"Whoever has ears, let them hear." - Jesus in Matthew 11:15
"You can educate a man, but you cannot make him think" - Ben Harper
I had a few college professors who drove their students crazy, because they would never give straight answers to questions.
Instead they would either answer in a cryptic, circular way (a little bit like Yoda from Star Wars), or they would answer your question with another question.
I had one of these professors for an eight am class and another one right after lunch.
When you are just waking up, or in a bit of a food coma, you just want the answer or the facts that will be on the test, you don't want to have to think.
Because thinking, really thinking, is work. Wrestling through a strange answer is effort.
Jesus was a great teacher, and he knew that getting the crowds around him to wrestle with big truths about God the Father and the nature of faith would weed out those who were just there for the excitement of the event.
He was not shy about announcing his intentions about this. He would begin many teachings with this great statement: "For him that has ears to hear, let him hear."
This was his way of saying "understanding what God is like will be hard work, expanding your concept of grace and holiness and the nature of the Father will take time and effort, but the truth will find the hearts of those who really want to understand, those who have the ears to hear."
Because in the small towns and villages of Israel he was the most interesting thing happening at the time, and everywhere he went crowds would follow, not to understand the nature of God more, but for the kick of seeing the dude everyone was talking about.
But it's interesting to note that there are many times that the gospels mention that after he was done teaching for the day the crowds would be almost non-existent, because when Jesus starts talking in parables or riddles, the multitudes tune out a bit and suddenly find something else that they needed to do. ("Is that guy talking about planting seeds and lost sheep? I think I left the oven on, I should go check.")
There were a few times that it was just the disciples and a few others who remained after the crowds dissipated, and I love that they were not afraid to say things like "Master, this is a hard teaching."
What's comforting to me is that there were also times the gospels record that a few days later Jesus' followers would say something like "Master, that thing about the mustard seed that you said a few days ago, could you tell us what you were talking about?" And Jesus would walk them through the little piece of truth that he wanted them to understand.
Those who follow Jesus often get labeled as having "turned off their brains."
But nothing could be farther from the truth.
The whole Bible is full of huge concepts that take time to wrestle through.
What's amazing is that the gospel (our need of forgiveness of sins and the death and resurrection of Christ being the bridge of that forgiveness) is both easy enough for my five year old daughter to comprehend and accept, (praise the Lord) and complex enough to take a lifetime to figure it out. (Praise the Lord for the Holy Spirit, who helps us understand and acts as our guide.)
The Lord honors both the simple faith of my daughter and the diligent study of his word by her dad.
So may we be a group of folks who do the hard work of figuring out what it is that the Lord has for us to learn this day, this week and this year.
May we have "ears to hear".
Have a great week,
- Alex (Tincan) Caldwell
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