Knowing God
Knowing the will of God The Father
Knowing the Will Of God.
the sword of the Spirit with double edge, one edge for convicting and converting some (Heb 4:2), and the other for condemning and destroying the unbelieving
quick—Greek, “living”; having living power, as “the rod of the mouth and the breath of the lips” of “the living God.”
powerful—Greek, “energetic”; not only living, but energetically efficacious.
sharper—“more cutting.”
and of the joints and marrow—rather, “(reaching even TO) both the joints (so as to divide them) and marrow.” Christ “knows what is in man” (Jn 2:25): so His word reaches as far as to the most intimate and accurate knowledge of man’s most hidden parts, feelings, and thoughts, dividing, that is, distinguishing what is spiritual from what is carnal and animal in him, the spirit from the soul: so Pr 20:27. As the knife of the Levitical priest reached to dividing parts, closely united as the joints of the limbs, and penetrated to the innermost parts, as the marrows (the Greek is plural); so the word of God divides the closely joined parts of man’s immaterial being, soul and spirit, and penetrates to the innermost parts of the spirit. The clause (reaching even to) “both the joints and marrow” is subordinate to the clause, “even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit.” (In the oldest manuscripts as in English Version, there is no “both,” as there is in the clause “both the joints and … which marks the latter to be subordinate). An image (appropriate in addressing Jews) from the literal dividing of joints, and penetrating to, so as to open out, the marrow, by the priest’s knife, illustrating the previously mentioned spiritual “dividing of soul from spirit,” whereby each (soul as well as spirit) is laid bare and “naked” before God; this view accords with Heb 4:13.