He Who Has Ears To Hear...

 

Mankind has al­ways wanted to play and have fun rather than work. We have always wanted to be entertained, more than to be serious about spiritual matters. This desire is worldliness at its core.

What we sometimes fail to realize is that this mindset was common long before mod­ern gadgets and playthings. Centuries before smart phones, cars, jets and cruise ships, peo­ple sought the pleasures of life. They wanted the best food, the nicest clothes, the most comfortable houses, and the most exciting forms of entertainment. This craving char­acterized people in Noah’s time, people in Jesus’ time, and people of today. In every case, this attitude always has the same effect: it leaves people with little interest in spiritual things. Whatever religion remains, is cold and lifeless. Religious leaders are expected to be shallow advisors instead of convicting preachers of the Word.

How little life has changed. A homeschooling history book describes the religious climate of New En­gland in the 1700’s (America: Land I Love, Beka, 1994, p.69). A Connecticut historian described the situation by saying that “…the forms of religion were kept, but there ap­peared but little of the power of it.” Preachers of the period “…contented themselves with preaching a cold, unprin­cipled and lifeless morality.” Even without temptations we consider to be modern and unique to our generation, these early Amer­icans were absorbed with worldly cares and pleasures and had little concern about their souls.

[Luke 8:14] “Now the ones (the seed – God’s Word) that fell among thorns are those who, when they have heard, go out and are choked with cares, riches, and plea­sures of this life, and bring no fruit to maturity.” The world has always offered mankind pleasure. It has always suffo­cated spirituality because men love darkness rather than light (John 3:19). What a warning this case should be to us! The craving for worldly pleasures quickly stifles the power of the Word of God in our lives! We must make sure as individuals that we are spiritually minded. We must fight as the church to resist the trend to become an entertainment center. We must keep the fo­cus of the pulpit and classrooms on teaching the Word of God in all its power. Let us learn from the past instead of repeating it.

Many give lip service to the Bible and claim to believe that it is the Word of God. When Jesus was walking the earth, the Jews thought they were worshiping God when in reality they were just following the traditions and commands of men. Jesus said this wor­ship was vain or useless (Matthew 15:1-10). Do we really know what God has said in His Word? Do we believe what the Holy Spirit inspired writers recorded for us in the Bible? Are we following God in our worship or like the Jews, are we listening to what men (preachers, teachers, the world) say about our spiritual life? Jesus said that not every one that says, “Lord, Lord” will be saved (Matthew 7:21). In our every­day language, that means we can’t just “talk the talk”, we must also “walk the walk”!

Paul wrote “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus …and being found in appearance as a man, He humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross” (Philippians 2:5-8). Je­sus “walked the walk” so that we could be saved. Should one not be willing to “…present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service” to Him? (Romans 12:1)

The Jews of long ago didn’t have a “ready reference” as to what God commanded as we do today. Open your Bible and read it. Some day every ear will hear its words, and every knee will bow to Jesus. (Matthew 13:36-43) He who has ears to hear, let him hear!