John 8:51

Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps my word, he will never see death.”

I know what it means to keep my word but what does it mean to keep His?

Just to simplify my intentions here let us look at the Greek definition used in John 8:51.

Logos “a word or saying,” also means “an account which one gives by word of mouth”. Source Vine’s Dictionary

The simplest definition seems the best. Whenever we speak His Word it should be accurate in meaning and use. It should be an accounting, a right representation of the Word of Jesus.

We have the bible which we read and study, memorize and quote. This seems to be the most reasonable understanding of what it means to keep His Word.

I have four bibles in my home which I rarely open. Is that keeping His Word? If I were to argue it is available to refer to when needed, I could say it is keeping His Word.

I have a bible app on my phone. More and more people have found that convenient to carry around and use. Pastors have had to get used to the notion that his flock is not texting during his sermon. Is that keeping His Word? Sure just as much as my four bibles sitting on a shelf.

When I go into a store and leave my wife in the car on a hot day and turn on the air and leave my phone connected so she can listen to music, am I leaving His Word rather than keeping it?

I would argue that His Word resides in my heart and if needed is available to be spoken aloud. Do I speak from the heart or from an aging and fallible memory? The hearer would not know one way or the other. It might sound right but unfamiliar, or it might sound foreign according to that person’s beliefs.

That is a simple explanation. We need not complicate it any more than that.

What does keeping His Word mean to you?

• Numbers 9:2
  “Let the people of Israel keep the Passover at its appointed time.
  Numbers 9:3
  On the fourteenth day of this month, at twilight, you shall keep it at its appointed time; according to all its statutes and all its rules you shall keep it.”
• Numbers 9:7
  And those men said to him, “We are unclean through touching a dead body. Why are we kept from bringing the Lord’s offering at its appointed time among the people of Israel?”
• Numbers 9:13
  But if anyone who is clean and is not on a journey fails to keep the Passover, that person shall be cut off from his people because he did not bring the Lord’s offering at its appointed time; that man shall bear his sin.

Easter is over and now is the appointed time for the Passover. It cannot be any clearer in this calendar year that the two events are not connected. They each have different appointed times.

I am not Jewish and I do not understand the statues and rules that must be kept. Even if I did understand them, I would not keep them. Because I am not Jewish I do not understand two of the above passages. What offenses disqualify a Jew from celebrating Passover? Secondly why were those on a journey given a pass on not keeping Passover?

Romans 2:29

But a Jew is one inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter. His praise is not from man but from God.

We who are in Christ are members of one body. He was a Jew and only from the sense that we are adopted is there a need to understand what it means to be Jewish. That only holds meaning in the life Jesus lived and since we follow Jesus who was perfect in performance, how any other Jew might keep their appointed times is meaningless. What Jesus asks of us is all that matters.

Since the point of the Jewish Passover was death passing over because of the blood of the lamb, then in Christ we have already received the only Passover Lamb that matters.

John 8:51

Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps my word, he will never see death.”

This is the whole purpose behind Passover, to never see death.

I know what it means to keep my word but what does it mean to keep His?