe in general, the world in particular, and mankind specially are constructed by God's power-Word. Jerusalem understands and accepts this and looks to the Word of God as the source and frame of all life. Athens completely rejects the Word of God, even as it rejects the God of the Word. Consequently, Athens is always acting within a make-believe, fundamentally untrue world. The Athenian cannot see the world as it truly is. Jerusalem, however, seeing and believing the world in truth, has access to enormous cultural power. Athens is constantly paddling upstream--and that through endless rapids--whereas Jerusalem is always paddling downstream, being carried along by the tides of God's power-Word.
An illustration of the "with-the-tide" versus "against-the-tide" construct is found in our Lord's appearance to the rebellious Saul while on the Damascus road. Paul's account of the event in Acts 26:14 reveals our Lord arresting Saul with the words: "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads." Whilst Saul lived in unbelief, with the mind of an Athenian, there was a sense of the whole of creation being inevitably arrayed against him. He was kicking back against the goads: it was a painful process.
This is not to say, of course, that Jerusalem does not experience trouble, suffering, and hardship. It clearly does--and the Word confirms that this will always be the case. But the wonderful irony is that even our sufferings are constituted by God's Word, such that they are never in vain, but always work together for good, for ourselves and the Kingdom. So, the Believing Mind is able to rejoice and glorify even in its weakness and frailty, knowing that it is part of riding the rushing tide to the consummation of all things. So, Paul: "there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to buffet me--to keep me from exalting myself! Concerning this I entreated the Lord three times that it might depart from me. And He said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.' Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, that the power of Christ may dwell in me." (II Corinthians, 12:7--9)
The Word of God, however, does not only structure the world of creation. It also structures salvation. It is clear in Genesis, that salvation is called into existence by the spoken Word of God. The earliest indication of this is the pronouncement to the serpent which pronounces his inevitable defeat by the seed of the woman. "I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; he shall bruise you on the head (the fatal blow), and you shall bruise him on the heel (a trifling blow)" Genesis 3:15. Similarly, the prominence of the Word to create and structure redemptive history is clear in Genesis 12:1—3, when the Lord calls Abraham, who is to be the father of the Believing Mind: "(n)ow the Lord said to Abram, 'Go forth from your country and your relatives . . . I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you . . . and in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.' " The entire course of human history has been, is, and will be shaped and governed by those marvellous Words.
Similarly, in Genesis 17: 1—8 which is the third statement of the promise, we read, "Now when Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him . . . . 'As for me, behold, My covenant is with you, and you shall be the father of a multitude of nations.' "
This Word calls forth Abraham into covenant with the Lord. Out of that covenant will come the chosen people, the Messiah, and then God’s grace to all peoples and nations—that is, to the Gentiles. The significance of Abraham cannot be overstated--he is the father of all believers, everwhere. This Word to Abraham constitutes our lives to this very hour. In that Word we live and move and have our being.
Throughout Scripture this great theme of redemption being commanded and called forth by God's Word comes back again and again. Isaiah 51 is one of the most beautiful passages in Scripture in this regard. Israel is in disarray. But the Lord says, “Look to the rock from which you were hewn, and to the quarry from which you were dug. Look to Abraham your father, and to Sarah who gave birth to you in pain.” Pay attention—I will set My justice for a light of the peoples. (Isa. 51:4). Despite all the calamities and discouragements--none will prevail--for arrayed against them is the declaration of God to Abraham, which governs all aeons, all ages, all peoples, and all nations.
God speaks and thereby constitutes Abraham as our rock, the root and principle of everything that we are. To this very hour we, the citizens of the heavenly Jerusalem, are constituted either as a son or daughter of Abraham and Sarah—that shapes who that we are, it shapes how God looks upon us; it shapes how we are to live, and will live. (This is why Christian covenantal whakapapa is so important for us and to us.)
God says, “and in you all the nations of the earth shall be blessed.” I cannot resist quoting Pangle at this point with respect to Abraham:
As such, his name or glory will be brilliant; nay, his name will be not merely known as some object of historical memory or wonder or awe (like Cyrus’s, for example); the name of Abraham will be, God promises, employed lovingly, as a blessing—by every family on the face of the earth. One can wonder if any man of political ambition and love of glory has every dared to hope for, let alone has ever been promised, so total a satisfaction of his deepest longings. (Pangle, p. 129)
Another insight into the creative power-Word of the Lord is found in Isaiah 55:6—11. The Word in Genesis 1 which called forth the world out of nothing has not ceased to speak. It continues to go forth, and equally powerfully and imperiously as in the day of creation, it calls forth divine fruit, out of nothing. "For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there without watering the earth, and making it bear and sprout, and furnishing seed to the sower and bread to the eater; so shall my word be which goes forth from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, without accomplishing what I desire, and without succeeding in the matter for which I sent it."
Then, Jeremiah 1:1—10. By the Word, nations are changed; the tectonic plates of history are altered. "Then the Lord stretched out His hand and touched my mouth, and the Lord said to me: 'Behold I have put My words in your mouth. See, I have appointed you this day over the nations and over the kingdoms, to pluck up and to break down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant.' " Jeremiah never picked up a sword. He never formed a political party. He never led an army. Yet he cast aside and destroyed nations. He raised others up. His word, which was God's Word revealed to him, shaped and controlled the history of nations in the Near East.
