Four Myths

05/22/2008, 9:00 am -- by | 6 Comments

1. Racism

Racism — the idea that people hate other people for the color of their skin — is a myth.

How do I know? I grew up in Watertown, N.Y., a city so far north that we only had four black families in the whole city when I was a kid. So what did we do? We hated other white people, and it worked out just fine.

We hated each other for being rich or poor, fat or skinny, tall or short, Northsiders or Southsiders. We hated each other for living in the different projects: Maywood Terrace, East Hills, Cloverdale, Empire Flats. We hated people for being from Canada or Carthage, Adams or Alex Bay.

What people call racism is simply hatred and it has nothing to do with the color of your skin, but rather the color of your heart. If we were all the same color, ate the same food, listened to the same music, and even went to the same churches, we would still find a million reasons to hate and despise each other that had nothing to do with race.

2. The birth of a child is a miracle

A miracle occurs when God suspends the natural operation of this world and interferes with the outcome of a particular action or set of actions. As mind-boggling and incredible as the birth of my children was to me, it was still simply the most likely outcome of my union with my wife.

If producing a child is miraculous, then some of the sorriest examples of humanity ever to live have also been prodigious miracle workers, and should be able to avoid beatification and be immediately named as Catholic saints.

3. The tie goes to the runner

Anyone who has watched any baseball has to admit that this isn\’t the case.

I am too young, or perhaps too unobservant, to comment on whether it was ever true in the past, but surely today it is not. The tie goes to the infielder who makes a spectacular play. If a shortstop or third baseman makes a spectacular grab, wheels, and throws an off-balance strike that skips off the dirt and right into the glove of the first baseman, there ain\’t no way — if it’s at all close — that the runner will be called safe.

4. Southern Hospitality

I know I have said this before, but experiencing “Southern hospitality” for the first time is like drinking a Diet Coke: an initial sensation of sweetness that quickly dissipates, leaving an aftertaste that tells you it\’s not quite genuine.

Adults end every encounter with “Come see us!” (an updated version of “Ya\’ll come back now, ya heah?”) while secretly wishing you would never actually cross the threshold of their house. Children sweetly say “Yes, ma\’am,” “No, ma\’am,” “Yes, sir,” and “No, sir,” while lying to your face about the obscene gesture they made while your head was turned — and will make again as soon as you turn away again.

One Hundred Words (3)

05/17/2008, 10:00 am -- by | No Comments

In the spirit of Proverbs 10:19, our newest regular feature will be a series of posts of 100 words — or fewer. Comments under ten words!

They say every dog has his day and mine has been a good one; I have drunk from the porcelain bowl. I have chased squirrels and terrified the elderly. I\’ve escaped from the backyard more times than I can count, and fathered more children than anyone could count. I have left my mark all over this neighborhood, the only world I have ever known, and I am ready for the next one. Throw the ball (or bone) through the veil, and I will follow fearlessly, be it a treat or rolled-up newspaper that awaits me on the other side.

–DFS, for Wallace P. MacSweet

Tag, You’re It!

05/15/2008, 11:00 am -- by | 1 Comment

If you are reading this message, it is because I have put you on a list of my very best friends! This message brings with it financial blessings, happiness, and the chance to help those less fortunate than you. If you feel the same way about me, find ten of your best friends and send it to them, to continue this wonderful blessing and financial opportunity.

If, however, I am not one of the ten people that you send it back to, I will know that you do not love me, you are not really a Christian, and (in fact) you have always hated me, your mother and God (not necessarily in that order).

What is more, Proctor & Gamble has agreed that if you forward this message to ten people, they will stop tithing to the Satanic Church, and instead use that money to send food and medicine to needy children overseas. Also, Bill Gates and Microsoft have agreed that if you forward the message to the ten people, and they, in turn, forward it to ten more people too, the company will donate to an offshore account in Nigeria, $1,000 for every 100 forwarded emails.

That money will then be tied up in litigation, once the Barrister handling the funds dies in a plane crash, but don’t fear! His assistant, the Right Honorable M\’bai\’ D\’undooloo Kinsha-Shazz will contact you about how to retrieve your portion (possibly as high as $2,000,000.00) by simply sending him your bank account number, your debit card with PIN, all your blank checks, and any jewelry you have lying around the house.

Remember! You must forward this message to ten people before you shut down your browser, or even use the rest room! Starving children, Nigerian diplomats, and me — your best friend — are all hanging in the balance, and we could be hurt terribly by your indecision.

