Hearing and Doing

Driving home: And the wise man is not the man in this passage who places his faith in Jesus Christ, but the wise man is the man who does the will of Christ.

Uses the common Sunday school chorus about building on the rock to illustrate how people misinterpret Matthew 7, equating 'the rock' with Christ's person rather than the 'doing of His will' as taught in the passage.

Now, we must keep that before us, or we'll miss the whole boat, as of the whole point, and miss the boat, as does that little chorus that we were taught to sing in Sunday school. The wise man built his house upon the rock, the foolish man built upon the sand, and then they make up that next verse, so build your house on the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ is not the rock in this passage. He isn't the rock.

2:03 - 2:28 Read in full sermon

The point: Discipline your thoughts and prioritize conscious mental activity to overcome the mind's natural resistance to focusing on God's truth.

Compares the fallen mind's tendency to flit after trivial things to an 'incorrigible brat' that kicks and screams when forced to focus on God's truth, highlighting the difficulty of serious reflection.

It takes conscious, deliberate mental activity. Now one of the greatest indications of the fall is that our affections can go a-whoring after a thousand objects far unworthy of their affection, and yet this is what our hearts do. The living God who commands us to love Him with the whole heart, and we find that our hearts go a-whoring after a thousand other loves. Another great indication of the effects of the fall is that this mind that God has given to us to be the receptor of lofty thoughts of Himself and His universe and His world and His truth and His redemptive purposes, it'll go flitting...

10:00 - 11:26 Read in full sermon

The point: Discipline your thoughts and prioritize conscious mental activity to overcome the mind's natural resistance to focusing on God's truth.

Contrasts the ease of concentrating on a 'devil's Bible' (Sunday paper) with the difficulty of focusing on eternal truths, proving the remains of corruption in believers.

If you have the devil's Bible at home, Sunday paper, and you sit down to read that, why, you can just sit there bug-eyed and follow your favorite comic strip right through and the telephone can be ringing, the rose can be burning, but you can concentrate no problem. No problem!

11:30 - 11:47 Read in full sermon

The point: Do not let the world squeeze you into its mold; instead, be transformed by the renewing of your mind through serious reflection.

Uses the metaphor of the world as an 'aggressively evangelistic system' and a 'mighty hydraulic vice' that seeks to squeeze believers into its mold, emphasizing the pressure to conform.

I think it's Phillips who renders it. Don't let the world squeeze you into its mold. It's the picture of the world as an active, aggressively evangelistic system. The world is not neutral to your Christian perspectives.

19:02 - 19:17 Read in full sermon

The point: Do not let the world squeeze you into its mold; instead, be transformed by the renewing of your mind through serious reflection.

Explains how phonograph records are made using a master mold and hydraulic pressure to illustrate how the world seeks to stamp believers with its standards, making them 'sing the same tune.'

You know how records are made, don't you? Phonograph records, you know how they're made? The master is cut and then from that master there's a mold made of high quality steel. And then that mold under tons and tons of hydraulic pressure comes down upon melted soft plastic and presses down until every single groove that's in that master stamp, that masterpiece of steel, leaves its impression so that anything that comes out of that stamp, where those two jaws have come down together under tremendous pressure, it'll always play the same tune.

19:26 - 20:05 Read in full sermon

The point: Turn your own feet (your whole being) to God's testimonies, making it a personal and practical action.

Explains the poetic language 'turn my feet' as symbolizing turning one's whole being, emphasizing that practical action involves the entire person, not just notions or affections.

He said, I turn my feet, not my notions or my affections, but my feet. Now, this is poetic language. And what he's saying is, I turn my whole being. Where your feet are, you are.

27:50 - 28:04 Read in full sermon

The point: Govern your actions and responses to God's Word by His revealed will, not by convenience or existing community standards.

Uses Jesus' command to pluck out an eye or cut off a hand (Matthew 5) as a metaphor for the painful but necessary 'amputation' of sin, illustrating that obedience is not always convenient.

I turned my feet unto thy testimonies. It's so easy, dear ones, to turn our feet to the path of convenience. We see the precept of God making demands upon us. For example, our Lord says, if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out.

29:44 - 30:08 Read in full sermon

The point: Make haste and delay not to keep God's commandments, understanding that delayed obedience is disobedience.

Illustrates 'delayed obedience is disobedience' with a personal story of his son Joel delaying coming to bed, showing that even a short delay is defiance of authority.

I say to my son, Joel, come to Daddy, I want to get you ready for bed. He stays in, plays with his toys. I say, son, what are you doing? He says, well, Daddy, I was going to come in five minutes, but I want to play with my toys.

33:11 - 33:28 Read in full sermon

Driving home: If you hear, you're exposed, impression is made and you don't do, the impression will be lost, you'll deceive yourself, you'll harden your heart.

Uses James's analogy of a man looking in a mirror and forgetting his appearance to illustrate how hearing truth without doing it leads to the loss of impression and self-deception.

Be ye doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if any be a hearer of the word and not a doer, he's like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass, in a mirror. For he beholds himself and goeth his way and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. He looks.

35:12 - 35:40 Read in full sermon

Driving home: If you hear, you're exposed, impression is made and you don't do, the impression will be lost, you'll deceive yourself, you'll harden your heart.

Describes how people 'pull down the shade' in their minds when a challenging truth is preached, especially in areas where God has previously spoken, leading to dullness of hearing.

They weren't doing what David did. And so they became dull of hearing and the minute you hear about a duty about which one time previously you were disturbed, you say, oh well, I know all about that and you pull down the shade there in front of your mind. All of us have a shade there. And we can, while looking up with a smile on our face, grab that thing a dozen times during the sermon and pull it right down.

38:12 - 38:34 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: He shares a pastoral anecdote about a young man who immediately acted on counsel, illustrating the encouraging sign of undelayed obedience when light is fresh. He emphasizes that…

Shares an anecdote about a young man at camp who, after receiving counsel about a crush on an unbelieving girl, immediately wrote her a letter stating his stand with the Lord, demonstrating undelayed obedience.

They realize that God has something to say about this particular problem they have as a Christian. And when God has enabled you to bring to bear upon their lives and their situation the eternal truth of God, know what I always look to see? What do they do immediately after they get that light? I had a boy come to me at camp this past week, not one of our own.

40:46 - 41:08 Read in full sermon