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Hear With Their Ears
Devotional for Friday, August 15, 2003 by Rod Marshall
Matthew 13:15-16 - "For this people's heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them." But blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear. (NIV)As I have the chance and the leading, I confront work colleagues and friends about the miracles that I believe Jesus is performing today, through the Holy Spirit. Those who are Christians, or are at least sympathetic, are touched and encouraged by my accounts of God's accomplishing what is truly impossible.
Those who are not predisposed this way think that I am deceived, gullible, or just well-intentioned. It is not yet their time to comprehend the truth; they do not want to see Him the way I do, working behind everyday events. I guess they think that it might mean a change of lifestyle or a letting-go of the things that they have allowed to eat into their existence.
But I believe that God, in and through the Holy Spirit, can speak to them for Himself. It happened to us, so it could happen to them, if they could "see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn". Those of us in the kingdom have a job to do, to evangelize wherever we find ourselves, enabled by the Holy Spirit.
We are now closer to the time that the biblical texts tell about: God's cataclysmic wrapping up of the universe. We live in a world that is not only ripe for judgement, but also one ripe for harvest.
Acts 1:7 - [Jesus] said to them, "It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth." (ESV)
Prayer: Lord, impart to us Your Word so that we can speak it to others. Enlighten our hearts and minds to know when You are working miraculously in our lives today, so that we might share Your work with those around us, that they might "hear with their ears". Amen.
Rod Marshall <rmarshall@glos.ac.uk>
Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England
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Today's Music:
O For A Thousand Tongues.