It is important to understand that we live today in the climax of this redemptive development. We live in the days of Messiah. And it is not without the deepest significance that He comes forth as the Word: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through Him; and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. . . .” John 1:1—3
The creative, power-Word is now at the right hand of God, reshaping all human history, and placing all God’s enemies under His feet. And He is doing so by means of His Word.
So, it is of the greatest significance that we read in Acts 2:14: “But Peter, taking his stand with the eleven, raised his voice and declared to them . . .” And so begins the unleashing of the Word of God upon the nations that commences the great work of redemption where all nations are being discipled unto Christ—this great work to which we are called, in our generation, to play our part.
And so, with respect to the theme of the creative power-Word—just a few more texts:
Romans 1:15, 16: “Thus, for my part, I am eager to preach the gospel to you also who are in Rome, for I am not ashamed of the Gospel of God, for it is the power of God for salvation for everyone who believes . . .”
I Corinthians 1:17ff. The word of the cross is powerful to those who are being saved. God was well pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe.
I Peter 1: 22—25 “You have been born again . . . through the living and abiding word of God. . . . . The Word of the Lord abides forever. And this is the word which was preached to you.”
The War of the Words
Throughout human history there has been a war of Words. In the Garden of Eden it was God's Word arrayed against the word of the serpent. "Has indeed God said this . . . but I say to you . . ." The Tower of Babel represented the epitome of the hope of the Unbelieving Mind to create a unified world, based on a single univocal word.
The Lord thwarted this attempt by a judgement of breaking apart the univocal word of Unbelief, substituting a competing cacophany of tongues. But like Sauron and the Ring--ever the mind and heart of Unbelief yearns and longs for the power of the one Tongue, the one Word which would unite them all and bind them in a final darkness. In both ancient and modern times this yearning has taken political forms. The Pax Romana, promising universal peace through the rule of Rome was one. In the more recent twentieth century we have seen several "one world empire" movements: National Socialism--the Third Reich of One Thousand Years; International Communism where the workers of the world were to unite, and so forth.
But ever since the Enlightenment--which was a re-discovery and re-assertion of the one univocal word of Babel--the West has been offered the power-word of man. All language, all culture, all human endeavour was to be united under the univocal word of human reason: the age of secular rationalism flourished. There was no room for God and His Word, for these were offensive to humanist reason.
But the Babel of the West is doomed. Its univocal word of human reason is being inevitably fractured, once again, by the endless diversities and ultimate meaninglessness of post-modernism. The power of the word of man is a lie, a chimera.
Against this false word of Athens stands the true Word of Jerusalem's God. Across the nations marches the King of all kings. His sovereign power-Word is calling, making, shaping, conforming--and finally, all earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of God as the waters cover the sea.
Some Abiding Implications
1. As God’s people, we will ever be a people of the Word. Since all of creation and providence lives and moves and has its being through the Word of God, wherever and whenever the Spirit of God applies redemption to man you will find a respect and reverence for the Word of God, the Holy Scriptures. Whenever Jerusalem becomes infected with a rationalistic imperative that puts man's reason above the Scriptures to test and prove them, Jerusalem is robbed of its power. It begins to crumble. This is effectively what happened to the Church in the West in the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth centuries, as higher criticism became academically fashionable and men--under the influence of Enlightenment idolatry--sought to exert human authority over the Bible, to authenticate, purify, and liberate it from its "less comely" aspects.
It would appear, however, as though this destructive movement is now runing its course. Those truly of God have extensively turned away from such idolatry and have increasingly returned to a position of submission to all of Scripture. Not surprisingly, they are beginning to show aspects of spiritual authority and power again over the world--even as they make their own thinking and acting congruent with the Word which governs and shapes all reality.
2. Our times of worship will be filled with meaningful utterances of God’s Word. Worship of the Living God is the most holy and ennobling of all human activities. It is the Word of God which is to structure and give content to our public worship. When we worship using the content, promises, strictures, examples, and commands of Scripture we are worshiping as we ought, since all of creation is similarly structured by the Word.
At the same time, our worship will be verbal and intelligible. Over the past one hundred years, Jerusalem has been deeply infected (there is no other word) by a false spirituality which substitutes gibberish, claiming it truly to be a re-emergence of the gift of tongues found in apostolic times. There are many problems associated with this nonsense; salient amongst them is that it denies or devalues the power of intelligible speech, and therefore of the Word.
3. Our tongues and speech are to be culturally constitutive and powerful.
4. We will guard our words very carefully, seeking to speak as the very oracles of God. As James tell us, the one who is able to control what he says is able to rule his whole body. Self-mastery comes with mastery of the tongue. This is both positive and negative: it encompasses not only refraining from speaking lies and evil, but also positively speaking that which is needful, godly, and appropriate for the occasion.
The person who has learned to speak thusly will be a person of significant spiritual influence and power.
5. We will make language (that is, word, especially our native language) one of the major studies of our lives, so that we might be true servants of the Lord, in His image. Mastery of (at least our own) language is a major responsibility of all citizens of Jerusalem. To the extent we master our own language, to that extent our mastery over the creation increases.
6. Our covenant schools will make the study of language, mastery of speech, written expression, vocabulary etc at the heart of the curriculum.
7. Skill in, and mastery of, language is to be a great joy.
8. Parents will make biblically sanctified language the bedrock of their relationship with their children.
9. We will understand the spiritual power of language, and will use it for the extension of God’s Kingdom.
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