Listening to what we do not want to hear.

Listening to What We Do not Want to Hear

Jeremiah 36-40.

“Yet the King and all his servants who heard all these words were not afraid, nor did they rend their garments.” (36:24)

                  When writing to Timothy, Paul warns, “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths” (2 Timothy 4:3-4).  The hardest thing to do is to listen to a warning that challenges us to change.  We want affirmation so that we do not need to change.  We want to be told that God loves us and that we are exempt from judgment.  But the one thing we do not want is to be told is that we must change or face the consequences of our sin. We want heaven, but reject hell, even though Christ affirms them both in one sentence (see Matthew 25:46).

                  The leaders of Judah during Jeremiah's ministry were no different.  When Jeremiah confronted them with the sin and warned them of impending judgment, they refused to listen.  Instead of responding to Jeremiah’s warning, they sought out “prophets” who would only promise peace.  With the impending threat of Babylon invading from the north, instead of repenting and trusting in God for His protection, the king of Judah, Jehoiakim, attacked the messenger. As a result of his refusal to repent, he was captured by Nebuchadnezzar and taken into captivity. 

                  When Zedekiah became king, God again spoke through Jeremiah to warn the people of their sins and to call them to repentance. While Jehoiakim rejected Jeremiah’s prophecy, Zedekiah took it a step further by throwing Jeremiah into a cistern and making an oath that he would hand Jeremiah over to those seeking to kill him. Undeterred, Jeremiah still challenged Zedekiah to listen to God's warnings, and if he did, he would be spared from death. But Zedekiah refused, and as a result, his last sight before being blinded by Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, was seeing his own sons put to death before his eyes.  

                  We marvel at the audacity of Jehoiakim and Zedekiah when, in their folly, they thought they could refuse to listen to the prophecies of God, yet we often do the same thing. We approach Scripture as if it were merely thoughts of God written by human writers rather than the Word of God. We want God to affirm us and accept us without the demand to change. We want teachers who promise eternal life but reject the warnings of judgment. In doing so, we make God into our image rather than surrender to Him for who He is. However, like the kings of Jeremiah’s day, we cannot conform God to our perspective and dismiss the scriptures we find disagreeable. Rather, all we can do is humbly accept God for who He is and then accept the salvation that He freely offers if we trust in Him. Do you conform God to what you want Him to be, or do you surrender to God for who He is? God warns us of judgment, not to torment us, but to call us to repentance and to accept the grace He offers.  He calls us to surrender to Him.  Instead of dismissing His word we need to embrace His word in its totality.