Hearing from God

Amen. Ask you if you will now. Stand and we'll sing number one in your hymnals. It's titled Oh Worship the King. Dark is his path on the wings.

On the last verse, frail children and all firm to the our maker redeemer and friend you may be seated and I've changed the order a bit because of the seriousness of the the conditions of some of our members and what have you. So, we'll, at this time, I'll do the announcements and there's a lot of those so I want to get moving so, brother Poe will have some time in the pulpit. As I mentioned about miss Jesse, remember her and, we're privileged to welcome my, namesake, number one friend, Roger, here from Ohio visiting in the area, sitting in miss Jesse's seat. Glad to have him, and I think he's in for a treat because we have a special speaker today. His name is John Poe.

I remember that. I also have it written down here and I he's not of Hispanic descent, I don't think but brother Steve Morris is. So, when he says something to me that I don't understand, I'll get brother Steve to translate it. If it's bad, he'll clean it up. So, brother Poe is with, I got this written down so I could, read it off to you.

But he's with, I wanna say Baptist Mid Missions, and he's with EBI which but Steve, you want to say that in Spanish or you want me to? Okay. So all for all those pardon me? That's exactly editorial Baptist independent. Is that right?

I got it right. He's from he's out of Sebring. He knows our former, you know, the last time we had a real song leader, brother Marv Stevens. For those of you who've been here for a while, you remember him. He is very well organized unlike me and he's a very excellent singer.

So so what we're I'm glad to have him here because I I got permission to use this term by the way. He is a cracker jack speaker, and he knows that's a compliment. Even in in Spanish it is. Right, Steve? So he'll be here he'll be here in a few minutes to speak, and I'd like to go now to the let me finish the rest of the announcements first.

There there will be no service tonight. 6PM, pastor will be in and prayer for the adults here in the auditorium and the children in the back and then that's called the Joy Club. Then, on Thursday, it's the disciple in Bible study at 11:00 here at the church and they're studying in the book of Amos and you can see that. The next men's Bible study is in December. That's on the fourth and a special announcement that miss Jules wants me to make is that the boating outing which is scheduled for this Saturday, December 5, and it's at 10:00.

The sign up list is still in the back, and there are, there are openings. And, it's for ladies only. So men, if you wanna dress up in a lady's outfit and put on a wig, you might could you might could do that but by the way, if you do and she finds you or or a false lady, she will push you overboard in the middle of the bay. So, don't forget that. There's still plenty of room according to miss Jules.

The new church directories directories are on the back table. They're they're available back there for you. So, mark your calendar. I see Betty is here this morning. Happy birthday in advance to December 6.

So and, Nyla Ray Nyla Ray Phelps is miss, Cheryl Vote's mother. Does anybody know how old she'd be? I'm guessing 95. If I'm wrong, Cheryl will correct me when she gets back. But she's not in bad health.

She just not done is like to expose herself to the the pandemic. So remember those special birthdays. And Joshua who's not here and and he'll be I don't know how old he'll be 16, I guess, something like that. Anyways, he's junior in high school. So, pardon?

Is Joe your wife? Oh. Oh, she has a birthday? Oh, yeah. She has a birthday on, my wife's name is Mary Jo.

She was born on Christmas day and they wanted a son to call him Joseph, but they got a daughter, so they call her Mary. And then Joe, because what they really wanted was a boy. So they got Mary Joe Summerford, born Christmas Day, and appropriate, for for my wife. Anyway, I'll pay for that when I get home. So, that's it for the the announcements and now, we're gonna, get if miss Judy will let me.

I'm going to skip the second song and we're going to go sing at the cross. So, if you will turn in your in your hymnals to number is it one thirty nine? One twenty nine. 129. I don't know who wrote this thing for me, but when I did it, I can't read my own writing.

One twenty nine. First, second, and last verse. And did my savior bleed and did my sovereign die would he be both at stake and it bore such a worm it was there by faith I received my sight and now I am happy all the day on the second verse was degree. At the cross, at the cross where I first saw the light and the burden of my heart rolled away. It was there by faith.

I 'm a going to I'm you I give my soul the weight is all that I can do at the cross at cross where I first saw the light and the burden of my heart rolled away it was there by faith I received my sight and now I am happy all the day and right before brother John comes up, we have a visitor representing the Dale family. That would be how come I can't remember? Phil. Phil Martin and who is Sarah's father, retired preacher from a teacher. Heaven forbid, retired teacher from Indiana.

Come on up, brother John. Good morning. Good morning. It is a joy to be here with you folks and it has become somewhat of a tradition for me. I think this is the third time I've been able to come and speak on the Sunday after after Thanksgiving and so I always appreciate pastor Rick giving me that opportunity.

