Peters Progress – 6 June 2014

I had a close shave the other day. Yes, down at the barber-shop in the Salt Rock Shopping Centre, a few shops downs from the Salt Rock Vet. It was my first time. I’ve never been so smooth since I started growing facial hair!

“It was a close shave” is a funny English saying. It means to have a narrow escape or a close call. But I get where it comes from. You sit in a chair, head tilted back with a man wielding a razor, also known as a cut-throat razor. See the link: cut-throat razor, an exposed throat and a close shave? Thankfully, I trust my barber 100%. He’s highly professional. I’m in safe hands. But in the wrong hands, well, it could be a close shave in all senses of the saying.

This randomly got me thinking about the preaching of scripture.

The writer of Hebrews says, “The word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.” I would like to wield scripture to preach nice, comforting, motivational, feel-good-type sermons. Sometimes the passage of scripture doesn’t lend itself to that type of application but rather to a sharper challenge, insights to penetrate our hearts and minds deeply and even to bring conviction. It’s then that I hope I can wield the sword of the Lord as expertly as my barber does his razor-blade.

Too often we can be stabbed and hacked by those wielding God’s word and walk away wounded. Have you had a bad close shave with a preacher where the preacher went straight for your jugular in a rather cut-throat manner? Paul writes to the church in Ephesus that we must speak the truth in love so that we can mature into the fullness of Christ. And yet we sometimes don’t. For something that can penetrate even to dividing soul and spirit, a lot of damage can be and has been done. But so too, has a lot of good. Lives can be transformed and turned around. The Living Word brings life and light and hope.