God bless!

I’ve Got A Mansion?

05/9/2008, 10:00 am -- by | No Comments

One of the much ballyhooed aspects of Christianity that perplexes me is this notion that when I get to heaven, I will have a mansion waiting for me. Don\’t get me wrong — I know that Jesus Himself said that in his Father’s house were many mansions, and that He was going there to prepare one for me — I just don\’t know what I\’m going to do with it.

If you’re like me (and you\’ll admit it), you have daydreamed at some point abut being rich. You know, winning the lottery, inheriting millions of dollars, inventing some great product or service that makes you a millionaire or billionaire. And part of that, of course, is planning out your mansion. Have you ever had these two trains of thought collide? Have you ever dreamt of what your mansion would be like in heaven? I have, and it\’s perplexing.

I love books, so my earthly mansion is always centered around a great library. Something huge, two floors high, dark wood paneled, and stocked with volume after volume of leather-bound Bible commentaries, exegetics, and first editions by all my favorite authors. If you saw the movie Meet Joe Black, Anthony Hopkins has a similar library. So what\’s the problem? Well, what could I possibly need books for in heaven? I suspect I\’ll know everything I need, or want, to know. Why would I still be interested in the affairs of a sin-sick fallen race? Like Paul said, “Now I know in part; then I shall know, even as I am known.” So, anyway, the library is out.

What about a kitchen? I like to cook. But will I have to cook there? If I have to cook, I\’ll make a mess, and since we aren\’t given in marriage there, abiding like the angels, I\’ll have no wife to help clean! I usually do a lot of that myself anyway, but how would it be heaven if I still have to empty the trash? Wash dishes? Sweep and mop the floor? Wipe down the counters?

And if I need a kitchen, will I need a bathroom? I hope not.

You see where this is going. A game room: you gonna shoot pool in heaven, or play ping-pong? A home theatre: what are you gonna watch in heaven? Certainly not Charlie\’s Angels. How many bedrooms? What would I do with one anyway? Will I even sleep in heaven? It\’s mind-boggling.

As grateful as I am, I just can\’t think of one thing that I would need a mansion for in heaven. I plan on worshipping the Lord, and maybe, if it\’s possible, slipping out for a ride through the cosmos once in a while, to check out the planets, nebulae, comets and asteroid belts. I can\’t think of anything that would compel me to hang around a mansion, washing windows, mowing lawns, waxing floors…

A Wedding Blessing

05/2/2008, 12:00 pm -- by | No Comments

What does it mean to you?
When you find a friend that is true?
Will you count all your treasures less precious than this?
I know two people who do. . .
— Honeytree

I\’m leaving for New York today to see my nephew Djere get married to his sweetheart Karen. It\’s exciting. I have been thinking about it more and more, as the day approaches, and I keep remembering a similar wedding 26 years ago this month when my wife and I were joined together in holy matrimony.

The days leading up to the wedding will be hectic, the day itself crazy. There will be so many things to do, so many people to greet and thank, so many well-wishers extending hands and hugs and hurried words of wisdom or encouragement. So here is my word of wisdom and encouragement, to be taken at leisure when times slow down a little bit.

The quote above is from a song played at our wedding in May 1982. I remember a lot of things about the wedding, but this one song, and this one verse, has stayed with me longer than any other. When I heard the line “Will you count all your treasures less precious than this?,” I remembered a round red tin container, the former home of butter cookies or some such thing, which then held the few treasures I possessed in life.

It held:
(1) REGGIE candy bar wrapper from 1977, when the Yankees were the reigning world champs
(1) ESSO coin/keychain fob that I had found in my coin collecting days
(1) tattered white/gold tassel from my graduation from Jefferson Community College in 1981
(1) bundle of articles I had written while serving a journalism internship at the Watertown Daily Times in spring 1981
(1) bulletin from the retirement service for Pastor Polly, my first pastor after I became a Christian.

It\’s odd the things that make up a man\’s life and dreams at the age of 21. I loved Jesus, sports, antiques, and the dream of being a newspaper reporter. In my mind, the tin and its contents were what I saw when I felt those words bidding me to take all that I had, every dream that I had ever dreamed, every object that I had treasured, and lay them down as meaningless compared to this woman whom I loved — and still love — with all my heart.