We grew up together and he he's a little older than I am but we grew up in the the same church up in Virginia and so as our paths cross and and different things he's kept in touch and offers me the opportunity to come here when he's travel So, it's always a joy to be here with you folks and as you know, we were my wife Debbie and I, we have two daughters, Elizabeth and Olivia. We were missionaries in Lima, Peru able to help start two churches and Iglesia Bautista Lafe which is the Faith Baptist Church in La and the Mission Bautista, the Mission and we help start those two churches and the Lord is blessing. The Ate Church as we called it is going strong, has its own national pastor, has a beautiful facility, and and actually has a small Bible institute that they've started to train their people and interestingly enough, during the pandemic, they've been able to have their services online and so, it's kind of neat for me to to catch up and watch some of their messages as they stream them there and just to kind of see what they're doing and how the Lord's blessing their ministry.

So, it's been good since 2014. We've been back in The US. That happened because my wife, Debbie, almost died in Peru from liver disease. It was totally undetected. She had just had a checkup right before before she got sick and then on Father's Day on 02/2014, we had a Bible study in our home that Sunday night and I'll never forget it.

I was taking some people home. I came back in the house and she told me I'm not feeling well and to make a long story short, I won't go into the gory details but within two hours, she was being taken by ambulance to the hospital and she was put in intensive care unit. She lost so much blood. They told me they didn't expect her to make it through the night and the Lord was gracious, merciful. She survived that night and they told me she might have a year to live.

Well, that was in 2014. I'm happy to tell you she's doing well and on January 28, she had a liver transplant just close by at Tampa General Hospital and recovering well from that. We have to of course take lots of precautions with the pandemic because she definitely doesn't need to get sick but the Lord's been good and since coming back to The States, we began working with EBI as you heard which is a Spanish publication ministry and so we help publish books. Anything that a church would need or a ministry would need in their in their ministry. So, we have everything from but for beginners, discipleship material, all the way up through seminary level.

So, for professor, professors to even study and that would include commentaries and study books and women's studies, children's books, counseling books, just about anything you can imagine. This year, in 2020, we've produced 24 titles, 24 new titles. Next year, we're scheduled to planning to publish 18 new titles. Overall, we have about 180 books that we have published so far, and just help distribute those all over Latin America. And Latin America, Central America, any Spanish speaking country.

Interestingly enough, our ministry is not just publishing. However, we also have the privilege of helping people learn to use our material. So, we do teaching teacher training sessions, professors, training. We have an online master's program that helps pastors to be able to continue their education online and during the pandemic, we've been blessed to be able to just do all kinds of conferences, different things that had to be cancelled in person but we've been able to do those online and so the Lord is good. We've seen tremendous interest in our materials but more importantly, of course, that leads people to the tremendous message of the gospel and so we're thrilled with that.

I like for you if you would today to take your Bibles and turn over to Matthew chapter 13. Matthew chapter 13 Let me share a little story with you. I will have to tell you that I'm a person that I don't really like to go through drive thrus. Until the pandemic came along, my daughter said they don't remember ever going through a drive thru with me and well, let me tell you why I don't like to go through a drive thru. When I go through, well, first of all, for years, I was a missionary, we had old cars.

So, I was always afraid I'd get stuck in the line and I couldn't get out and my car would overheat. So, that was why I started not going through drive thrus but I had some bad experiences in my past. To be honest with you, the car was my excuse. The reason why I didn't like to go through drive thrus is because every time I would go through, the person inside the restaurant would have a hard time hearing me. I was blessed with an unusual voice.

If you want to say blessed, cursed. I've never really liked my voice and you know what? They almost always say, I give my order and then they always say, will that be all, ma'am? Ugh, I just hate that so much. So, I go to the drive thru and I'm like, yes, I would like two cheeseburgers, please and they, would that be all, ma'am?

Oh, it just drives me nuts and so, it it it hurts my male ego a little bit to go through the drive thru and so I try to avoid that. It's also frustrating when I go through and I say something and they can't hear me and I can't hear them and they sound like Charlie Brown's teacher. Yes, sir. There's nothing there. You're like, I'm sorry.

I can't understand you. Well, it gets a little bit frustrating and so, isn't it frustrating when people can't hear you? Isn't it frustrating when we can't hear other people? It it it's it's a it's a frustration for us. Do you ever have that feeling in your relationship with God?

You just feel like you can't hear him? You want to hear from him. You see all kinds of struggles going on in the world. You you see problems. You have issues.

You have obstacles in your life and and you want to hear from God and you you cry out to him and sometimes it feels like you just don't hear what you want to hear. Now, that's not the spiritual thing for me to say. You're supposed to say, woah, I thought you were a missionary. You're up here preaching. What do you mean you don't hear from God?

Well, we all face times like that. And you know, I don't think that we should necessarily be listening now for the audible voice of God. I'm not going to say God couldn't speak to us today in an audible voice but I don't think he does and I don't think he needs to. Why? Because we have his complete word.

