God's breath: how powerful?

A few days ago, I was chatting with some buddies about the Bible and we came upon the topic of the breath of God. I walked away from that conversation with a deeper appreciation of the sheer power of God's breath. God is omnipotent. We are not. I can't do much with my breath than spread a few dandelion seeds around my lawn.

The effects of my breath: nothing to write home (or blog) about.

God can do much more with His breath. Let's look at a few examples from the Bible:

1. With His breath, God created man.

Gen. 2:7 - "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul."

Adam was formed out of the dust of the ground, but he was just a lifeless piece of earth until God breathed into him. When God breathed into him, Adam became a living soul. Adam became a human, the most complicated and sophisticated of all God's creatures.

2. With His breath, God wrote the Bible.

2 Timothy 3:16 - "All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,"

Physically, it seems that Bible was written by more than 40 different authors over a period of more than 1,500 years. But in reality, the Bible was written by God exhaling. Because God breathed out the Bible, there are deeper spiritual realities behind the physical words on its pages.

3. With His breath, God destroys His enemies.

The Bible contains numerous cases of God defeating His enemies simply by breathing on them. For example, Job 4:9 speaks of the consequences for those who plow iniquity: "By the breath of God they perish, and by the blast of his anger they are consumed."

The most poignant example of victory by breath, however, is still to come. 2 Thessalonians 2:8 describes the fate of the man of lawlessness (Antichrist): "Then that lawless one will be revealed whom the Lord will slay with the breath of His mouth..." Antichrist will fight with all his might and all his armies, but he will be slain by nothing more than a gentle puff from the the Lord's mouth. Kind of anticlimactic.

4. With His breath, God gave us the Holy Spirit.

John 20:22 - "And when He had said this, He breathed into them and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit."

Of all the things that God has done and will do with His breath, this is my favorite. After the resurrection, when the Lord breathed on His disciples, they didn't just smell the fish He was preparing for them. Through the Lord's breath, the disciples actually received the Holy Spirit. Today, it is the same. The Lord desires to breathe the Holy Spirit into people. All we have to do is open up and receive.