Life will be filled with so many complications, disappointments and surprises that I\’m not sure anyone could ever give a newly married man a map to safely navigate it all. But do this: treasure your wife above everything you have; love God; and love your children when they come. As the bondservant said in Exodus 21:5: “I love my master, my wife, and my children. I will forswear my right to be free.”

Why You Show Up

04/24/2008, 10:00 am -- by | No Comments

I read an article once, in a motivational booklet our company circulated each month, in which a boy was beaten up by a bully at his bus stop. The next day, the boy got to the bus stop early, and waited. As the bully approached, the boy set his books down, assumed a fighting stance, and said, “Let\’s go!” The bully, confused, asked, “What are you talking about?”

“We\’re going to fight again,” the boy said. “Today, tomorrow, every day until I beat you.”

The bully shook his head and walked away, mumbling, “I can\’t. I hurt my arm yesterday when we fought.”

And that is why you show up in life.

You never know what will happen tomorrow. Yesterday is dead and gone. Did you lose then? So what? That doesn\’t mean you’ll lose today. Some days, all you have to do is show up. In sports, it\’s called a forfeit, or a walkover. The person, or team, which was so unbeatable yesterday, may not even be able to perform today.

I know some of you are hockey fans, many of the Philadelphia Flyers, so you know just what I mean. The Flyers got off to a great start in their opening round series, going up 3-1 in games. Then what happened? The sleeping giant awoke in Washington, and the Capitals dominated for two straight games. They shut the Flyers down in Washington in game 5 (3-2), then came to Philly and shut them down again (4-2) to tie the series at 3 apiece.

Their superior skating and playmaking, and the explosive offense of Ovechkin, Backstrom and Semin simply overpowered the Flyers for two straight games — and game 7 was back on their home ice. No one would have blamed the Flyers for not showing up Tuesday in Washington.

A funny thing happened, though. When you play two straight nights, and three times in four nights, people become fatigued — and as Vince Lombardi was fond of saying, “Fatigue makes cowards of us all.” So what happened? Washington didn\’t show up. They had nothing left in the tank. After spending 2 straight games checking the Flyers into oblivion, dominating the boards and winning every loose puck, the Capitals had nothing left to give. And the Flyers won the game and the series.

And that is why you show up.

My Words

04/18/2008, 9:26 am -- by | No Comments

Bweinh! celebrates National Poetry Month.

I write these words today and hope that they are true
true to the purpose
of living here for You

And I long for eloquence to break the gravity
breaking with tradition
to soar with levity

And somewhere in heaven perhaps they’ll find a home
mixed with the prayers of saints
who suffered here alone

But my words are limited in what they might become
a prayer, a song, a monologue,
a sonnet to the Son

While your words are powerful though ever so reserved
dropped from heaven sparingly
till all the earth is served

But my words are all I have, thoughts cast into stone
settled on a point of view
and lifted to your throne

I only hope they’re purified passing through the cloud
purged from their insolence
before they’re heard aloud

Waxman In Trouble Again

04/11/2008, 10:00 am -- by | No Comments

Sen. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) is in trouble again. You’ll recall that Waxman spent the last 18 months embroiled in an intellectual property lawsuit with New Line Cinema, who accused him of violating their trademark for the computer-generated King Kong image by wearing an identical mask on the floor of the Senate, terrifying visitors and amusing colleagues.

After months of legal wrangling and threats of financial penalty, it was determined Waxman was not indeed wearing a mask, and that any similarity between him and the mythical ape was purely coincidental. New Line apologized warily, but told Waxman off the record that they would be watching to see if his appearance changed down the road.

Now his colleagues are after him. After the televised baseball hearings, featuring Roger Clemens, put Waxman in the public eye for long periods of time, many senators were deluged with complaints from frightened members of their constituency.

Several have now sponsored a bill with wide bipartisan support, which would establish protocols for which senators would receive prominent coverage during televised hearings, based on standards of personal appearance. Although no one has specifically pointed to Sen. Waxman as the bill’s target, around the Senate, the bill has been unofficially dubbed the “Hideous Henry Act.”

“There should be a minimum level of attractiveness that we adhere to in our dealings with the public through mass communications,” said Fran Crouse (R-Iowa), chairman of the powerful Personal Beautification Standards committee. “We have not singled anyone out — obviously we would never do that — but there are, frankly, some politicians who should be heard and not seen.”

The Heroes Series — Caedmon

04/3/2008, 11:30 am -- by | 1 Comment

Read the first in the series!