We have revelation. Okay. So, God reveals himself to us in two ways. One, some people would call general revelation. So, when we go outside last night, I I came over early and when I was driving across some bridge, I don't remember where I was.

I saw the the sunset and it was just spectacular and I almost if I'd I if I'd had a place to stop, I would have stopped and snapped a picture. It was gorgeous. Well, when we look at nature, when we look at landscapes, when we look at the human body, when we look at DNA, all of those things reveal God to us because it shows us that there is a designer. Nobody has an excuse to believe there's not a god. As a matter of fact, I tend to think that a atheist has a whole lot more faith than I do because they, if they believe in in an evolution or the big bang theory, they're certainly more faithful than I am.

I believe that God created the Earth in literal six days but God reveals himself to us through nature but God more importantly perhaps reveals himself to us through his word and that specific special revelation that we have here and so, I don't believe God needs to speak to us in an audible voice anymore because he's given us everything that we need to hear but do you know sometimes when we read scripture, it almost seems like we don't hear anything. Have you ever found yourself reading the Bible? You you're you're trying to be methodical about your daily Bible reading and you get through the end of the passage and you realize, I'm not even sure what I read and sometimes, we might find ourselves because of distractions. We read, we're literally reading the words. Sometimes, even reading them out loud and we get to the end and you know what?

Our my mind is racing. We're thinking of something else. We don't hear from God and that can be discouraging for us. I heard the story a number of years ago that I thought was just fascinating. It was a man.

I jotted his name down here. His name was Daniel Kish. Daniel Kish, when he was two years old, had to have both of his eyes removed because he had a type of cancer. Very, very unusual cancer. Well, since he grew up most of his life blind, he learned to adapt and one of the things he did, he learned to make a clicking sound with his mouth and so I I I've heard it years ago on a news story but something like he just basically go he'd make this clicking sound and he actually called his technique flash sonar.

So, kind of like the way a bat can fly at night in total darkness by using the sonar, the sound waves that they would send out and then echo back, see because of the sound. Well, this Daniel Kish learned how to do that. And so, the news story that I saw and I've read up on it since then, he makes this clicking sound and was able to was able to, let's say, see through that sound. He was able to fine tune his ears so much that he could walk through an area that had obstacles just as if he could see. He just makes this little clicking sound.

Well, that's pretty amazing to me but what's even more amazing about Daniel Kish is that he fine tuned his skills so well that he began to ride a bicycle and not only did he begin to ride a bicycle, he got a mountain bike and he would take mountain off road trails through the woods on a mountain bike as a blind man at full competition speed. Isn't that amazing? So, he was able to hear so well to tune his ears and he and which by the way, I think that speaks of God's miraculous creation of our brain but his brain could process that so much and he describes it as he sees the field around him and he can picture because of those sounds bouncing back from the trees or the rocks or the ground or the bushes around him. Isn't that how tuned our spiritual life should be to God? Shouldn't we be able to see him?

Shouldn't we be able to hear him? Just like a deaf man, we might not know what's around, I'm sorry, a blind man. I said it backwards. Just like a blind man that's using his hearing, we ought to be able to see what's around the next corner even if we can't see it with our eyes. Why?

Because God will direct us. He will lead us and scripture describes it as through his still, small voice. Daniel Kish didn't have to have a trumpet. He didn't have a loud noise. It's a little tiny click and he tuned his ears to it.

God often speaks to us just like a whisper in that still small voice. First Kings chapter 19 verse 12, you don't have to turn there. We'll get to our passage in a minute but God's, it says, it speaks in a still small voice. He speaks in a still small voice. Some versions of scripture actually use the translation.

He speaks in a gentle whisper. John's chapter 10 and verse 14, Jesus said, I am the good shepherd. Then, you drop down to verse 27. It says, my sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me. I could give you the example of sheep but sheep know the shepherd's voice and they go to their sheep and they follow their sheep and so Jesus, God, speaks to us just like that loving shepherd.

But my question for us today is then, why don't we seem to hear from God anymore? Now, I had a youth pastor once that told us, he said, if you feel like you're having a vision or you feel like you're hearing the audible voice of God at night, you probably shouldn't eat pizza before you to bed. So, I don't want you to go. Don't tell pastor Rick. Boy, that John Poe, he's telling us, he wants us to call down and hear the voice of God.

I'm not saying you won't but I'm not asking you to look for that. I'm not asking you to expect to hear the voice of God but what I do want you to, I want you to hear maybe not the audible voice but I want you to hear the powerful, still, small voice, that gentle whisper of God when you read your Bible. When you come to church, when you hear his word preach. Why do you think we don't hear his voice anymore though? Why don't we hear it anymore?

Well, it's not because God stopped speaking. It's not because his word isn't less powerful today but I think it's because there's so many distractions around us today. There's so much noise that's drowning out things in our lives. Now, I'll be honest with you. I stayed in a hotel nearby last night.

