Ears to Hear & Eyes to See

Mark 4:1-2, 4:9-13

INTRO

How many of you would agree with me this morning that knowledge often changes perspective

Knowing more about a person changes your perspective of them.

Understanding their past helps you understand and accept who they are in the present.

Knowing how an object or a tool works changes your perspective on how useful it is to you.

A prime example of this for me is the game of golf

I loved watching sports as a kid growing up but I HATED watching golf

For whatever reason, I thought it was so boring and I found myself frustrated when these pro athletes couldn’t hit what I thought were easy shots

That was because I had never played more than a round of putt putt.

I played my first real round of 18 golf holes about 5-6 years ago

I was with a couple of older gentlemen at the church I was serving at and I was expecting to go out there and show them what’s up

What happened was actually the opposite…

Ever since that day, my love and appreciation for watching golf has grown

Now I watch and I am amazed by the talent that these pro golfers on the tour possess

Playing a round of golf gave me a new perspective on the sport

I was now watching and listening to others play golf with new ears and fresh eyes

What ultimately was the change caused by? An experience…

This same principle applies to many people sitting in our churches today.

Much of the Bible doesn’t click for people or others have been turned off by the action of other christians they have experienced.

People’s perspectives can often be skewed for one reason or another but I was to point us today to what I believe Jesus says is the real hinge point of that particular issue

Many people do not understand or follow Jesus because they simply do not have Ears to Hear or Eyes to See…

They have not had an experience with the holiness, power, presence and grace of God that has healed the blindness of their eyes or opened their ears to hear His truth.

BODY

This is exactly what Jesus has been met with by his own people thus far in His ministry…

Read Mark 2:7 ““Why does this man speak like that? He is blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?””

Read Mark 2:16 “And the scribes of the Pharisees, when they saw that he was eating with sinners and tax collectors, said to his disciples, “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?””

Read Mark 2:24 “And the Pharisees were saying to him, “Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?””

Read Mark 3:4–6 “And he said to them, “Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?” But they were silent. And he looked around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, and said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was restored. The Pharisees went out and immediately held counsel with the Herodians against him, how to destroy him.”

Read Mark 3:20–22 “Then he went home, and the crowd gathered again, so that they could not even eat. And when his family heard it, they went out to seize him, for they were saying, “He is out of his mind.” And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, “He is possessed by Beelzebul,” and “by the prince of demons he casts out the demons.””

Read Mark 3:30 “for they were saying, “He has an unclean spirit.””

This was the spirit of the day.

A group of people in the Jews who were awaiting the coming of their Messiah and when met with Him face to face, they cannot see who he truly is.

They do not have ears to here and eyes to see

Never is this more able to be seen than instances like we come across today…

Read Mark 4:1-2

Jesus is at the sea of Galilee and because of the size of the crowd, he hops into a boat

He likely does this to use the water as a means of voice projection

Then it says that he begins to teach them “many things in parables”

A parable is a story with an underlying truth, an allegory that is used to illustrate a main point

Jesus used these stories throughout his ministry to illustrate to his insights into the Kingdom of God.

Here in Mark, we will be taking a look in depth at 4 of them

The parable of the sower

The parable of the lamp

the parable of the seed growing

the parable of the mustard seed

But before we dive into these, I want us to wrap our minds around the purpose of these stories…

Jump down with me to Mark 4:9

Jesus finishes his first parable which we will study together next week and he makes an interesting statement. He says, “He who has ears let him hear.”

This is a statement that Jesus makes 6 times throughout the gospel accounts.

Kind of interesting when you think about it. I am sure many were sitting there questioning Jesus’s words because most of them probably posses ears.

How many of you would scratch your head if someone said “He who has feet, let them walk.”

You would probably think something like “Yeah, that’s what feet do. They walk.”

“That’s what ears do Jesus, they hear things.”

But what if Jesus isn’t talking about the ears on our heads but the ones in our souls?

Read Mark 4:10-11a

Here we arrive at an interesting point in the story.

Reading in sequence, it seems that Jesus stops in the middle of his teaching to hundreds, maybe thousands to make this statement to his 12 disciples.

Its more likely that this conversation happened after his teaching but Mark puts it in the middle to make a point to his readers.

But nonetheless, Jesus tells his disciples that to them has been given the secret of the Kingdom of God.

Jesus has divinely chosen 12 men who would go on to be the founders of the church to be given supernatural insight and explanation about the Kingdom of God.

But, Jesus says there is another group of people who are also hearing these teachings but in a different way…

Read Mark 4:11-12

Jesus says for you is wisdom, insight and explanation but for those outside, everything is in parables

In other words, they will not understand

Then Jesus quotes Isaiah 6

This is a very well noted moment in Old Testament scripture where the prophet Isaiah has a vision of God in is throne room and God gives Isaiah an assignment to carry with him a message back to his people and this is that message…

Read Isaiah 6:9–13 “And he said, “Go, and say to this people: “ ‘Keep on hearing, but do not understand; keep on seeing, but do not perceive.’ Make the heart of this people dull, and their ears heavy, and blind their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed.” Then I said, “How long, O Lord?” And he said: “Until cities lie waste without inhabitant, and houses without people, and the land is a desolate waste, and the Lord removes people far away, and the forsaken places are many in the midst of the land. And though a tenth remain in it, it will be burned again, like a terebinth or an oak, whose stump remains when it is felled.” The holy seed is its stump.”

In the same way, peoples hard hearts were blinded and deaf to the truth in Isaiah’s day, the same is true for Jesus during his ministry…

Particularly Jesus’ own people, the jews and this is true today.

There are just some who simply do not have ears to hear and eyes to see the things that Jesus is actually saying.

I think of it like family lingo

You might be thinking, Micah what does that mean for me… here are a few takeaways

CLOSING

1: If you have ears to hear and eyes to see then this morning, rejoice!

If you have heard Jesus’ words and responded in faith then Jesus’ promises are true.

He is the good shepherd and the sheep know his voice.

Sometimes I fear that there is a lack of excitement, zeal and gratitude just for the honor of being called chosen and highly favored.

2: There are some who will never hear and never see

This is really the crux of the issue at hand today, what do we do with the fact that Jesus said that there are people who will see and not perceive, who will hear and not understand

God in his sovereignty and divine purposes has given unrepentant sinners over to their spiritual blindness and deafness

If you know Christ this morning praise God that is not your story

But it also means that as you labor for the gospel, the results are his business

3: If you haven’t, open your eyes and ears this morning

You know, what if walking out of church was different today than it normally is

What if you walked out with the scales off your eyes and the cotton removed from your ears

What if you said yes to the words of Jesus and no to the world?

Today can be your golf moment. where you experience the goodness, love and power of Jesus and then walk out of here with a whole new perspective on who He is and what it means for you

Do you have ears? Then listen to Jesus this morning