Caedmon was a 7th-century cowherd in Saxon England. During gatherings at the abbey which employed him, it was a common form of merrymaking in the evening to pass around the lute and take turns making up frivolous songs in the easy, alliterative style of rhyming popular at the time. As the lute drew nearer and nearer to Caedmon, he became more and more distressed, and finally, as his turn arrived, he quickly left the house and retired to his bed in the stable, where he cast himself down in misery.

Suddenly there appeared to him a vision of Jesus saying, “Caedmon, sing.”

“I cannot sing,” was the melancholy reply. “That is why I came out here.”

“But you will sing to me,” Jesus replied.

“What shall I sing?”

“You will sing of all created things.”

The next day an amazing transformation took place as Caedmon went to the Abbey and had the abbess read to him from the Scriptures. He then began to sing the story of Creation. With all of Europe lying in spiritual darkness, Caedmon began to put the Bible into the language of the common English-speaking people.

Caedmon became a voice to his generation; his writings became seminal resources for the eventual English translations of Wycliffe and Tyndale. This was Caedmon\’s call, and although I have no confirmation, it must be the origin of the name for the Christian band, Caedmon’s Call.

I stumbled across this account in a book called How We Got Our English Bible, and I have been challenged ever since by thoughts like, “What can I do to be a voice for my generation, a voice to my culture? What excuses do I have? What deficiencies can He turn to His glory?”

We never know until we open our mouth — or pick up a pen — how God may use us.

The Poison of Oppression

03/25/2008, 9:00 am -- by | No Comments

“I tell you that, if these should hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry out.”
–Luke 19:40

I read a commentary on this verse that interprets it to mean that, had the oppressed people in question been silenced, they would have picked up stones and rocks to voice their rage and displeasure. Anyone who watches CNN knows that this is still the preferred way to confront political oppression among the powerless inhabitants of Palestine. But even if this was Christ’s meaning, the manner of his life and death serves as swift assurance that he uttered it not as a veiled threat, but simply as a commentary on the desperation of the oppressed.

I remember an episode of Remington Steele, where Pierce Brosnan’s character was describing his early life as an urchin on the streets of London. He was homeless and hungry one Christmas Eve when he came upon a street-level window; there he watched a family, gathered around the tree, celebrating together. He described it beautifully, and then was asked how he responded to the scene. Shrugging his shoulders, he said, “I threw a brick through the window and ran away.”

When I watched that scene as a young adult, it was the first time that my previous life as a juvenile delinquent made any sense to me. I was part of an angry pack of youths — we stole from anyone we could, burglarized many businesses, and perpetrated all manner of indiscriminate acts of vandalism on the streets of my hometown. Although I never could have articulated it at the time, we felt oppressed. We hated anyone with nice clothes, or nice houses, or money. And we fought back with the only weapon we had: our rage.

I accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior at age 17, but the years before are still stored in my memory, along with the dregs of feeling oppressed and powerless.

So when Barack Obama\’s pastor — as a black man — rails at the hostility and oppression that he perceives to be inherent in white culture, it neither confounds nor distresses me. I understand it.

When he speaks those things as a man of God, however, it deeply grieves me. It is one thing to drink from the chalice of bitterness, but another thing entirely to stand at the altar in the house of God, and offer it as a vessel, fit for the communion of God\’s holy saints.

He That Hath Ears to Hear, Part IV — Thorns and Weeds

03/24/2008, 9:00 am -- by | No Comments

Don\’t close your eyes,
Don\’t close your eyes —
This is your life . . .
Is it everything you dreamed that it would be?
When the world was younger . . .
— Jon Foreman, Switchfoot

I have a friend named Chuck, and I remember a conversation we had seven or eight years ago about how our zeal for the things of God can diminish with time. We were reminiscing about when we first got saved — how we were going to change the world, how we witnessed to anything that moved, how we went on the streets, and handed out tracts, and preached in the jails. In fact, Chuck made a confession to me that we both found quite humorous at the time. He said that he was so on fire for God when he first got saved and started reading the Bible, that he became absolutely convinced he would be one of the “two witnesses” spoken of in Revelation; he could not conceive of his life ending any other way.

I don\’t really need to tell you the rest, do I? I saw Chuck\’s wife in Wal-Mart a while back on a Sunday afternoon, and she told me they are “out of church,” as they call it down here. Why? They are building a new house, and the weekends are the only time they have to oversee the work being done by subcontractors. When the house is finished, though, they are planning to look for another church.