I did it mostly because on my credit card, I get a free hotel night every year and if I don't use it by the end of the year, I lose it. So, I said, hey, what's used to getting early to drive to Clearwater? I'll just go stay in the hotel and I I I checked into the hotel. They put me on the 1st Floor which I didn't really wasn't real thrilled about but it was a free night so I couldn't complain. I got into the room and would you know it, The lovely family next door to me had some toddlers that apparently thought it was pretty cool to jump on the bed and to slam the doors and I would have thought the toddlers with that much energy being used would have gone to sleep early.

Well, they didn't and guess what? They got up early and those good secured doors really slam loud and I could tell you, there was a lot of noise and that noise distracted my sleep. The cars going by. You can hear that. There's noise.

If we were to go stand, I'm sure if I was to go stand in that front vestibule out there, there's traffic sounds that go by on a busy street. There's noise everywhere. Have you noticed you constantly hear a little beeping and dinging and buzzing of people's cellphones? We live in a place that's we live in a world that's loud. But you know what?

I'm not only talking about audible sounds that we hear with our ears. There's all kinds of things that drowned out God in our life. Let me let me give you an example. I just did a three week series for our young adults at our church in in Sebring. I called it Redeeming the Screen.

I talked about our cellphones and how much time we use on our cellphones. How many people are so addicted to their cellphones? Yesterday, doing some Christmas shopping. I actually saw their selling. I'm sure people think it's a joke but they're selling a little, it looks like a little gel sale.

It's like a little prison bars and it's a little box and you put your cellphones in it. It has a padlock on it and it says so that families can spend time together. It's the cell, the cell, cell, or something like that. You put your cell in the cell and lock it up but do you realize how many people? Do you see people at restaurants?

The whole family sitting at the table doing this? I think someday, you know, if evolution was true, we wouldn't have anything but thumbs because that's all that the young people use these days, right? We live for our phones and we look on our phones and I've seen teenagers. I'm I'm ashamed to say I've seen my daughters do it. They will sit at the table with other people or sit in the room with other people and text people in the room instead of talking to em and so, you know what?

We spend so much time on our phones that our phones are a distraction to us. So, we we get distracted and we can't hear God. We have televisions. We get distracted. We have time for TV but we don't have time for God.

We have our careers. We have our sports. We have our hobbies and none of those things are all bad but anything that we have in our life that comes before God can eventually drown out that still small voice of God. Now, that leads me to our passage of scripture today and what I want us to do is I want us to look at Matthew chapter 13 and what's going to be interesting about this is, I want us to compare and do what I would call a hearing test today. Let's have a hearing test of our spiritual hear hearing and how we're doing and I think it's kind of interesting because here in Matthew chapter 13, we're going to be able to see four different types of soil.

Now, this is not a passage that should be unfamiliar to you. I'm sure you've heard it preached or you've seen it taught for years and years. Maybe even from your childhood, a Sunday school lesson or something but what I want us to do is I want us to compare those four types of listeners. We could kind of think of the soil as listeners and let's see how they listen and the results that they get and try to determine what kind of soil am I? What kind of listener am I?

You know, it's interesting. My dad is almost 80 years old. My dad's very very healthy and very very young acting. As a matter of fact, it's funny the other day. He told me he was a little bit annoyed.

He goes to a gym that's 20, I think it's called, no, Anytime Fitness and he goes there to Anytime Fitness and they're having this competition to see who does the most cardio activity in a week's time or you know, it's it's an ongoing competition for six months or something and so my dad, 80 years old, he was annoyed that he was in second place in the whole gym and he said, well, I think that they're cheating me because he said, I don't think anybody goes to the, you know, does more time on the cardio equipment than I do. My dad does two hours a day nonstop on an elliptical machine. Can you imagine that? Two hours nonstop. He took me to the gym with him one time.

I thought I was going to die. I tried to keep up with him and I'll never go to a gym with him again. So, anyway, but my dad, even though he's energetic and youthful, he's hard of hearing and he didn't think he was hard of hearing but the TV at their house would just be deafening to me and we would come in the room. It's like, oh my goodness and so finally, he said, I can hear. I just don't choose to listen all the time.

We thought he had selective hearing. Oh, no. It got worse and worse and worse. So, dad went and finally, at the insistence of my mom, to get his ears checked and come to find out he was severely deaf and needed hearing aids. Well, he was very reluctant but he got hearing aids and now he loves them.

He's like, boy, I wish I had done this earlier. I can hear everything now and the other day, I heard him, I was on the phone talking to him and he he said, my mom said something to him and he didn't hear it and he goes, I'm not deaf anymore and so he said, I just didn't hear you because you didn't say it loud enough. Well, we get frustrated when we can't hear and it's difficult when we can't hear but spiritually, it's vital for us to be able to hear. So, let's look at this passage of scripture together. Matthew chapter 13.

