{"id":117747,"date":"2026-10-03T07:12:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-03T11:12:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bgodinspired.com\/?p=117747"},"modified":"2026-10-03T07:12:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-03T11:12:12","slug":"rhema-meaning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bgodinspired.com\/index.php\/bible-resources\/bible-answers\/rhema-meaning\/","title":{"rendered":"Rhema Meaning: The Spoken Word Mary Kept in Her Heart"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n \t<\/i> Read Time:<\/span>10 Minute, 57 Second <\/div>\n\n <\/div>\n

Some sentences stay with you for years. A teacher once said, “You’re good at this.” A parent said, “I’m proud of you,” once, on an ordinary afternoon. Someone at a hospital bed said, “It’s going to be all right.” You probably can’t remember what you had for lunch that day, but you remember the exact words, and sometimes the voice that said them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That kind of word, the spoken kind that lands on a real day and stays, is close to the rhema meaning<\/strong> in the Bible. Rhema is one of the two main Greek words the New Testament uses for “word.” You may have heard it set against its better-known partner, logos, or seen it on the sign of a church or Bible college. This is what the word itself actually says, and the place in Luke where it shows up three times around one manger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rhema Meaning: A Word That Was Spoken<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Rhema (\u1fe5\u1fc6\u03bc\u03b1, Strong’s G4487) means something that has been said: a word, a saying, a statement, an utterance. It comes from an old Greek verb for speaking, so at its root it describes a word with a voice behind it. Not an idea floating in the air, but a sentence that somebody actually said out loud.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here’s the part that surprises most readers. Rhema can also mean a thing<\/em>, an event, a matter that happened. That second meaning makes more sense once you know the Greek Old Testament often uses rhema where the Hebrew has dabar<\/em>, and dabar means both “word” and “thing.” In the Hebrew way of seeing it, what God says and what then happens are not two separate categories. The word is the event on its way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can see that in one of the best-known promises in Luke. When the angel tells Mary she will carry a child, he finishes like this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“For with God nothing shall be impossible. And Mary said, Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word.”<\/p>Luke 1:37-38 (KJV)<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Read in Greek, verse 37 is built around rhema. A very literal rendering is something like “no word from God will be without power.” The “nothing” is a rhema. Then Mary answers, “be it unto me according to thy word,” and that “word” is rhema too. The angel says no spoken word from God is powerless, and Mary says, in effect, then let that spoken word happen to me.<\/p>\n\n\n