In this last section of the parable, Jesus compares people who get consumed by “the cares and riches of this life” to the seed that falls among thorns and eventually gets choked out. I\’m a pure exegetic preacher, so I see no other way to deal with metaphors than to trust that Jesus was correct when he defined them as cares and riches. How could there be another application than what Jesus so clearly stated? Cares and riches — these choke the word of God in our life so that we bring no fruit to maturity.

Cares are unavoidable; we have to work, mow our lawns, raise our kids, file our taxes and pay our bills. But we cannot let these choke out the work of God in our life. That\’s what Luke 13 and Matthew 7 are all about. We cannot live like the unbelievers. We cannot worry about the things that the world worries about.

Riches, Paul told Timothy, are deceitful and hurtful, plunging men into all manner of evil. The pursuit of riches has left many a person “pierced through with many sorrows.” Any conception you have of Christianity that allows you to put Jesus on a back shelf while you deal with your life, or pursue riches, can only hurt you and bog you down. It will only kill the work of the word of God in your life, and it will keep you from accomplishing what you have already heard from God.

Human Hearts

03/20/2008, 4:30 pm -- by | No Comments

To be a human being is to be a failure. To have been born of woman and lived among men is to have been spawned and nurtured by a fallen race; a race that could not abide in its original position of favor with the Almighty God of the universe, but rather, was overcome by sin and fleshly temptations.

In many respects it is an exercise in futility. Even as Christians we serve a God who commands us to be like him and supplies us with His Holy Spirit to accomplish such an end — sending His own Son to die on the cross to remove our sin, so as to make the whole thing possible! And yet it seems impossible, for we continue to sin after we are saved, we still fall short of his expectations.

God tells us in Peter\’s first epistle: “Be ye holy, even as I am holy.” Jesus tells His disciples that if they love one another, even as He loved them, then the world will know that they are His disciples. John repeated this, saying, “He that sayeth he believeth in Him ought also so to walk, even as He Himself walked.” Men, called to live like God; we can\’t even live like men.

There are days that I take comfort in the fact that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Sometimes it helps to know that my brothers and sisters deal with all the weight of sins that Paul said “so easily beset us” — but not today. Today it only increases my distress to know that there is no one beyond the siren call of sin and carnality. The only man who ever lived above the fray, and pleased His heavenly Father, was Jesus.

My only hope is to cling to Him — with all the desperation that the human heart can feel — and to trust that His blood will cover me, and bid the avenging angel to pass over this hovel, and let God be pleased to spare the miserable creature inside.

He That Hath Ears to Hear, Part III — Stony Ground

03/20/2008, 1:30 am -- by | No Comments

Are you in a pattern in your life where you start well, but never finish? Is the cycle of your walk with God one of repentance, proclamation, and good intentions — but at the end of the day, no apparent progress? Does no work of God in your life last very long before you again backslide and run from God?

This is what Jesus addresses in the next section of our parable — “the seed that fell on stony ground,” those with no root who wither away when trouble or persecution comes.

What keeps the Word from sinking down and developing strong roots? The problem is what’s below the surface — the hidden rock, the obstacle that keeps us from doing business with God. The only reason for a root not to progress to a deeper place to nourishment and water is the interposition of something immovable and unyielding.

What are you hiding? What are you afraid of? Moving this object will not be as horrible as you think.

God loves you. Anything that He requires of you in exposing sin — your own or perhaps another’s — will only be a blessing. He has no desire to harm you, but some things cannot be healed until they are exposed to the light, so that they can be killed.

In the famous tract, My Heart, Christ’s Home, the writer compares salvation to literally turning his house over to Jesus. Jesus strolls through it, looking at the library, workshop and other rooms — and many changes have to be made. It turned into a horror story for me when Jesus found the hall closet and commented on the stench emanating from it. The writer was put off by the request to clean out that dark little closet, so Jesus turned around to leave, saying, “I’ll be out on the front porch. I can’t stay in a place that smells like this.” The writer relented, and he was finally freed from the secret sins he had buried in that small dark place.

I recently saw a news story about a 29-year-old youth pastor who came forward to confess that he had killed a man at 16, before he was saved. He had been hiding it for 13 years. I can’t imagine the courage this required, but I too have been in the place where I’ve said to God, “No! I can’t dig this up! It’s too deep! It’s too messy! Everyone will see it and the scar it leaves on the ground! You can’t ask this of me!”