I'm going to read through several verses very very quickly. So, listen and follow along if you can. Matthew 13 verse one. The same day when G went Jesus out of the house and sat by the seaside and gathered multitudes and and great multitudes were gathered together unto him so that he went into a ship and sat and the whole multitude stood on the shore. By the way, I think it was Charles Spurgeon said that churches would be a whole lot more effective if we followed this model.

He said that the preacher in those days sat down and everybody else stood and he said, it's hard fall asleep if you're standing, you know. So, it's interesting to me. Verse three, and he spake many things unto them in parables saying, behold, a sower went in, went forth to sow. And when he sowed, some seeds fell by the way side and the fowls came and devoured them up. Some fell upon stony places where they had not much earth.

And forthwith, they sprung up because they had no deepness of earth. And when the sun was up, they were scorched and because they had no roots, they withered away. And some fell among thorns, and the thorns sprung up and choked them. But others fell into good ground, and he, and brought forth fruit. Some 100fold, and some sixtyfold, and some thirtyfold.

Verse nine, who hath ears to hear, let him hear. And the disciples came and said unto him, why speakest thou unto them in parables? And he answered and said unto them, because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given. For whosoever hath to him shall be given and he shall have more abundance but whosoever hath not from him shall be taken away even that he hath. Therefore, speak out to them in parables because they seeing, see not.

In hearing, they hear not, neither do they understand. Verse 14, and in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah which say it, by hearing you shall hear and shall not understand and seeing, you shall see and shall not perceive. For this people's heart is waxed gross and their eyes are full, dull of hearing and their ears or I'm sorry, their eyes, they have closed, lest at any time they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and should understand with their heart and should be converted and I should heal them. But blessed are are your eyes for they see and your ears for they hear for verily I say unto you that many prophets and righteous men have desired to see these things which you see and have not seen them and to hear these things which you hear and have not heard them. Hear you therefore the parable of the sower.

When one when anyone heareth the word of the kingdom and understand it not, then cometh the wicked one and catch it away that which was sown in his heart. This is he which receives seed by the wayside but he that received the seed into stony place is the same as he that heareth the word and and on with joy receiveth it. Yet had he not root in himself but doeth for a while for when tribulation or persecution arises because of the word by and by he is offended. He also that receives seed among the thorns is he that heareth the word and the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word and he becometh unfruitful but he that receives seed into the good ground is he that heareth the word and understandeth it which also beareth fruit and bring it forth some and hundredfold, some 60, and some 30. So, this is an interesting passage of scripture to me.

I doubt that you've noticed this specifically but did you see how many times that he said here, listen, or turn your ears 19 times in that 23 verses that we just read. 19 times in those verses, he said, here, listen or turn your ears. You all know this story, this parable very very well. Incidentally, a parable has been called an earthly story with a heavenly meaning. I like to think of it as an object lesson, something that God uses to help us to to understand something maybe a more difficult concept.

He uses an object lesson to make it more understandable and that's something good teachers do and that's something that Jesus did as the great teacher but you know this this parable. So, first, we see that some seed fell along this along the path and what happened? It was trampled and the birds ate it up. Then we see this seed that fell on rocky ground without much soil. And it sprouted pretty quick because sometimes on a rock there will be some real fertile soil on the top and it's very shallow and so that soil with no deep roots it wilts on the first hot sunny day.

Then we see some seeds that sprung up among weeds and thorns and then the weeds choke them out and then we they they couldn't reach their full potential and then we finally see those seeds that land in that rich, that good, that deep soil and what happens? They grow, they're strong, and they produce fruit. Much fruit. Now, I want you to remember then that this this is a parable and and it has a message for us that we see here. Just like a seed, God's word is powerful.

Hebrews four twelve calls scripture living and powerful and so have you ever heard somebody use the expression? Let me plant this seed in your mind. Have you ever heard that? Well, that idea of I'm going to I'm to plant a seed in your mind. I want you to think about that for just a minute.

Well, the idea is we want to plant a seed in your in your mind and we want something to grow from that. We want you to take action. We want you to change. We want something out of that. Well, when we see in this parable, literally, God's word is planted in our mind.

As we hear it, as we read it, it's how we today hear from God and and the different types of soil represent the different types of minds and how people receive the word, the different kinds of listeners and unfortunately, just like planting seeds, not every seed is going to grow. Not every seed is going to produce. A few years ago, my wife Debbie decided she wanted to plant a little small herb garden in our little sunroom on the back of our house and she got some seeds that were on clearance at Walmart in this little kit and she painstakingly followed all the directions and planted, watered them in a sunny spot. And six months later, those dried up little pots were still there. Nothing ever, ever sprouted.

I think that's why they were on clearance. No telling how long they had been sitting at that Walmart. But that idea is not every seed will produce fruit. Not every seed is going to grow and you know, if I look at this passage of scripture, it might be somewhat discouraging for a preacher. We probably shouldn't tell Rick.

