God's word is the rule of life and the basis upon which He judges us. In order never to offend God, we must hide His word in our hearts. If we forget God's word and offend Him, His wrath will come upon us. The punishment of forgetting God's word is inescapable: "For if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful expectation of judgment, and fiery indignation" (Heb 10:26-27).
When Moses was about to die, he commanded the Israelites to remember God's word for all generations—lest they grow distant from God and offend:
And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. (Deut 6:6-9)
God instructed Adam not to eat of the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil—if he ate it he would surely die. Adam did not hide God's word in his heart, so he was deceived by Satan and ate the forbidden fruit. This resulted in immediate spiritual death, though he still lived physically for a time.
After Jesus had fasted for forty days and forty nights, He was hungry. Satan came to tempt Him. With each temptation, Jesus answered Satan with God's word. When Satan could not succeed in his schemes, he left Jesus.
Adam's failure and Jesus' victory reveal to us the importance of hiding God's word in our hearts and applying it to our lives. In applying it to our daily lives, we are walk so as to remember God's word: the older generation instructing the younger, parents teaching their children. We can only cultivate a spiritual family and community through frequent discussion of God's word and commandments within the home and the church.
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