The Unstoppable Word of God

“Remember Jesus Christ, raised from the dead, descended from David. This is my gospel, for which I am suffering even to the point of being chained like a criminal. But God’s word is not chained.” (2 Timothy 2:8-9)

Years earlier Paul had written to the Philippian church that his first imprisonment, from AD 57-62, had in no way hindered the Gospel (Philippians 1:12-21). To the contrary, being jailed opened up an otherwise inaccessible audience to him, e.g. Roman soldiers, the Praetorian Guard, Roman governors, kings and queens, Caesar’s household, and the Emperor Nero himself. Plus faithfulness in the face of persecution had emboldened others to faithfully preach the Gospel.

Now Paul is jailed again, though in the far worse conditions of Rome’s Mamertine prison – a place reserved for those condemned to die. Paul knows he’s at the end of his race and will soon be delivered from this life by the executioner. But God will stand by Paul and usher him safely into His heavenly Kingdom (1 Timothy 4:17-18). Opportunities to evangelize are now meager. “But the word of God,” Paul writes, “is not chained.” Nothing of this world can hold it back.

And the 2,000 years which followed Paul’s death have proved him right. The blood of millions of martyrs, slain for the Gospel, has proven to be the seed of the church. The more Satan kills, many more believers spring up to replace them. The more the devil tries to suppress the Gospel, the more powerfully it changes people’s lives. The Seleucian King, Antiochus IV tried to destroy every copy of the Scriptures in the Second Century before Christ. But he perished and the word of God prevailed. The Emperor Diocletian (AD 284-305) ordered every copy of Scripture in his realm be burned and demanded that anyone possessing it be executed. But the word of God survived. Indeed, neither the suppression of the fallen Soviet Union nor all the cruelties of Red China have been able to stop the gospel. Even when pushed underground, the Gospel continues its miraculous work in the hearts of sinners.

And from the time of the pagan philosopher, Porphyry (AD 234-305) the Bible has had an aggressive army of critics. But all have been silenced yet the Bible remains. Consider the attacks of Voltaire. In the 18th Century he declared that 100 years from his time the Enlightenment would relegate every last Bible to the trash bin or the museum. Yet only 50 years of his death, the Union Bible Society purchased his printing plant to print Bibles and his house to store them. Yes, no matter how much its critics attack it, the Bible always wears them out as an anvil wears out the hammers which pound it.

REFLECTION