We don't want to discourage him because look, if if you're thinking like I am, maybe at best, 25 of those seeds are actually going to grow and produce fruit because we had these four types of soil just assuming that maybe equally the seeds were scattered. Remember, there were great multitudes of people that followed Jesus but sadly, most of them did not receive his word as life changing. They didn't receive the gospel. It didn't change their life even though there was great crowds that followed him and so we need to understand that God's seed is but one voice in our lives. That's why I mentioned those distractions.

That's why I mentioned that hotel with the kids screaming. That's why I mentioned our cellphones. That's why I mentioned our TVs and our jobs and our careers. There's all kinds of voices in our lives, all kinds of things that we're hearing, all kinds of things that distract us, that take away our attention from God. And so, why don't we always hear?

Why don't we always receive? And so, there are some so many voices and sounds that drowned out God so we don't hear him anymore. I want to mention real quickly a few of those different voices. I think one of em is Satan. I think Satan is one of those voices.

Just like we could compare him to those birds that we see in that first type of soil. Kind of like those birds that snatched up the seeds. Satan's at work in our world and Satan and the evil in our world can be a voice that distracts us from God and tempts us with sin. John chapter 10 and verse 10 says, the thief cometh not but for to steal and to kill and to destroy. Why can't we hear?

Because there's a thief that's robbing us of the blessing of hearing God's word. First Peter five eight reminds us to be sober, be vigilant because your adversary, the devil, is as a roaring lion, walketh about seeking whom he may devour. So, just like those birds swoop down off of that tramp down soil on the path and steal those seeds away before they have time to to spring forth and to grow. Satan can spring down and dive down and steal God's word. Steal that seed that's been planted in people's life.

Look at the world around us. I look back and I'm 47 years old. I look back and I think to myself, I'm too young to be saying, boy, I remember the good old days but boy, I do remember the good old days compared to the world that we live in today. The world around us is evil and I can't help but think that we must be close to the end times. How much more patience?

How much more grace can God extend to this evil world? And Satan is active and Satan and sin is one of those voices that distract us. The second one that I want you to to see is self, self, Just like the sun scorching that rocky soil. We all have a sin nature. Paul calls it the old man or the flesh.

It's our flesh. We naturally think of ourselves. We're self centered. I thought it was interesting. One commentator said, our nature tries to starve starve out the seeds of God's voice because we don't want to share or relinquish our power.

Isn't that true? We're all self centered in a sense. We're motivated by our selfish ness and so our self, our own voice can drown us out. It's this constant struggle in our mind, the battle for our mind. Galatians five seventeen talks about it.

For the flesh, lust is against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh and these are contrary the one to the other so that you cannot do the things that you would. I love this passage of scripture where Paul talks about and he and he says, basically, you know, what I want to do, I don't do, and what I don't want to do, I do. How many of us have found ourselves doing that? I want to read and study my Bible but I'm too distracted and and I want to think pure thoughts but then, I let my mind raise or I want to be a good witness for the Lord and I know I should but I get distracted and so that's that voice, our own selfishness, our sin nature can be a voice that drowns out and keeps us from hearing the voice of God. So, we've got Satan.

We've got self. Then, we've got society. I would call that like the thorns that choke out the seeds. This is the voice of the world. We should notice that our mindset, our world view, our Christian worldview is very very different than the world around us.

We could compare the voice of the world, what the world offers to thorns that ruin a garden. Thorns that take a beautiful garden and choke out the good plants. By the way, I have to tell you, I've always liked to grow plants. In Peru we didn't have a yard. We lived on a 3rd Floor apartment.

So, we had this little strip of grass and I painstakingly took care of that one little tiny section down by the street. I moved to Florida and I'm thinking, wow, this is going to be great. Look at all the wonderful tropical things that will grow here. And I have to be honest with you, I never knew what weeds were until I moved to Florida. Man, up in Virginia where I'm from, we had weeds but not like Florida.

My goodness, this stuff here, you know, I'll clean out everything out of my yard and then I'll get busy and I'm traveling and I come come back and a couple months later, I'm like, didn't I just do this? How is this that Virginia creeper stuff must grow three feet a day? And so, just like weeds in my garden can ruin a beautiful part of my garden, Sin and our society around us can be like that. They can choke out our spiritual life. First John two fifteen and to 17 says, love not the world neither the things that are in the world.

If any man love the world, the love of the father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life is not of the father but is of the world and the world passeth away and the lust thereof but he that doeth the will of God abideth forever. If we aren't careful, we'll be just like the world around us. We'll become deaf to the voice of God. His word won't seem powerful to us anymore.

We'll be conformed to the world around us not transformed into the image of Christ. Our goal as believers, what's going to bring us peace, what's going to bring us joy in our lives, what's going to bring glory to God the father is when we hear the voice of our savior. You notice there, there was three things, Satan, self, and society that dragged us out but what do we really need? We need to hear from our savior. Like the seeds that fall on that good soil and they grow and they thrive and they produce fruit.

