The words spoken by God, and concerning God, both are called God’s word in Scripture.
Again, if we say the word of God, or of man, it may be understood sometimes of the speaker: as the words that God hath spoken, or that a man hath spoken; in which sense, when we say, the Gospel of St. Matthew, we understand St. Matthew to be the writer of it: and sometimes of the subject; in which sense, when we read in the Bible, the words of the days of the kings of Israel, or Judah, it is meant, that the acts that were done in those days, were the subject of those words; and in the Greek, which, in the Scripture, retaineth many Hebraisms, by the word of God is oftentimes meant, not that which is spoken by God, but concerning God, and his government; that is to say, the doctrine of religion: insomuch, as it is all one, to say λόγος Θεοῦ, and theologia; which is, that doctrine which we usually call divinity, as is manifest by the places following, (Acts xiii.[xiii.] 46) Then Paul and Barnabas waxed bold, and said, it was necessary that the word of God should first have been spoken to you, but seeing you put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles. That which is here called the word of God, was the doctrine of Christian religion; as it appears evidently by that which goes before. And (Acts v. 20) where it is said to the apostles by an angel, Go stand and speak in the Temple, all the words of this life; by the words of this life, is meant, the doctrine of the Gospel; as is evident by what they did in the Temple, and is expressed in the last verse of the same chapter, Daily in the Temple, and in every house they ceased not to teach and preach Christ Jesus: in which place it is manifest, that Jesus Christ was the subject of this word of life; or, which is all one, the subject of the words of this life eternal, that our Saviour offered them. So (Acts xv. 7) the word of God, is called the word of the Gospel, because it containeth the doctrine of the kingdom of Christ; and the same word (Rom. x. 8, 9) is called the word of faith; that is, as is there expressed, the doctrine of Christ come, and raised from the dead. Also (Matth. xiii. 19) When any one heareth the word of the kingdom; that is, the doctrine of the kingdom taught by Christ. Again, the same word, is said (Acts xii. 24) to grow and to be multiplied; which to understand of the evangelical doctrine is easy, but of the voice or speech of God, hard and strange. In the same sense (1 Tim. iv. 1) the doctrine of devils signifieth not the words of any devil, but the doctrine of heathen men concerning demons, and those phantasms which they worshipped as gods.
The word of God metaphorically used, first, for the decrees and power of God.
Considering these two significations of the word of God, as it is taken in Scripture, it is manifest in this latter sense, where it is taken for the doctrine of Christian religion, that the whole Scripture is the word of God: but in the former sense, not so. For example, though these words, I am the Lord thy God, &c. to the end of the Ten Commandments, were spoken by God to Moses; yet the preface, God spake these words and said, is to be understood for the words of him that wrote the holy history. The word of God, as it is taken for that which he hath spoken, is understood sometimes properly, sometimes metaphorically. Properly, as the words he hath spoken to his prophets: metaphorically, for his wisdom, power, and eternal decree, in making the world; in which sense, those fiats, Let there be light, Let there be a firmament, Let us make man, &c. (Gen. i.) are the word of God. And in the same sense it is said (John i. 3) All things were made by it, and without it was nothing made that was made: and (Heb. i. 3) He upholdeth all things by the word of his power; that is, by the power of his word; that is, by his power: and (Heb. xi. 3) The worlds were framed by the word of God; and many other places to the same sense: as also amongst the Latins, the name of fate, which signified properly the word spoken, is taken in the same sense.
Secondly, for the effect of his word.
Secondly, for the effect of his word; that is to say, for the thing itself, which by his word is affirmed, commanded, threatened, or promised; as (Psalm cv. 19) where Joseph is said to have been kept in prison, till his word was come; that is, till that was come to pass which he had foretold to Pharaoh’s butler (Gen. xl. 13) concerning his being restored to his office: for there, by his word was come, is meant, the thing itself was come to pass. So also (1 Kings xviii. 36) Elijah saith to God, I have done all these thy words, instead of I have done all these things at thy word, or commandment; and (Jer. xvii. 15) Where is the word of the Lord, is put for, Where is the evil he threatened. And (Ezek. xii. 28) There shall none of my words be prolonged any more: by words are understood those things, which God promised to his people. And in the New Testament (Matth. xxiv. 35) heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away; that is, there is nothing that I have promised or foretold, that shall not come to pass. And in this sense it is, that St. John the Evangelist, and, I think, St. John only, calleth our Saviour himself as in the flesh the word of God, as (John i. 14) the word was made flesh; that is to say, the word, or promise that Christ should come into the world; who in the beginning was with God; that is to say, it was in the purpose of God the Father, to send God the Son into the world, to enlighten men in the way of eternal life; but it was not till then put in execution, and actually incarnate. So that our Saviour is there called the word, not because he was the promise, but the thing promised. They that taking occasion from this place, do commonly call him the verb of God, do but render the text more obscure. They might as well term him the noun of God: for as by noun, so also by verb, men understand nothing but a part of speech, a voice, a sound, that neither affirms, nor denies, nor commands, nor promiseth, nor is any substance corporeal, or spiritual; and therefore it cannot be said to be either God, or man; whereas our Saviour is both. And this word, which St. John in his gospel saith was with God, is (in his first Epistle, verse 1) called the word of life; and (verse 2) the eternal life, which was with the Father. So that he can be in no other sense called the word, than in that, wherein he is called eternal life; that is, he that hath procured us eternal life, by his coming in the flesh. So also (Apocalypse xix. 13) the apostle speaking of Christ, clothed in a garment dipped in blood, saith, his name is the word of God; which is to be understood, as if he had said his name had been, He that was come according to the purpose of God from the beginning, and according to his word and promises delivered by the prophets. So that there is nothing here of the incarnation of a word, but of the incarnation of God the Son, therefore called the word, because his incarnation was the performance of the promise; in like manner as the Holy Ghost is called (Acts i. 4; Luke xxiv. 49) the promise.
Thirdly, for the words of reason and equity.
There are also places of the Scripture, where, by the word of God, is signified such words as are consonant to reason and equity, though spoken sometimes neither by prophet, nor by a holy man. For Pharaoh-Necho was an idolater; yet his words to the good king Josiah, in which he advised him by messengers, not to oppose him in his march against Charchemish, are said to have proceeded from the mouth of God; and that Josiah, not hearkening to them, was slain in the battle; as is to be read (2 Chron. xxxv. 21, 22, 23.) It is true, that as the same history is related in the first book of Esdras, not Pharaoh, but Jeremiah, spake these words to Josiah, from the mouth of the Lord. But we are to give credit to the canonical Scripture, whatsoever be written in the Apocrypha.
The word of God, is then also to be taken for the dictates of reason and equity, when the same is said in the Scriptures to be written in man’s heart; as Psalm xxxvii. 31; Jer. xxxi. 33; Deut. xxx. 11, 14, and many other like places.
Divers acceptions of the word prophet.