If we are reading the Word of God without actually hearing it—that is, hearing with obedience—then we aren’t really hearing the Word at all. And we’re starving ourselves of the only truth that can set us free from the grip of sin. Today’s excerpt from The Joy and Rejoicing of My Heart is found on page 11:
“We evangelicals have established a place of prominence for ourselves in this society by our penchant for declaiming loudly against the sins of others. We have denounced the secular humanists, chastised the evolutionists, decried the postmodernists, and raged against the immoral practices of the people of our day.
“Yet we hear little such passion in the acknowledgment of our own sins before the God of judgment and mercy – sins of complacency, failure in mission, poor stewardship, ecclesiastical in-fighting, and a host of others.
“This absence of repentance suggests to me that we in the Christian community are starving for truth. We have descended into a famine of hearing God’s Word. For all our reading and study, the clean, pure, true, and uncompromising Word of God is not breaking through to our sinful hearts. Some of the most profound and moving words of repentance in the history of Biblical religion are from the mouths and pens of the great saints of God: David’s plea in Psalm 51; Augustine’s Confessions; the meditations of Christian mystics; the great liturgies of the high church tradition; the writings of the Puritan fathers, the tears of multitudes, awakened in times of revival.
“Here is heartfelt repentance in response to the clear teaching of God’s Word concerning our wretchedness, God’s holiness, and our infinite need of renewing grace. It is just such repentance that is lacking within the evangelical church in our day, and that shows just how in danger we are of spiritual starvation.”
For reflection or discussion
1. Do you agree that repentance—ongoing and sincere—is proof that we are actually hearing the Word God? Why or why not?
2. What can we do to help one another be more consistent in practicing repentance?
If we are really hearing the Word of God, then we will respond according to what Scripture promises or commands. Scripture promises that we are all sinners, and it commands us all to practice ongoing and sincere repentance. Are we listening? Share today’s podcast with a friend, then meet to discuss the practice of repentance as an ongoing discipline in your life. Your copy of The Joy and Rejoicing of My Heart is waiting for you in The Ailbe Bookstore.
T. M. Moore