Again, I'm not saying that God's going to speak to you in an audible voice. That's not my goal. That's not my goal. Shouldn't be the goal for you but I do believe he needs to have everyone of us. He needs us to hear him and hear what he's saying.

You know, as humans, we would probably like to hear a booming voice, wouldn't we? You have a decision to make. I remember when Debbie got sick and we came back to The States and we had we had some time to work through things but we had to make a decision about what we were going to do. Are we going to try to go back to Peru? If we can't, what kind of ministry we're going to do?

And we prayed and we struggle with that and our heart broke to think about not going back to Peru but you know, I would have loved at that point to have had a text message from God. I think you should go to EBI or if God would have said, John, EBI is where I want you to go. After I've recuperated from my heart attack, then, it would be nice. We would love to hear an audible voice. Wouldn't you like to have an a detailed plan of everything that's going to happen for you in your future?

Maybe, maybe not, maybe we don't want to know but to be honest with you, we would love to hear from God but God doesn't choose to speak to us that way. I read a commentary and he he made a comment of something that made me think of my own life. You know, just picture sometimes when my daughters are 15 and 19 but I still think of em as my little girls and I still picture them being my little babies, you know, and my my youngest, Olivia, she used to do this thing. She called it cheekage. She would come up and she just loved to lay her cheek against my cheek and oh boy, as a father, I loved cheekage and she'd come up and so now at 15, she doesn't like cheekage quite as much as daddy likes cheekage.

So, sometimes I'll sit there and I'll say, I want some cheekage and she's like, oh, dad. So, she'll come over there and she'll kind of, you know, touch her cheek against mine and she's like, I'm going in my room. Alright. Other times with my daughter Elizabeth, she would be busy doing something and I'll say, hey, Elizabeth, I wanted to do something and she'd be what? I tell somebody to God's a beautiful heart.

So, then, she'd come up closer like, come here and then and then I'd grab her and say, oh, I just wanted to hug you. Do you do you think that possibly that's why God doesn't scream at us? That's why God doesn't speak to us in an audible voice. Why he desires that intimacy with us? He wants us to come closer to him.

He doesn't want to shout so that we could just continue doing what we do, live like the world, be distracted by all this noise around us. He wants us to stop and hear and listen for that still, small voice. That gentle whisper. He wants us to come closer to him. I heard a pastor speaking about the voice of God and he suggests that God whispers because it draws us closer to him and he desires that intimacy instead of the voice of the world around us.

Romans ten seventeen, you know it well says, faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. Jesus in in Romans 13 verse nine says, or here in in Matthew 13 verse nine says, who hath ears to hear? Mark four twenty four, he says, take heed what you hear. Luke eight eighteen, he says, take heed how you hear and so he's emphasizing this for us so much. So, I want us to think about this.

I teach the the young adults class at our church. So, it's mostly younger married couples that are a little younger than I am And being in Sebring, Sebring's demographically the second oldest county in The United States. So I'm 47 and in Sebring I feel like a teenager. It's kind of nice. I get to be real young in Sebring because it's an older community with a lot of retired people but we have a young man in that group that got very on fire for reading the Bible and he does a chronological Bible reading and he started to encourage others in the church to read through their Bible chronologically every year and he did that and so we talked about it and then, I began to realize that not to be judgmental but including myself, a lot of times, it's easy and a lot of the people in the class, it's easy to be disciplined to read your Bible but not to get anything from it.

Just to hurry through it or just to feel like I completed an obligation today. Pastor might ask me if I'm reading my Bible or it's just something that Christian are supposed to do. So, I'm going to read my Bible and if we find ourselves reading our Bible but we're not really hearing from God, that means we might need to have a hearing test a little bit. And so, as we finish up, I want us to look really quickly and I want to just compare these four types of problems that I see. Verse four, and when he sowed, some seeds fell by the wayside and the fowls came and devoured them up.

I'd like to call that person the hardened person. Just like trampled footpath over time, some people reject the gospel. They reject the truth of God's word so much that it can no longer penetrate their heart. Perhaps, that's when scripture talks about somebody that's been given up for a reprobate mind. I don't know.

That's what comes to my mind but this is the kind of person that's so content with their life that they don't feel like they need God. This could be the person that's inattentive to the Lord speaking to them. This is the person that's easy easily going to be taken away by the temptations and the teachings of the world and sadly, I believe that this is where most of the world is. There are people that have hardened their hearts. Alright, look at verse five.

Some fell into stony places where they had not much earth and forthwith they sprang up because they had no deepness of earth and when the sun was up, they were scorched because they had no root, they withered away. I would call this the shallow person. You know em. This could be the person that heard a powerful message. They jumped up to make a decision but really they didn't understand the gospel.

