[Darris McNeely] Can the Word of God hurt people? You know, no one should ever take the Bible, the Word of God, and use it to browbeat people, to hurt people, to harm people. That's not what God intended. God intends that all sinners would come to repentance. But the Word of God is the Word of truth. And truth cuts to the heart of every issue and can impact every one of us. And if it wounds our conscience, and causes us to understand a need to repent and to change our life, then that's the purpose of the Word of God.

I read recently where a well-known evangelical minister and writer and speaker was called on the carpet for a sermon that he gave several years ago where he explained the Biblical role of marriage and gender, male and female. God created them both that they might come together in one flesh in a marriage. And he was explaining, in a sermon, the Biblical role of genders, male and female, and God's purpose in marriage, and what marriage is in God's sight.

Well, recently, this same gentleman gave another message, at a well-known Cathedral in America, and then his past sermon was pulled up. And he had to then apologize for something that he said several years ago where he spoke truth. Here is what he said. He said, "In 2004 I preached a sermon on the topic of same-sex marriage. I now see that in that sermon I was disrespectful. I was hurtful. I wounded people in ways that were devastating, and I should have done better. I ask forgiveness of Christ."

"People may disagree," he said, "about what the Bible says about homosexuality, but we agree that God's Holy Word must never be used as a weapon to wound others." It's not God's Word that wounds people. It's not God's Word that hurts. People can misuse and abuse the Word of God, the teaching of God. History shows that. But God's Word, Hebrews 4:12 says, "The Word of God is quick, powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and the marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and the intents of the heart."

God's Word describes the Bible as being like a two-edged, sharp sword that divides down into our minds, our hearts, and our conscience convicting us of sin. It's sin that hurts people. It is sin that causes suffering. It is sin that wounds people, and destroys cultures, and creates even a culture of death. That's what wounds people. That's what hurts. God's truth heals. God's truth points us, as a light, in the right direction to create peace, goodwill, good relationships, and a right relationship with God, and a good life, a righteous life. We don't have to apologize for the Word of God, truth, or anything that is there.

But we're in a different culture, and a different age right now. And we're dealing with what I like to call "the woke Sanhedrin of culture and media," and other self-proclaimed individuals who are now going after people of faith, churches, others who dare to speak the truth and stand for righteousness, especially the Bible.

No, it's not God's Word that hurts people. It's sin. It's actions that hurt people. And when that's taken out of context, when we forget what God's Word is to do, to bring us to God, to a relationship with Him that helps and to heal. Something to think about in these times that we're living in.

That's "BT Daily." Join us next time.