Isaiah 50:4-5 ~
". . . He awakens me morning by morning, He awakens my ears to hear as the learned. The Lord God has opened my ear; And I was not rebellious, nor did I turn away."
The last three years have opened blind eyes as I live amongst deaf ears. Blind eyes that had never seen the devastation of deaf ears. But, now I see. I see the stagnated souls, the isolated ill, the hollowed hearts that know no language of love. When ears empty of all God's grace life becomes a lonely place. A separated soul is a sad sight to behold, void of meaningful moments of a simple, shared love. Some deaf ears will defy nature and seek language in a different manner. Some will stay the isolated ill. Many have little choice, language is situational unattainable; they live isolated and ill-souled through cruel circumstances.
We so often look at the deaf or the disabled with a mournful, sympathetic eye; but, never stop to recognize that physical malady is often a God-given gift to diagnose our own spiritual maladies.
We must stop, open blind eyes and see that deaf ears abound in far more then the physically disabled.
Deaf ears deaden the absolutely healthy to His language of love and His repeated call to repentance.
Many are not deaf, more akin to hard of hearing ~ we hear the language of love and miss the language of repentance. "What was that you say? Oh, I heard of Your great love for ME but that latter was a little mumbled and muffled. Well, certainly I heard enough of Your great love for ME and I certainly agree, we all should love ME!" And hard of hearing ears hear partial message.
Many choose not to hear, for with God's grace comes Jesus' cross; a cross we would rather not bare.
And yet I see the starved souls before my own eyes of deaf ears that desperately need language. When we do not hear, we perish. With hearing comes communing and abiding and this is relationship. And for ALL of us relationship with Jesus is the ONLY Savior for soul sick us.
Every Sunday, countless sit and most will hear in an auditory way and yet, will not truly hear. We hear only that which we want to hear, we accept that which tickles our ears (2 Timothy 4:3), and if that inner warm fuzzy is not included we reject the words and often mock the message.
We are deaf for sin and deaf for selfism.
We live life void of true Life because we are unwilling to hear. Oh certainly, we sit in Sunday pew as good Americans know to do.
But we steel our ears,
for we refuse to hear,
His call to death that is our only hope to spiritual health.
I have seen deaf ears lead to sick souls, in the physical.
Now I see it in the spiritual.
And in the physical, deaf ears may cause loneliness for a time.
But, in the spiritual deaf ears will cause loneliness for ALL of time. A loneliness that knows only despair and that horrid gnashing of teeth (Matthew 23:42, Luke 13:28). Those deaf ears lead to an eternal death of all that is good or lovely or pure. The spiritually deaf face eternity dead to God ~ dead to the only Goodness this world has ever known.
Here we are so bloated, saturated on God's words yet we do not know His language.
It is not about all the many words you heard but never heard (James 1:22). It is not about where you sit on a Sunday or who your family is. It is not about the way you vote or the time you raised your hand or walked an aisle. Dead men walk aisles all over our country.
It is only about complete abandon to our relationship with Jesus. It is about hearing His words, ALL of them. The ones of grace and the ones of suffering, the ones of comfort and the ones of sacrifice. For better or for worse. And on this globe He promised us it would often be worse, very worse.
You do not want to hear that, I know. Neither do I. But, Truth is Truth. And our eternities are depending upon what we do with that Truth ~ surrender and serve or determine to discard.
Jesus, give ears to hear.
". . . He awakens me morning by morning, He awakens my ears to hear as the learned. The Lord God has opened my ear; And I was not rebellious, nor did I turn away."
The last three years have opened blind eyes as I live amongst deaf ears. Blind eyes that had never seen the devastation of deaf ears. But, now I see. I see the stagnated souls, the isolated ill, the hollowed hearts that know no language of love. When ears empty of all God's grace life becomes a lonely place. A separated soul is a sad sight to behold, void of meaningful moments of a simple, shared love. Some deaf ears will defy nature and seek language in a different manner. Some will stay the isolated ill. Many have little choice, language is situational unattainable; they live isolated and ill-souled through cruel circumstances.
We so often look at the deaf or the disabled with a mournful, sympathetic eye; but, never stop to recognize that physical malady is often a God-given gift to diagnose our own spiritual maladies.
We must stop, open blind eyes and see that deaf ears abound in far more then the physically disabled.
Deaf ears deaden the absolutely healthy to His language of love and His repeated call to repentance.
Many are not deaf, more akin to hard of hearing ~ we hear the language of love and miss the language of repentance. "What was that you say? Oh, I heard of Your great love for ME but that latter was a little mumbled and muffled. Well, certainly I heard enough of Your great love for ME and I certainly agree, we all should love ME!" And hard of hearing ears hear partial message.
Many choose not to hear, for with God's grace comes Jesus' cross; a cross we would rather not bare.
And yet I see the starved souls before my own eyes of deaf ears that desperately need language. When we do not hear, we perish. With hearing comes communing and abiding and this is relationship. And for ALL of us relationship with Jesus is the ONLY Savior for soul sick us.
Every Sunday, countless sit and most will hear in an auditory way and yet, will not truly hear. We hear only that which we want to hear, we accept that which tickles our ears (2 Timothy 4:3), and if that inner warm fuzzy is not included we reject the words and often mock the message.
We are deaf for sin and deaf for selfism.
We live life void of true Life because we are unwilling to hear. Oh certainly, we sit in Sunday pew as good Americans know to do.
But we steel our ears,
for we refuse to hear,
His call to death that is our only hope to spiritual health.
I have seen deaf ears lead to sick souls, in the physical.
Now I see it in the spiritual.
And in the physical, deaf ears may cause loneliness for a time.
But, in the spiritual deaf ears will cause loneliness for ALL of time. A loneliness that knows only despair and that horrid gnashing of teeth (Matthew 23:42, Luke 13:28). Those deaf ears lead to an eternal death of all that is good or lovely or pure. The spiritually deaf face eternity dead to God ~ dead to the only Goodness this world has ever known.
Here we are so bloated, saturated on God's words yet we do not know His language.
It is not about all the many words you heard but never heard (James 1:22). It is not about where you sit on a Sunday or who your family is. It is not about the way you vote or the time you raised your hand or walked an aisle. Dead men walk aisles all over our country.
It is only about complete abandon to our relationship with Jesus. It is about hearing His words, ALL of them. The ones of grace and the ones of suffering, the ones of comfort and the ones of sacrifice. For better or for worse. And on this globe He promised us it would often be worse, very worse.
You do not want to hear that, I know. Neither do I. But, Truth is Truth. And our eternities are depending upon what we do with that Truth ~ surrender and serve or determine to discard.
Jesus, give ears to hear.
No comments:
Post a Comment