Being a doer of the Word is one of the most revolutionary things you can do in your life. Being a Christian myself for quite some time I have piles of notebooks of teaching and personal revelation. God has blessed me so much with His Word. Here is the problem though, I largely did nothing with it. I was looking through all my notes one day and thought “If I took time to value these and seek God on how to apply knowledge to my life, I would look a lot different.

I believe it is the same way with a majority of the Church. We have a lot of knowledge but little in the way of practical application of that knowledge. James 1:22 tells us to be doers of the Word and not hearers only. The devil doesn’t mind if we hear the Word as long as there is no practical application in our life. When there is no practical application, satan comes and steals the word from our hearts.

Think of it this way. When a farmer goes out to plant a seed in his field, he expects a harvest. His livelihood depends on that seed coming to maturity. So naturally, he works hard to make sure his seed has every opportunity to thrive and produce full yield. As Christians, we can hear the Word Sunday or in our personal time with God, but never see it produce fruit in our lives because we are not adequately taking care of the seed sown into our hearts.

Like the farmer, we must take the Word of God and not just plant it in our hearts, but nurture it. That means we take the Word and study it. We don’t just hear a message Sunday, but we meditate on it and ask the Holy Spirit to reveal it to us. That is what it means to hide the Word in your heart. We can’t just plant something and expect it to grow without taking any time to nurture it.

Let’s take a closer look at James 1:22-25

But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was. But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does.

These Scriptures outline what happens when we don’t do the Word. Firstly, we become deceived. When we don’t act on the Word it gives satan a place to twist and take what we have received from God. Then when the storms of life come, we have a crummy foundation, trying to believe that the situation will work out, but confessing something different. Secondly, We suffer from identity crisis. James tells us it’s like looking in a mirror then forgetting what we look like.

We are supposed to be a reflection of God. The Bible tells us we were fashioned in God’s image and likeness (Genesis 1:27). The Bible also says that in the beginning was the Word and the Word was God (John 1:1). So when we look at the Bible and see the nature and character of God, we see who we are made to be. What happens when we don’t do the Word, is we look and see who God made us to be and we never walk in the identity He gave us.

We can read things like Matthew 5:14, Proverbs 28:1, or 1st John 4:18-19 but never rise to the occasion because we don’t practice what we hear. When the storms of life come, and they definitely will, if you apply the Word of God and walk in it, you WILL overcome. There is no “well it might work out,” God works out everything for the good of those who love Him who are called according to His purpose. When you decide to abandon the way you have always done things and choose to walk the Word out, it will change your life and the lives of those around you forever. A person who applies one Word from God to their life will see infinity more than an individual who has read the entire Bible and done nothing with it.

The Practical Application

So how do we go from hearing to doing? We simply rely on the Holy Spirit to reveal the Word to us, show us how to apply it, and enable us to walk in it. Philippians 2:13 (NLT) says this “For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.” The thing about Jesus is that He died because we could not earn righteousness, nor could we fulfill His law. We need the work of the Holy Spirit desperately in our life.

Ask God to reveal His Word to you. Go over what you heard in your local Church on Sunday and your personal time with Him. Ask God to show you how to apply it. He will enable you to be obedient and walk in a way that pleases Him. Start small, and the seed of humility and obedience will grow in your life, and you’ll be a wellspring of life to affect the World around you!