January 06, 2010
Spiritual Hearing Aids
A recent AP report says that more than 30 million adults in the United States have some degree of hearing loss and most could be treated with hearing aids, but only about one in five people use them. The report states, “Many people simply don’t know, or accept, that they need one.” I think this sounds remarkably similar to those who are spiritually hard of hearing. According to Jesus, “He who belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God.” (John 8:47 NIV)
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Gail;
-----I approach with a grain of salt such assessments as thirty million people having some degree of hearing loss. If we were to analyze the masses according to a practical need for hearing, maybe only three million would be considered hearing impaired. Analyzed according to the actual capability designed into the human ear, those with some degree of hearing loss would be more like three hundred million. If perfect hearing is the standard, we could all use one.
-----During our Wednesday morning Bible study, one of the brothers read a statement proclaiming all Catholics to be out of line with the Word, therefore not belonging to God. Thankfully, another brother raised immediate objection to the statement and the rest of us basically objected as well. But we were not saying Catholic positions are wholesome and congruent with the Word to the last one. I have also observed in the Presbyterian church that none of the women elders are the husbands of one wife, and I would like them and their women preachers, too, to expound upon I Cor 14:33-38 and I Tim 2:12-14. I have always been interested in the Pentecostal’s take on I Cor 13:8-10, the Christian Church’s take on I Cor 14:39, the Baptist’s take on Heb 3:12, the Seventh Day Adventist’s take on Acts 15:28-29, and the Jehovah’s Witnesses take on Isa 9:6. Every one of us has a take on some Scripture which is quite different from the take of another, and every one of us has some Scriptures we miss taking all together. If perfect hearing is the standard, we all need hearing aids.
-----Because of the imperfections of the human ear, no one hears perfectly. Because of the imperfections of the human soul, no one perfectly hears spiritually, either. But there is a line dividing both types of hearing impairment from both types of hearing adequacy. When talking to a friend we may feel he needs a hearing aid if we must keep repeating ourselves. But the truth may be either that his ears hear well enough and he has a distraction problem, or we ourselves tend to mumble more than we realize.
-----Although the Word does not mumble, its message is not laid out in concise, catalogued statements. A lifetime of study does not even begin to reach the depths of all it has to say. And although many of its messages are clear, concise, and ordered well enough for communicating basics to folks not busied by a whole lot of thinking, many of its heights and depths are accessible only through sharp reasoning, knowledge of history, nature, and human nature, and a proficiency with its original languages. So our distraction with life’s mundane issues can easily get in the way of or distort the subtle messages of the Word.
-----I would like to think that those whom God chooses are the folks humble enough to realize they need a hearing aid and to reach for it, the Holy Spirit. And the Spirit deals with both distraction and volume, as does a good physical aid. Since God implants that aid in all who come to Him, all of His have one. Yet, they also have some control over its filtering and volume. The more His child cultivates the soul for growing the fruit of the Spirit, the more clearly the aid renders the message of the Word.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
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