Hebrews chapter 5 begins with a review of the role of priests in Jewish worship, and continues to compare and contrast the Levitical priesthood to the priesthood of Christ Jesus. This is critical theology, and should be closely studied and well understood by today’s Christians.
Any other day, I would dive into great detail, as some Christians today (including myself) come from church traditions which do not recognize the role of priest in modern Christianity. Instead, I want today to focus on the writer’s lament in verse 11: “About this we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing.”
He’s not writing about a physical sensory disability. He’s writing about a much more serious disability, the willing refusal to “hear” and delve deeply into the knowledge of God’s ways and God’s will; to re-shape their hearts to more closely align with God’s own heart.
This is not a new problem. Jeremiah wrote of the same approximately 600 years before Jesus was born. “To whom shall I speak and give warning, that they may hear? Behold, their ears are uncircumcised, they cannot listen; behold, the word of the Lord is to them an object of scorn; they take no pleasure in it.” (Jeremiah 6:10) Jeremiah was calling his people to repentance, but in chapter 6, specifically warning them of the impending siege of Jerusalem. For both purposes, he laments that most will not “hear”, because they don’t want to listen.
Six hundred years later, Jesus faced the same problem with the Jews of His day. He spoke of this when his disciples asked why he taught in parables, and quoted Isaiah: “This is why I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. Indeed, in their case the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled that says: ‘You will indeed hear but never understand, and you will indeed see but never perceive. For this people’s heart has grown dull, and with their ears they can barely hear, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn, and I would heal them.’” (Matthew 13:13-15)
We don’t have the same problem … we like to tell ourselves! What lesson shall we take home from these scriptures?
Only the lesson of a stern and critical warning. How many times have we heard a great Bible lesson on Sunday morning, and would have struggled to tell someone about it on Tuesday afternoon? How many times have we been encouraged to make a change for the better in our behavior, our attitudes, or our thought life, only to tell ourselves, “I’ll get around to that later this week.” James wrote about us: “For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like.” (James 1:23-24)
We study our Bibles at least weekly, hopefully daily, but how many times do we “commit” to turning our hearts closer to God, only to forget the lesson the next day? Are we studying God’s Word to feel better about ourselves, or to truly grow closer to God and to incorporate His will into our own hearts?
What in my life will I change, TODAY, to hide away a bit of His Word within my heart?
Rod's Quiet Time 