That person doesn't stay with their faith. The person springs up as soon as a trial comes along and then they fade away spiritually. So, we have the hardened person, the shallow person. Verse seven, I think we have person. It says and some fell among thorns and the thorns sprung up and they choked them.

That distracted person or perhaps we could call him a deceived person. Their heart is in love with the material things of the world. You know what? We used to call them when I was a kid. We called them C and E Christians.

You ever heard of a C and E Christian? That would be Christmas and Easter. They only come to church for Christmas and Easter. You know what? We, as Christians, we want those people because we want them to come and hear God's word.

So, we welcome anybody to come to our church but if somebody's a C and E Christian, they say, hey, you know what? I'm a good person. I go to church every Christmas. Well, they're probably deceived. Maybe the person's trying to work their way to heaven with good works or they're they're they're not listening for the truth of God's word.

They don't understand that Christ paid the price for them. And ultimately, no matter how we describe these types of soils, these types of persons, they're deafened spiritually and I think that's why Christ keeps using those words there. Let him hear. Let him hear. 19 times.

Let him hear but don't lose hope. Verse eight talks about the people that are going to make it. Verse eight, but others fell into good ground and brought forth fruit and some 100fold and some sixtyfold and some thirtyfold. I'd call those the faithful ones or the fruitful ones. They produce fruit.

This is a type of soil that God desires for all of us. So, that leaves me with the question, what type of soil are you? In the latter part of this passage, clearly describes the exact meaning of the parable. The disciples like, why are you teaching this? And Jesus says, well, let me explain it and he clearly explains what he meant by all of this and and the type of soil, what each one meant.

So, I think it all comes down to hearing. How well do we hear? How well are we listening? How much do we want to hear? Verses nine to 17, you know, tell us, who had the ears to hear?

Let him hear. It's more than just say, hey, listen up. Listen up. I'm up here. Look at me.

No, it's more than that. It's showing that people, some people are spirit ually sensitive enough to understand and take note of what Jesus is saying. What type of soil are you? The passage encourages us to examine our spiritual life. Now, one final thought and we'll finish.

I'm very long winded. I'm sorry about that. The bad part is I can't see the clock. I need glasses. I'm going to get glasses this Friday.

So, I see that there's a gold circle back there but I can't see it at all. So, I think I've gone over but anyway, what type of soil are you? The ultimate hearing test, I think we can see in verse 23 and that is that you're going to produce fruit. Can you sense God's presence in your life? Do you recognize God's leadership in the circumstances of your life?

How do you know? Well, you're going to produce fruit. According to Jesus, that fruit bearing is the mark of a disciple. John fifteen eight tells us, by this, my father is glorified that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. Galatians five twenty two tells us but the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, long suffering, kind goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control.

We should see those things in our lives. What kind of soil are you? What kind of listener are you? I believe that God is speaking to us. His word is very very powerful.

If we've become bored with it, if we feel like we don't learn from it anymore, it's time for us to have that spiritual hearing test. Our church over in Sebring has on the back wall three things. I'm going to I thought I knew em when I'm standing in the pulpit, my brain goes dead so I'm going to make sure I I say it right. It says, know Christ, grow in Christ, show the love of Christ. That's what's written on the back wall and when we hear God, when we hear him in our spiritual life, we're going to know him and then when we know him, it's just like that seed has been planted and what happens?

We're going to grow in him and then, what are we going to do? We're going to produce fruit and we're going to show him to others. How's your hearing today? Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word.

Father, we thank you that Christ as a marvelous teacher used object lessons, used parables that were simple enough that a common person could understand. Understand and yet we see even in this passage of scripture that Christ says that they have ears and they hear but they don't understand. In other words, they were so distracted. They didn't want to hear. Father, we've seen these types of soils and they certainly represent the types of hearers in the world.

The people that are going to listen, the people that aren't going to listen and father, the difference is of inter as of eternal importance. Father, there's so many distractions in our world today. So many noises, spiritually things that can distract us, that can keep us from church, that can keep us from reading our Bibles, that can keep us from sharing our faith with others. Father, help us to just meditate on this passage of scripture today to think through what you would have us to do to make sure that we're listening for your voice and father as we're faithful to do that, we know that you will be faithful to make yourself clear to us. Father, help us to trust in that.

If there's anybody here today, why your eyes are closed and why your heads are bowed. If there's anybody and you say, hey, you know what? I've heard of the this soil before but I'm not sure that I ever understood it and I'd like for you to pray for me so that I can know that I know that I'm going to heaven. If that's you, raise your hand. Anyone?

Perhaps then, there's believers here and you say, boy, I faithfully try to read my Bible every day and I don't hear as well as I'd like to. Pray for me. If that's you, raise your hand. Thank you. There's several.

Father, be with those that want to hear your voice. Make yourself known to them. Father, may you be glorified in everything that we do today. Thank you for the privilege we've had to meet together. Thank you for the freedoms we still have in our country to congregate and to worship.

May we be faithful to you. In Jesus name, amen.