Monday, February 25, 2013

Dull Hearts

You know those moments when you are reading something from the Bible, and you seem to comprehend it, but then the Holy Spirit takes it to a whole new level, and all you can say is... woah! This happened to me today!
I've been studying through, Live Deeply: A Study in the Parables of Jesus, and I've really learned a lot from just the first few days. The first parable I've been studying is the Parable of the Sower Jesus told in Matthew 13:1-17... 

On that day Jesus went out of the house and was sitting by the sea. Such large crowds gathered around Him that He got into a boat and sat down, while the whole crowd stood on the shore. Then He told them many things in parables, saying: “Consider the sower who went out to sow. As he was sowing, some seed fell along the path, and the birds came and ate them up. Others fell on rocky ground, where there wasn’t much soil, and they sprang up quickly since the soil wasn’t deep. But when the sun came up they were scorched, and since they had no root, they withered. Others fell among thorns, and the thorns came up and choked them. Still others fell on good ground and produced a crop: some 100, 
some 60, and some 30 times what was sown. Anyone who has ears should listen!” 
Then the disciples came up and asked Him, “Why do You speak to them in parables?” He answered them, “Because the secrets of the kingdom of heaven have been given for you to know, but it has not been given to them.  For whoever has, more will be given to him, and he will have more than enough. But whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him. For this reason I speak to them in parables, because looking they do not see, and hearing they do not listen or understand. Isaiah’s prophecy is fulfilled in them, which says: You will listen and listen, yet never understand; and you will look and look, yet never perceive. For this people’s heart has grown callous; their ears are hard of hearing, and they have shut their eyes; otherwise they might see with their eyes and hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn back—and I would cure them. “But your eyes are blessed because they do see, and your ears because they do hear! For I assure you: Many prophets and righteous people longed to see the things you see yet didn’t see them; to hear the things you hear yet didn’t hear them.

Honestly, I've known this parable since I was little bitty, and I can not count on my hands the number of times I've heard someone preach through this and explain who the sower represents, who the seed represents, who the ground represents, and on and on. BUT for the first time today the last portion of this scripture (I've italicized it and made it bold) became real to me.
Jesus spoke to the giant crowds in parables, or short stories that had a spiritual meaning. There were people in these crowds who had absolutely no idea what He was trying to say (you can see the disciples getting frustrated with Jesus in this scripture because people were obviously confused). It seems weird that Jesus would appear to conceal the truth from these unbelievers by placing it in a parable (since He came to die for the sins of everyone who would believe), but if you flip back over to Matthew 11:20-24, we learn that the more exposure you have to the Truth, the more accountable you will be before God in judgement. So, God was basically extending His grace yet again to those who didn't believe in His son by having Jesus conceal Truth in a parable they didn't understand. How gracious and beautiful is our God? He shows grace and love to the very end, wishing that all would turn to Him even as they break His heart.

Then, Isaiah brings the calloused hearts into the picture. Calloused. Gross. When I think of calloused, the synonyms that come to my mind are: insensitive, hard, no feeling, tough, dead, etc. Here is a new synonym from today... DULL. It's amazing how one little word can trigger brand new thoughts. As opposed to asking myself what makes a heart grow calloused, I asked instead what makes a heart grow DULL? One of my favorite hobbies is cooking. When it comes to cooking, one of the most essential items is a sharp knife. In fact, a well trained chef will sharpen his knives everyday. A sharp knife will chop, julienne, slice, dice, and fillet much more efficiently than a dull knife. Things go more smoothly and dinner is ready on time when your knives are sharpened. But, what makes a knife dull? Using it for things it wasn't made to cut through; cutting boards, plates, pans, kitchen towels, and fingers (just kidding!). Each knife in the kitchen is designed for a certain purpose. Serrated knives cut bread or things with a tough outer skin, paring knives clean and cut vegetables, filet knives are used to fillet fish, etc. None of these knives were designed to cut through hard plates or cutting boards, so when they attempt to, they become dull and useless. Let's skip to my newfound hobby of sewing. There are so many life-long seamstresses who I have heard mention that they hide their fabric cutting scissors from their husbands so they don't make them dull by using them to cut something they were not made to cut.
In the same way that kitchen knives and fabric scissors become dull when they are used for the wrong purpose, so do hearts. When a person takes a heart that was carefully crafted by God and uses it for any other purpose than true devotion to and worship of God, it becomes dull. Taking a heart designed by the one true God and choosing to devote it to loving and worshiping another human being makes it dull. Taking a heart designed by God and choosing to fill it with greed and selfish desires makes it dull. Taking a heart created by God and filling it with pride or works alone makes it dull. This is why Solomon wrote so carefully in Proverbs 4:23, "Guard your heart above all else, for it is the source of life." Solomon is saying to make sure your heard is kept sharp with the Word of God, protect that heart of yours in a secret drawer where you keep those fabric scissors! Don't let it be used for anything other than what it is designed for, devote it to God! If a heard does become dull, it misses being used to it's full ability.
Sadly, a dull heart sits right in front of Jesus (the one who created it and the only one who can cure it) and all His teaching, but hears nothing, sees nothing, and understands absolutely nothing at all. I pray that we would all sharpen our hearts everyday so they would avoid becoming dull and missing anything our Savior has for us.

Jesse