He can ask, though, and He does. And if we refuse to yield, the growth — the relationship — is over, until we relent and let Him move the thing that lies hidden, below the surface.

But I promise you: it always brings joy and indescribable peace when it’s accomplished.

He That Hath Ears to Hear, Part II — The Wayside

03/14/2008, 10:30 am -- by | No Comments

Read Part One here.

If you find yourself sleeping through church, please give me just five minutes! If you find yourself unable or unwilling to read your Bible or pray, because you believe that God has nothing to say to you anyway, please read this article!

In the Parable of the Sower, Jesus describes four types of soil that we offer God to work with in our life; the first He calls “the wayside.” This is where you are — but you don’t have to stay there.

The wayside is the ground that borders the fertile field — trampled by traffic, beaten, barren, and impenetrable. Listen to the explanation He gave His disciples about this ground. He said that when God speaks in your presence, it hits a hard and unbreakable surface. It lays there for but a moment before the devil swoops in like a bird and carries it away.

In this parable, God is always speaking, always casting out his word: to move and motivate you; to free you and heal you; to make you what you need to be. By tuning out, you have given the enemy the right to intercept and carry off anything God says to you. You think that the One who loves you most never calls, or writes, or visits, but in reality, you’ve let the devil take over the phone, check your mail and answer the door.

The first thing to do is realize what has happened. Take a stand by praying, “Speak, Lord, for Your servant is listening.” The next step is softening up the ground. But how did it get so hard and how can you soften it up again? In the parable it was hardened by a constant traffic of feet, carts and hooves. This constant barrage of objects and instruments beat the ground, making it hard and impenetrable. How do we change that? First, you must shut everything else down. Close the road to traffic. Turn off the television, the radio and the computer. Put away the hunting rifle, the fishing pole, the toolbox — whatever you distract yourself with. You have to eliminate distractions and get before the Lord.

Charles Finney wrote an excellent tract in the 1800s, called Breaking up the Fallow Ground. It was based on Hosea 10:12: “Break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the Lord, till he comes and reigns righteousness upon you.” Your ground will not be barren unless you leave it barren. To be good for tilling, ground must be broken up and plowed. This only happens in your heart by an intentional act of your will.

You must take control and get your heart into the place where you can, and will, hear what the Spirit is saying to you.

He That Hath Ears to Hear

03/13/2008, 12:45 pm -- by | No Comments

I believe that the most pressing problem in the body of Christ — the thing that most hinders growth in Christians, leaving them confused and frustrated in their walk — is hearing from God. This article is the first in a series on hearing from God, taken from the Parable of the Sower.

Part One: The Importance of Hearing

In this parable, Jesus talks about a man sowing seed; He lists the four types of soil where the seed lands, then compares them to those who hear the word of God. Telling His disciples that “the seed is the word of God,” He specifically connects each type of soil to people. It is also important to note that when He tells and explains the parable in Matthew 13, He uses the words “hear,” “perceive,” and “understand” over 20 times! Clearly His point is to instruct us on how to hear from God.

But how important is hearing from God? Is it optional? Is it something that preachers and other spiritually-minded people do for us? Isn’t that why we pay preachers anyway, to hear from God and bring it down from the mountain to us like Moses did? No, no, no and no.

The Bible says that we are saved by faith, but it also says that “faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God.” So a man cannot even be a Christian if he has not heard from God. Paul wrote to the Romans: “As many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God.” A person must be in an active relationship with God’s Spirit — listening and obeying — to be considered a child of God.

Can you conceive of being married to someone with whom you never have any interaction? No talking, no listening, no times of intimacy? You are the bride of Christ; you must hear His voice! While Jesus is teaching this parable in Luke, someone tells Him that His family has come to see Him, and he says: “My mother and brothers are those who hear the Word of God and keep it!”

Hearing from God isn’t just important; it is everything to the Christian. In Deuteronomy 8, God tells the Israelites: “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.” Hearing from God is the first step in faith. James teaches that the blessed of God are not hearers only, but are both hearers and doers. He goes on to teach that true faith is a process, which must begin with hearing, proceed to belief and culminate in action.

The next three articles in this series will deal with the types of soil that keep us from hearing, cutting us off from fellowship with God and short-circuiting the work of faith in our lives.

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