7-7-2017

Good Morning All,

                  Proverbs 1:33; “but whoever listens to me will dwell secure and will be at ease, without dread of disaster.”

       “Will you listen to me?”  Any exasperated parent has spoken these words at least once or twice in their lifetime.  This is usually followed by, “Next time, maybe you will listen to me” as everyone gets down to clean up some mess that resulted from not listening.  I think that, for most people, starting at a very young age, we learn how to turn on and off our ears.  Just think how often someone hears something you do not want them to hear and how often they do not hear something you want them to hear.  We learn that real early and use it real often oftentimes it leads to less than desirable results.

     Listening is probably our greatest weakness.  We tend to think we know how the conversation will go so we quit listening.  Sometimes we get easily distracted and lose our focus on the one who is speaking.  Sometimes we do not like what is being said so we ignore the speaker.  We do this with our boss or co-workers; we do this with our parents or teachers, we do this with our spouse or children but, above all, we do this with God.

    It would almost seem that sin affects our ears as much as any other part of our life.  Too often, we simply fail to listen.  When we listen to God speak to us through his Word, we often quit listening.  We have heard it all before; we have heard it often enough that we can recite what we will hear.  We hear it so often that we can mumble the sounds without caring about the meaning.

    Sometimes we listen but get distracted.  The false pleasures of this world, the sinful and destructive siren call can cause us to lose our focus.  We look around at the world and think that maybe it is ok to follow it once in a while.  Everyone around us is going that way; why shouldn’t we?

    Sometimes we stop listening because we don’t want to hear what God tells us.  Maybe we aren’t ready to forgive just yet.  Maybe we don’t want to worry about our neighbor or see that what we have is truly a gift from God, a gift to share.  Maybe we don’t want to hear that we are to care for one another; we prefer to be selfish.  Sometimes we simply don’t want to listen.  This always leads to trouble.  It leads to pain, it leads to sorrow and hardship and it ruins relationships.

    So our only recourse is to listen to God and to do his will.  When we fail to do so, we suffer greatly from our sinful existence.  When we listen to his Word and follow it faithfully, we are secure in our faith and secure in our world able to rest at ease because of his great grace.

Father, in your great mercy you pour out your Spirit upon us.  Lead us to listen to your Word.  Guide us to hear you as you speak.  Defend us from all harm and danger.  Lead us to live in your kingdom in service to you.  In the precious name of Jesus our risen King we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret