During the Preaching of The Word

The Solemn Duty to Take Heed How You Hear

0:01 In the eighth chapter of Luke's Gospel, a chapter in which we have one of the accounts of the well-known parable of the sower, our Lord, having uttered the parable publicly, having then interpreted the parable privately to his own disciples, gives several serious warnings with respect to the light now received. And then, in verse 18, he issues a commandment to his disciples in these words, Take heed, therefore, how ye hear. Pay close and constant attention to the manner in which you hear the word of God.

0:54 This text has formed the basis and the framework of this brief series of studies because, in the first chapter of Luke's Gospel, in this text there is established the fact that every Christian has a solemn and constant duty carefully to regard the manner in which he hears the word of God. One of the greatest tragedies of our day is the tragedy of what we might call the paucity of true preaching.

1:26 It could well be said of many who sit in houses of worship this day, hungry sheep look up. And are not fed. However, on the other hand, one of the greatest encouragements in our day is the resurgence of true preaching that is occurring in many parts of our own country and in many parts of the world. Now, whenever there is a rebirth of true preaching, there must also be the rebirth of true and scriptural listening to the word of God.

2:02 For as surely as... Poor preaching begets poor listening, true preaching must of necessity beget true listening.

2:15 And the focus of this particular commandment of our Lord is not with reference to true preaching, but it is with respect to true and proper listening to the word of God. Take heed, therefore, not what ye hear as our Lord commands, in Mark's Gospel, but take heed how ye hear. And as we stand on the threshold of the regular stated ministries of the Word of God, now that the summer is behind us, I felt tremendous pastoral pressure to bring this brief series that we, some of us, may be reminded of what constitutes a proper hearing of the Word of God and others perhaps for the first time might see from the Scriptures what it is properly to attend upon the preaching of the Word of God. In the opening up of this duty last Lord's Day, we began with what I call several foundational considerations, three very fundamental facts. First of all, the frightening fact that there is no blessing automatically given or received in the preaching and hearing of the Word. We looked at four examples both in the Old and the New Testaments which clearly demonstrate

3:38 that there is no blessing automatically given in the preaching of the Word. Then we considered the encouraging fact that under the blessing of the Spirit, the Word often does create its own proper hearing. This command, take heed how ye hear, is not the entire doctrine of the influence of the Word of God. It is the word of God upon the human heart.

4:04 And there is an encouraging fact taught elsewhere that the Word of God is often like a hammer that comes and breaks that heart of stone and makes it receptive to the Word. And then the assumed fact of the text is that it is the true Word of God being spoken. When our Lord said, take heed how ye hear, it was in the context of his own teaching of the Word of Truth. Then we proceeded to examine the first division of how we are properly to hear the Word of God by thinking of those responsibilities that are ours before we actually come to the hearing of that Word.

Review of Pre-Hearing Responsibilities

4:49 There are duties and responsibilities incumbent upon the people of God if they would hear aright. They are duties that must be performed before they ever sit under the preaching of the Word. And I suggested four such elements of this duty. We are consciously to cultivate a fresh awareness that we are dealing with the very Word of the living God when there is biblical preaching.

5:18 And that should beget an attitude both of reverence and of submission. And then we are consciously to repudiate all that would hinder the reception and assimilation of that Word. 1 Peter 2 and James 1. 1 Peter 2 and James 1.

5:31 And then we are consciously to acknowledge our need of the Spirit's ministry of enlightenment and illumination. Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law. And then fourthly we are to consciously cultivate a teachable spirit like the Bereans who receive the Word with all readiness or eagerness of mind. They came not to sit in judgment upon the preacher.

5:59 But they came to be taught. They received with readiness of mind the Word that was given. Now those of you who are here, may I ask you a very simple question? Did you do any of those things before you came this morning?

6:17 We were engaged last Lord's Day evening in a consideration of how we can obey the Lord's commandment. Take heed how ye hear. As that commandment has reference to what we do before we come to preaching, you were given directives that were meant to impinge upon the will. Now have you done any of those things?

6:44 Or was all of that like a well-played song upon your ear? Was it heard with interest but without involvement? Well, you answer. I have to answer for myself.

6:59 You must answer for yourself. Was any time constant? consciously spent prior to this morning in seeking biblically to prepare yourself for the ministry of the Word? Was there any conscious cultivation of that fresh awareness we're dealing with the very Word of the living God when this book is open?

7:22 Was there any conscious repudiation of anything that would upset your spiritual gastrointestinal system as we considered the illustration last Lord's Day? Will good food come to a good digestive system this morning? Was there any conscious crying out to God that He would by the Spirit aid you under the preaching? And has there been the conscious cultivation of a teachable spirit?

The Reality of Remaining Corruption During Hearing

7:51 Well, I leave the questions with your conscience before your God. We move on this morning now to consider the second broad area of our concern, namely, those things involved in the creation of the Word of the living God. Now, I want to make a very important introductory remark or two before we come to the end of the sermon. We're going to come to two lines of thought that will form the bulk of our study this morning. There are times when such a large measure of spiritual unction rests both upon the preacher and the hearer as to make the compliance with these guidelines almost automatic. In other words, there are those times when God comes with unusual measures of spiritual power. And in the midst of a gathering of His people of this nature, there is such an unction resting upon both preacher and hearer that good listening and the implementation of those spiritual principles involved in good listening are automatically present.

9:20 Now, they are present, but they are there without any conscious effort to bring them there.

9:28 On the other hand, there are times when there are periods in any given exposition of the Word of God when the preacher and the hearer are very conscious that they've been lifted, as it were, to a different level of spiritual energy, a different dimension of spiritual reality, when perhaps there's been that conscious plodding along in the establishment of a principle or a precept of the Word of God or an aspect of doctrine. And then, as it were, as we've worked at digging up the mine of that, or digging into the mine of that truth, the great gem is unearthed. And then we stand there breathless and we're caught up in the awareness of that grand aspect of the glory of God in the face of Christ. And then good listening is just sort of reflexive. However, in the more ordinary course of things, as in all other things, most of the time we will be conscious of the reality of Galatians 5.17, even in hearing the pure Word of God.

10:34 Paul says, The flesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh, and these two are contrary, the one to the other, so that you may not do the things that ye would. Or in the language of Romans 7.21, I find then a law that to me who would do good, even the good of hearing aright the Word of God, evil is present with me. Where?

11:01 Right when I'm seeking to hear.

11:05 And generally speaking, the more spiritual any exercise is, the more violent will be the opposition of remaining corruption.

11:17 The more spiritual the exercise is, the more violent will be the reaction of remaining corruption. Did you ever feel violent actings of your own remaining sin when you sat down to read the newspaper? Did you find an indisposition and a distraction of mind creeping over you? Well, no.

11:40 But ten minutes later, you could pick up your Bible and start to read, and now the mind is flooded with all kinds of distracting thoughts. What is that? It is the flesh lusting against the spirit. And the more calculated any activity is to counteract, to mortify, to put to death remaining corruption, the more violent will be the activity of that remaining corruption.

12:10 Now, if God is ordained the preaching of the Word as the major instrument in the complex of His sanctifying work, where will there be more violent reaction of remaining sin but under the preaching of the Word of God? It would be a wonderful thing if there was some kind of an exotic gas or some kind of an unusual talisman that we could make you breathe the gas or wave that talisman over you that when you entered the doors of a place set apart for preaching, you could shed, at least for those moments, the actings of remaining corruption. But you sit there with that remaining sin not only present, but active.

Duty 1: Hear with Resolute Fixation of the Mind

13:01 And it is in the interest of seeking to learn how we may deal with that reality that I suggest this morning but two lines of thought as directives to aid us in proper hearing in the act of preaching itself. The first one is this. We must hear the Word of God with a resolute fixation of the mind. Then our second point will be we must hear the Word of God rendering the appropriate responses of the heart.

13:38 First of all, then, we must hear the Word of God with a resolute fixation of the mind. And some of you kids say, Pastor, what's that big word resolute mean? Well, I'm going to define it for you kids. You know what resolute is?

13:55 Resolute is what happens out in the playground at school when somebody didn't like what you did and they stick their jaw out and they say, I'm going to get you after school. And they stick their little jaw out and the fire's in their eyes. What's happened? They have become resolute.

14:13 That is determined and they're going to get you. And sure enough, you come out of the classroom and come around the corner and there he is waiting for you with that same look in his eyes and his jaw stuck out and his fist clenched. You see, that's what it means to be resolute. It means to be determined, to have a fixed purpose.

14:29 Now, I'm suggesting that if we are rightly to hear the Word under the preaching of the Word, there must be this resolute, this fixed determination of the mind. Consider this duty. In the light of the first commandment as given to us or the first and great commandment by our Lord in Matthew 22.

14:54 In Matthew 22, one of the Pharisees asks our Lord this very vital question. Matthew 22 and verse 35. And one of them, a lawyer,

15:13 that is, one whose preoccupation was the implementation, interpretation of the law, both the law of God and all the extra additions of the Pharisaic sect. One of them, a lawyer, asked him a question, trying him or tempting him. Teacher, what is the great commandment in the law? And he said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy mind.

15:50 This is the great commandment and first commandment. Now when we were engaged in the series on worship back some months ago, one of the points that we underscored again and again is that true worship involves the engagement of the whole man. The mind is active thinking God's thoughts after him. The spirit is active in seeking to render an appropriate response to that which the mind entertains.

16:24 And the spirit is active and then the whole man in prayer and praise pours out, as it were, the strength of his redeemed humanity in the act of worship. Now what is true in the active elements of worship when we are rendering to God the sacrifice of praise and adoration is equally true in the receptive elements of worship. In praise and adoration and prayer, we are active. Something is going, going forth from us in the direction of God.

16:59 In preaching, we are on the receptive end in the context of having dealings with God in public worship. And as surely as in the active element mind and soul and strength all is involved in expressing praise and adoration, so in the receptive elements of worship, God is to be loved with all his love. All the heart, all the soul, and all of the mind. There is to be no lessening of the intensity of the engagement of the entirety of the redeemed man or woman.

17:43 It is all of the mind that is to be engaged. And it's just that biblical truth that I've tried to express in the words, we must hear the word of God with a resolute fixation of the mind. And why do I do that? Well, if I'm an intelligent Christian, I do it out of these motives that are not removed from Christ and my union with him.

18:13 Believing that he has redeemed me by his grace. Believing that he has purposed to make me holy. Believing that he has ordained his word as the great instrument in my sanctification, to sanctify them in the truth. Thy word is truth.

18:30 I come, as it were, out of loving attachment to my Lord. And I bring this resolute fixation of the mind because I dare not seek to frustrate his sanctifying purposes by bringing anything less than the full engagement of my mind to his word, which is the very instrument by which he carries on his sanctifying work. And so, if I am indifferent to the manner in which I listen to preaching, it is a manifestation either of ignorance of the place of preaching in the purposes of Christ or indifference to that person himself.

19:18 And so, in the light of this first and great commandment, we must hear, if hearing is a part of true worship in its receptive aspect, with this, a resolute fixation of the mind. But now consider how this thought and this truth is laid out clearly in 2 Timothy chapter 2. I'm giving you just these two pivotal texts, one from the lips of our Lord, directly, the other by the Spirit, through the apostle, yet equally as much the word of our great prophet, the Lord Jesus. 2 Timothy chapter 2. Paul has spoken, written to Timothy, laying before him certain responsibilities and duties. He has brought to bear upon those duties and responsibilities some analogies, both from the world of athletics and also from the realm of military practice and also from what we would call agricultural practice or agrarian habits. And after doing all of that, in the first six or seven chapters of the book of 1 Timothy chapter 2, we will be able to understand how the world of the world has changed and how the world of the world has changed.

20:36 In the first six verses of chapter 2, he then says in verse 7, Consider what I say, for the Lord shall give the understanding in all things. He uses a form of the verb which lays upon Timothy the duty of constant contemplation, constant, diligent, mental exercise with respect to what Paul has said to him. Be continually considering what I say. Timothy, don't expect that the full significance of what I've written will immediately burst upon you.

21:16 Bring to what I have said the total engagement of your mind. Consider what I say. And then look what he does to encourage him. For the Lord shall give the understanding.

21:27 And you see what he's saying. Timothy, the Lord will give you understanding. Don't be dismayed about what he says. Understand it.

21:37 Don't be discouraged. But, the Lord does not give understanding to a passive, lazy mind. Timothy, it is in the process of your earnest engagement of mind, independence upon the Spirit, that the Lord himself will grant that illumination and understanding. But it is your solemn duty, Timothy, to consider, continually contemplate what I have said.

22:05 And that word will be heard points in the direction of the vigorous activity of the mind. Now this is true with respect to the hearing of preaching. Who is it that gives illumination under preaching? It is the Spirit of God.

22:23 It is the Lord alone who can give any measure of true understanding. But he does not give it in such a way as to put a premium upon mental laziness. We must seriously, solemnly, diligently listen to what the Lord has said. And we will have fulfilled in us the wonderful promise the Lord will give understanding.

Application: Resist Mental Sins and Cultivate Mental Vigor

22:50 Now having established, I trust, from the word of God this aspect of what it is to hear aright under the very exercise or in the midst of the very exercise of preaching, I want to say some very practical things. First of all, I would like to ask you a question. Do you see how vital it is to resist all mental sins while the word is being preached? If we are to take heed how we hear, and that involves hearing with resolute fixation of the mind, do you see how vital it is to resist all mental sins while the word is being preached? What do you mean mental sins, Pastor? Well, I mean such mental sins as quote innocent unquote daydreaming. You see, in daydreaming you are not filling your minds, I trust, with a review of a lecherous past, or filling the mind with schemes that involve dishonesty and the open violation of memories of the past, or fantasizes about the present or the future.

24:16 And in that sense, I'm using the term innocent daydreaming, an activity that may be perfectly proper as a mental relaxation at other times. Of times it's an activity in which people get insights that are very helpful. But under the preaching of God the devil is in a sense as much an enemy to your understanding the mind and will of God as if you never appeared in the place where the preaching was to occur. If the devil cannot keep you as a body-soul entity from coming within the framework of your mind, then he will not be able to control you by letting your mind be somewhere else. And he gains victory after victory when people allow themselves the luxury of innocent daydreaming under preaching, for in a very real

25:45 sense where the mind will always be being able to be connected with debates, with narrative, with connected events, with arguments and connected ideas, with if therefore logical connections and deductions drawn from those connections, it's very form demands mental vigor. And it was not written to theologians. The Old Testament came to us in the context of God's Word being deposited in the midst of a of churches made up of Roman slaves, not many mighty, not many noble, and yet the very form in which the Word of God comes to us demands vigorous mental activity. And if you have quarrels with preaching that demands the same of you, your quarrel is with God, not with the preacher. Now the preacher's task is an awesome one. He is to seek to take those raw materials and without in any way diluting their substance or altering their inherent balance, he's to try to serve it up in such a way that makes it as easy as possible to

27:07 follow the track of the mind of the Spirit in the text of Scripture. But when he's done all of that, that track is gone. That track is gone. That track is not such that you can just saunter out half asleep, half awake, and just amble along and keep on that track. Sometimes that track is just three inches wide, and on either side are dangerous chasms of heresy. And my friend, you've got to have your mind on that track. You've got to give the entire energy of the soul to the listening of the Lord your God with all your mind. And if ever that duty is present, it is to be present in preaching. So do you see the danger of tolerating mental sins, innocent daydreaming,

28:02 mental laziness, or distraction of mind? You should see what I see up here sometimes in preaching. I see someone looks away from me, and they look at another person, and then they get a dull, glassy look for a little bit. They're off the whole track. Now, what's wrong? What they saw triggered something in their mind. It may have been perfectly innocent. It may have been tragically wicked. God alone knows. I can't read the thoughts. But I see what happens in preaching. It's one of the liabilities when you preach to people's eyeballs. Because the eyes are the window of the soul. And I see someone that, when I was over here, turned and looked at something outside the window, and by the time my head came around here, I didn't have them. There was a glassy look. They were looking right by me. I could

28:51 tell they lost the train of thought. Now, whose fault was that? They allowed the mind to be distracted. They dropped, as it were, the thread of the argument, and it may be ten minutes further on in the sermon before they pick it up again, and they may have lost something that was vital to their own souls.

29:13 Jesus said in Luke 9, 44, let these words sink down into your ears. And He gave that in the form of an imperative. It is our responsibility. I want to ask a second question by way of application.

29:31 If under preaching we are to come with this resolute fixation of the mind upon the Word, I not only ask you, do you see the wickedness of mental sins, but do you see how vital is the cultivation and guarding of mental vigor? And here you're going to see a beautiful fusion of the lesson of the previous hour and this hour. As so often happens. There's an integration of thought and emphasis.

29:59 You see how vital is the cultivation and guarding of mental vigor. Let me illustrate. Here's a man that sits around spending all his free time with his feet up in his lazy boy recliner, watching TV and munching on Fritos. He's terribly out of shape, his arteries are all clogged up with extra cholesterol and his whole cardiovascular system.

30:26 And all of a sudden there's an emergency that demands he's got to run half a mile. And the emergency may be very real. And his desire to respond to that emergency is very intense. But when he calls upon that old wreck of a body to go after about a hundred yards, he's done.

30:52 Why? He had no reserves for the intensive demands of the emergency. Because of the general pattern. Now in a very real sense, listening to true teaching and preaching of the Word of God is the emergency.

31:11 It demands an unusual output of mental energy. And if we have allowed lassitude and dullness and carelessness to mark our general mental habits, we cannot come here on Sunday morning and Sunday night and expect we're going to run a mile in five minutes. It just won't happen. And the reason some of you are making so little progress in grace is because you're like that man sitting in his recliner, chomping on his Fritos.

31:48 You spend too much time passively sitting in front of your television set, some of you. That's why you get so little from preaching. You sit and watch innocuous television programs. With plots that wouldn't make demands.

32:01 You sit and watch innocuous television programs. It depends upon the mind of an idiot. And you sit there and just watch. Passive.

32:15 Your mind utterly passive. Some of you watch too much baseball. Too much football. You're a sports addict.

32:26 And I know there is such a thing. Until God saved me, I was one. It's one of the reasons why we no longer have a television. Because I think I'm too weak.

32:42 Some of you are sports addicts. You think you can spend three and four hours on a Saturday just watching big brutes butt one another's heads and come on the Lord's day with a mind that is ready to give itself to the arduous task of really listening to the Word of God? Well, if we preach little ten-minute bitties here, you might be. You might be able to take a little forty-yard sprint. But we have sermons that are mile runs. We try to follow the track of the mind of the Spirit as we preach through large sections of the Word of God and vast themes of Scripture. And it demands that there is some general mental vigor and strength. I shall never forget preaching at a conference. And afterwards, the wife of one of the preachers in our fellowship came up to me and she said, Pastor Martin, she said, I'm exhausted. I said, good, so

33:56 am I.

34:00 I said, good, so am I. I said, good, so am I. And she said, that means you were really listening. Because if I was exhausted in seeking to convey that truth and brought into play all of the faculties of my own redeemed humanity to set the truth before you, why shouldn't you be exhausted if you were giving yourself to the receiving of that truth?

34:24 As we were dealing with vast and lofty concepts of God's grace and the operations of that grace. In great concentrated forms, she said, I'm exhausted. And there's a sense in which we ought to be. And we will not know what it is truly to listen to the Word of God unless we cultivate and guard our general mental vigor. When are we to love God with all our mind? Not just under preaching, but throughout the week, in our leisure hours, what we read, what we watch and don't watch on the TV, how much time we spend. We cannot be indifferent to general mental vigor Monday to Saturday and marshal the strength to profit from true preaching on the Lord's Day.

Application: Maintain a Distraction-Free Setting

35:18 And then I ask a third question by way of application. Do you see how vital is the maintenance of a distraction-free setting for preaching? The announcement Mr. Spence made at our congregational meeting about why we must exercise greater care that we don't have a lot of distraction under the preaching. Why? Well, for this very reason. If the mind is being distracted by noises and crying of little ones and the rest, God has so made us that it gets off the track. It can't concentrate. It can't give itself with full vigor. And it's very interesting that in that chapter in Nehemiah that is so often used as a specimen chapter to demonstrate what we're doing. And it's so often used as a specimen chapter to demonstrate

36:07 what we're doing. And it's so often used as a specimen chapter to demonstrate what we're doing. And it's so often used as a specimen chapter to demonstrate what we might call the origin or the beginnings of expository preaching. The Holy Spirit is very careful to emphasize this very point that I'm making. In the book of Nehemiah chapter 8, it is said that all the people, verse 1, gathered themselves together as one man into the broad place that was before the water gate. And they spake unto Ezra the scribe to bring the book of the law of Moses, which the Lord had commanded to Israel. And they said, I will give you the book of the law of Moses, which the Lord had commanded to Israel. And Ezra the priest brought the law before the assembly. Now notice, both men and women and all that could hear with understanding. And he read therein before the broad place that was before the water gate from early morning till midday in the presence of the men and the women and of those that could understand. Now isn't that interesting? You see the emphasis? Men, women, those that

37:10 could understand. Well, didn't they have little babies that might cry out and distract? Yes, they did. What happened to them? Well, somebody must have formed an ad hoc nursery.

37:18 But they weren't there distracting. The Holy Ghost is careful to underscore that in this solemn reading of the word and then the exposition, verse 8, and they read in the book in the law of God distinctly and they gave the sense so that they could understand the reading. We don't have some kind of a nasty attitude. We don't have some kind of a nasty attitude.

37:43 to little ones. Don't you remember the announcement made at the beginning? We rejoice at the birth of all these little ones. It's one of the reasons why we're so anxious to get on with the construction of our buildings so that we have adequate nursery facilities and the other things and eventually we trust in the blessing of God, a Christian school and all of these things. It's not some kind of a carnal irritation with a little whimpering of little ones. No, no. It is a lofty view of what's involved in properly hearing the word of God.

Duty 2: Render Appropriate Responses of the Heart

38:20 Well, I hasten to add one more major concern this morning. Under the act of preaching what is demanded of us, if we are to take heed how we hear, there must not only be the resolute fixation of the mind, but secondly, we must hear while rendering the appropriate responses of the heart. One has aptly said the heart is the chief guest at every ordinance. Now, as the word

38:57 is preached and you're listening with resolute fixation of mind, when the innocent daydreaming begins, you turn away from it and say, Lord, help me to fix my mind. And when there's that sense of dullness, you gird up in the language of Peter the loins of your mind and say, Lord, help me to fix my mind. And when there's that sense of dullness, you gird up in the language of your mind and you concentrate, you seek to follow the track that is being laid out from the Word of God. In the midst of that, as you think on these things, the Lord gives understanding. And insight comes under the preaching. Well, what are you to do? Well, as you are actually hearing, whatever that insight demands in terms of the response of your heart, you are to render it immediately, right in the situation where the Word is being preached. You see, that's why those who say, well, you see, preaching is passe. We live in a day that's non-authoritarian and we don't believe in one-way communication. Whoever said preaching was one-way communication? That's not a biblical view of preaching. Preaching

40:05 is not a one-dimensional or even two-dimensional exercise. It's a three-dimensional. God who has instituted the Word of God, who has instituted the Word of God, who has instituted the Word of God, who has instituted the Word of God, who has instituted the Word of God, who has instituted preaching, stands above and behind His appointed servants who open up His Word. And as we saw in our studies on the prophetic office of Christ, the ministry of the Word of God is in the church, the living presence of Christ as our great prophet, speaking to us through His written Word as it is expounded and applied.

40:45 By those whom He gives as pastors and teachers to His church. And as Christ comes to us in His Word, we have dealings with Him then in the responses of faith and love and contrition and obedience. So there is the preacher, there is the hearer, and there is the God who has instituted preaching and has given His Word and who receives the response of that Word from the hearts of His people.

41:17 Now, I want to illustrate this. We could spend weeks doing this, but I want to give you a couple of specimens of what we mean now by this rendering the appropriate response of the heart under the preaching of the Word. Turn to that familiar passage in Acts chapter 2. You remember the setting the Spirit of God has come on the day of Pentecost, and some unusual things have happened and some bizarre interpretations have been given.

41:51 Some say they are drunk, and Peter stands to explain what has happened. And in the midst of his explanation, which focuses on the mighty saving acts of God in Jesus Christ, we read this, verse 37, Now when they heard, and obviously not hearing with the outer ear only, but heard with an insight granted by the Spirit, they were pricked in their heart, literally stabbed as with a dagger. Now what happened? They felt the power of that terrible indictment.

42:32 Peter had told them, Jesus of Nazareth, who was anointed of God, you by wicked hands have slain Him and put Him to death. You slew your Messiah. But God has raised Him up and constituted Him Lord and Christ. Now that truth comes home with power. It gives you this power to It brings the awesome realization, we've killed the Messiah. What's the response of that believing insight to the Word? It's one of sensing their great danger, their great guilt. So what do they do?

43:11 They break Peter off right in the middle of the sermon. And they say unto Peter and the rest of the apostles, Brethren, what shall...

43:22 The Word has indicted us. The Word has found its mark. There's the response of the heart. We must, we must get out from underneath this canopy of the wrath of God against us for our crimes.

43:39 And then Peter gives them the directive. You find a similar instance in 2 Kings chapter 22. And I move from the New to the Old Testament to show that this is a principle that undergirds the principle of the Word. The bringing home of the Word of God to the heart in any situation.

44:00 It is not peculiar to the New Covenant. 2 Kings chapter 22.

44:14 Those of you familiar at all with these books of Kings and Chronicles know that they are sad chapters in the history of Israel. When again and again the nation moves into idolatry and then God is pleased to raise up a godly king leader, send a prophet into the midst and restore them for a time. Well in this chapter we have the record of God's raising up this man named Josiah. And under Josiah the law of God is discovered.

44:42 And we read in verse 8, And Hilkiah the high priest said unto Shaphan the scribe, I have found the book of the law in the house of God. And Hilkiah delivered the book to Shaphan and he read it. And Shaphan the scribe came to the king and brought the king word again and said, Thy servants have emptied out the money that was found in the house. And have delivered it to the hand of the workmen that have the oversight of the house of God.

45:07 And Shaphan the scribe told the king saying, Hilkiah the priest hath delivered me a book. And Shaphan read it before the king. And it came to pass when the king heard the words of the book of the law that he rent his clothes. What happened?

45:26 As he hears the word of God, as it registers upon his spirit, how far the nation has departed from the norms of scripture. There is this response appropriate to that understanding. One of grief and humiliation having heard he rents his garment to show by that external act that his heart was broken as the subsequent history reveals. So when the word of God comes indicting you who are out of Christ, when in this place the word comes saying, All have sinned.

46:03 The wages of sin is death. When the word comes saying, Except ye repent ye shall perish. What is the response that there ought to be right where you sit? The response of true contrition.

46:21 The response of obedience of faith. You find this all the way through the scriptures. I hope to give many other illustrations. Let me just touch on one other quickly.

46:33 There in Romans 9 the apostle and the unfolding of his argument comes to demonstrate that the grace of God in human destiny and salvation operates freely. God never relinquishes his throne when he stoops to show mercy to sinners. It will be sovereign mercy displayed to sinners sovereignly. And he anticipates the reaction of someone who understands what he has said.

47:10 And so he says in Romans 9 verse 19, Wilt thou then say unto me, Why doth he still find fault? For who withstandeth his will? Nay, but, O man, who art thou that replyest against God. Shall the thing formed say to the thing that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?

47:28 You see what he's saying? When a high mystery is brought to impinge upon us, When a high mystery is brought to impinge upon us, What is the appropriate response? What is the appropriate response? The response is appropriate in terms of who man is and who God is.

47:45 Nay, O man, creature, puny little creature of the dust, Who art thou to reply against God, Eternal, infinite, majestic, utterly above and beyond us, Eternal, infinite, majestic, utterly above and beyond us, The light and power and understanding. You see what he's saying? Render the appropriate response of the heart. So when convicting truths come to us, We should, in the very act of preaching, Render the response, O God, you have found me.

48:22 And as it were enter into momentary soliloquy with ourselves and dialogue with God. And that is not contrary to the fixation of the mind. Amazing how much can be done in a moment of a reflexive response to the Word of God. Lord, you found me.

48:42 I purpose to deal with that sin. For instance, when I touched upon the matter of mental laziness, there should have been some of you sitting there who would say, God, that arrow was feathered and aimed right to my heart. God, you got me. Lord, I've got to deal with that.

49:00 And there is right now a sense of contrition that you've robbed yourself and dishonored God because you've indulged in sloppy patterns of mental discipline or innocent daydreaming. And there's been the response, you see, that is commensurate with conviction. Other times the response is commensurate with truths so lofty that when the mind tries, as it were, to take hold of them, it's like clawing a sheer wall of granite it can't grasp. And at that point it was simply, bow and say, Oh God, what I cannot understand and fathom, I can believe, remembering you are God and I am the creature.

49:42 Other times it may be the response of joy, and you find this in the scriptures, the response of grief. All of these things are illustrated in the Old and the New Testaments, and they teach us that a proper hearing of the Word is a hearing while rendering the appropriate response of the heart. I quote from one of the old Puritans. He may not have been old.

50:09 Why do we always say old? I've been trying to get out of that habit. Some of them were quite young when they wrote their books that looked very old on our shelves.

50:19 Speaking to this very issue, he said, God's great work was to make the whole world for man, and man's great work in spiritual approaches is to give the whole man to God. If there be one wheel missing in a wheel, watch, it cannot go at all to be an index of time. So in holy duties, those who serve God must give him their hottest love, their highest joy, their strongest faith, their greatest fear. They must act every grace, extend every faculty, improve every part.

50:59 There must be head work, hand work, and heart work in all of the ordinances.

Preaching as Work and Blessing

51:06 He's simply saying, in quaint old language, what I've been attempting to say this morning. But now someone says, Pastor, that makes listening to preaching work. I thought we came to get blessed.

51:22 Now who says there should be an antithesis between work and blessing?

51:29 Jesus said, My meat is to do the will of him that sent me and to finish his what? Work.

51:41 Work. You see, the whole idea that has come to us and inundates society, at least in our culture, that blessedness comes in lengthy vacations and in relaxation, and cursedness is found in work. That is not the mentality of the Bible. In the unfallen state, work was a delight.

52:11 And though now there is an element attached to labor that is unfulfilled, unpleasant, in the sweat of thy brow thou shalt bring forth, there's a sense in which in Christ, as there is the earnest of every other restored blessing, there is the earnest of the restored blessedness of arduous endeavor, so that there should be no contradiction in the thinking of the child of God between the expenditure of all of his faculties and being in the way of blessing.

Summary of Duties and Admonition to Preachers

52:46 So my fellow believers, would you profit from the Word of God? Would you obey the command of Christ, take heed how ye hear? Then I would lay before you this morning this two-fold duty under the actual preaching of the Word you must hear with a resolute fixation of the mind. And anything that would challenge that fixation under preaching, treat it as viciously as you would the injection of a blasphemous thought, of a letter, of a wondrous, unclean thought.

53:22 I hope there's no one here who would willfully entertain such thoughts under preaching. Well, deal in the same merciless way with anything that would take away from you that entire fixation of all of the faculties of the mind upon the preaching of the Word. Now, I say to you who are aspiring to preachers, this is where great wisdom is needed. There is only so much energy that can be expended at an intense level for so long a period of time.

53:55 That's why there must be pacing in our preaching. That's why there must be periods where there is intense didactic, an intense didactic instructive element, and then let the mind relax a bit with an illustration, with the unplanned but timely injection of a little humor. This is all part of the responsibility of the preacher, to be sensitive. When he's really sensed his people have been thinking, and they've not run their hundred yards, and, man, they've come around the third lap, and some of them are just running out of a little steam.

54:26 Well, you sense that, and you pause for a little drink of water, get a few breaths, and then you say, all right, troops, let's get up and get going again and complete our mile. Now, that's all the responsibility of the preacher. Now, that's what we're trying to teach the men over there in the academy. But you can have skilled preachers who still, who still find relatively little fruit from their preaching because they've got poor hearing.

Evangelical Motives for True Listening

54:53 And so, because you are hearers' hearers, I would admonish you this morning, cultivate that discipline of the resolute fixation of the mind, not as a legalistic duty, but in the midst of the most profound sense of evangelical motives. That is, my Lord has brought me amongst His people. My Lord would instruct me from His Word, and I would have dealings with my Lord in the preaching of the Word. Therefore, I will resolutely fix my mind upon the preaching so that those dealings may be deep and real and vital.

55:34 And then secondly, we must, while we are listening, render the appropriate responses of the heart so that in the context of preaching that is biblical and the presence and aid of the Spirit, much heart work is done. That's what constitutes true preaching and true listening, a very vital part of worship. And again, you see, the element in our day says, let's get back to a lot of liturgy. Let's involve the people.

56:05 This idea of having preaching the dominant element in our public gathering, no, no. Let's get back to where worship and congregational activity is dominant. My friend, if preaching is not congregational activity, what is it? Emphasis doesn't understand preaching.

56:27 There's a sense in which there is no higher point in worship than when the creature, in reverence and in appreciation for the revelation of God in Christ, embodied in the words of Scripture, when that is opened up to him, and he, in this interaction of faith and love, receives and responds to the Word of his God. May the Lord help us to become true listeners of his Word. And I know that there are some of you that that's the last thing in the world you want, is to become a true listener. Because you know if you do, the Word is immediately going to attack your sin, your pride, your selfishness, your willfulness, your rebellion, your love of the world. My friend, you'll go on that way, sitting in a Christian congregation, but in essence, you'll have your fingers stuffed into your ears. Why? Because Jesus said, He that doeth evil hateth the light and will not come to the light.

Concluding Exhortation and Prayer

57:38 And some of you will never begin to become true listeners until you stack arms, turn from your life of rebellion against the God of heaven, and seek mercy in his Son, who alone can make of rebel sinners true listeners to the Word of God. Well, let me urge you to think upon these matters and come again tonight as we complete the series and consider from the Scriptures what it is that God requires of us after we've heard. You say, you mean it's not done yet? No.

58:18 There is yet a further line of responsibility to be opened unto us. May the Lord himself help us to profit from his truth. Let us pray. Our Father, we thank you that we have your holy Word.

58:39 We thank you that in your providence we have been brought or born and reared in a land where your Word is freely disseminated, where we may meet in public gatherings for its exposition and application. Grant that we may not despise this great privilege. We pray that you will teach us how to become good listeners to the Word of God. Teach us how to obey the commandment of our Lord, take heed how ye hear.

59:16 We pray, O Lord, that you would make us good listeners to the end that your Word may run and have free course in each of our lives, that it may become a more powerful instrument in our sanctification, that we may, by its influence, become more and more conformed to the image of your Son, that he may see in us the travail of his soul and be satisfied. Seal to our hearts, then, this your Word. We pray that your blessing will rest upon us and abide with us as we leave this building, as we seek further to sanctify this day to your praise and to our profit. Hear us, we plead, through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.