To whom shall I speak and give warning that they may hear? Behold, their ears are closed and they cannot listen. Behold, the word of the LORD has become a reproach to them; they have no delight in it. Jeremiah 6:10 (NASB)How’s your hearing? Especially when it comes to hearing God? I know, I know, it is easy to claim to have heard from God, it is quite another thing to actually have ears that are capable of listening to God. For the former all you have to do is say some words, for the latter you have to actually address your ability to hear.Our physical ability to hear is impacted by host of things, trauma, genetics, illnesses, and age (No one told me that by middle age I would all but lose my ability to grow hair, except of course in my ears which all of the sudden are able to grow hair as quickly and as dense as a patch of bamboo. And how far does sound carry in a thick forest?).What affects our spiritual ears, our ability to hear God?
- Apathy. Not wanting to, not caring to hear from God. We don’t pay much attention to what we do not care about. We listen so much better to what is important to us.
- Age. When we are young we are unfamiliar with the ways God speaks. As we get older it is not just unfamiliarity but also more and more things/“hairs” that impede and muffle God’s voice.
- Filters. We develop filters through which we hear: cultural and sub-cultural filters, political filters, personal filters, religious/philosophical filters, interest filters, love and hate filters, and such. This filtering process limits God to speaking on only certain frequencies, on the channels we like, on the content we approve. It is tough to really hear God when we are busy censoring him.
- Bones. Our ears don’t work well when we are mad, angry, bitter. When we are at odds with God it is difficult to hear him, when he allows the fire to burn us, evil to touch us, pain to torture us, injustice to cheat us, grief to strike us, or the inexplicable to happen to us or those who deeply care about without any good and satisfying explanation. It is so tough to hear while picking a bone.
- Answers. There are few, if any, questions when we have all the answers and the more answers we have the more we usually talk and the less we listen. The more answers we have the more we claim to have it all figured out, the more we have all figure out the more we think others should listen, preferably to us, including God.
- Noise. Try having a conversation at a rock concert, when the TV is blaring, with someone who has head phones on, in a crowded room. Try talking with someone who’s filled with worry, always in a hurry, constantly interrupted, or stuck in the trivial. Not to speak of some of things you read above under “bones.”
- Inflexibility. Listening to God, being in a relationship with him requires faith and faith requires flexibility. In speaking to us God invites us to adjust ourselves, our lives to him. We like to have it the other way around, that’s why the more opinionated we are the less flexible we become. (I can already hear some objections, calls for theological clarification, but remember the topic of this p-note is listening to God.)
Oh how much I want you and me to be good at listening to God, to what he said through his Son Jesus Christ, when he speaks today by the Holy Spirit. Our lives are so much richer when we hear, when we know how to listen, especially to God."He who has ears, let him hear." Matthew 13:9 (NASB) To God be all glory. Love you, Pastor Hans