God could have chosen any number of ways to carry the news of salvation to the world. He could have written it across the sky or sent an angel to knock on every door. Instead he chose something quieter and far more personal. He chose his word, spoken and read and planted in human hearts one person at a time. Faith comes by hearing, Paul wrote, and hearing by the word of God (). That means the word you take in, week after week, is not a small thing. It is the very means God uses to reach you, and what you do with it matters far more than you might think.
The Word Is Meant to Be Received
James told his readers to put aside all filthiness and receive with humility the word implanted, which is able to save their souls (). Notice the picture he paints. The word is like a seed pressed into the soil of the heart. A seed accomplishes nothing on hard, packed ground, but in soft and willing soil it takes root and grows into something that lasts. The power was never in question. God’s word is living and active. The real question is whether we come to it with hearts that are ready to receive, or whether we let it fall on ground too busy or too proud to let it in.
What Do You Want to Hear
Paul warned Timothy that a time would come when people would no longer endure sound doctrine. Wanting to have their ears tickled, they would gather up teachers to suit their own desires and turn their ears away from the truth toward myths (). It is worth asking honestly what we want when we sit down to listen. Do we want only the comfortable parts, the encouragement without the correction? Or do we want the whole counsel of God, the same full message Paul said he never shrank back from declaring ()? A heart that only wants its ears tickled will always find someone willing to tickle them. A heart that wants the truth will grow.
Welcoming the Hard Words Too
The word of God does more than comfort. Paul said it is meant to reprove, to rebuke, and to exhort, and all of it with great patience (). Those first two words can sting. To be reproved is to be shown where our lives have drifted outside God’s will. To be rebuked is to be urged plainly to turn from what is wrong. None of us enjoys that in the moment, but a good physician does not only tell us we are well. We need a balanced diet from Scripture, some milk and some meat, teaching about grace and heaven alongside teaching about repentance, holiness, and the cost of sin. The word that only ever soothes us is not the whole word of God.
Hearing Is Not the Same as Doing
Here is where so many of us stop short. James said to prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves (). He compared the hearer who never acts to a man who looks at his face in a mirror, walks away, and immediately forgets what he looks like (). But the one who looks intently into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, not forgetting but doing, will be blessed in what he does (). Reading the Bible, studying it, even loving good teaching does none of us any good if the message never travels the short distance from our ears to our hands and feet. The word has to be applied to be of any use at all.
A God Who Wants Everyone Home
Behind every call to listen and obey stands the heart of God himself. For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life (). Peter tells us the Lord is patient, not wishing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance (). This is why the word keeps coming to us. It is not to shame us or to wound us for its own sake. It aims for the heart, for the part of us that can actually change. God is not looking for a way to keep us out. He is making every appeal he can to bring us home.
What Will You Do With It
So the word has reached you again. The seed is in the soil. Paul reminded Timothy to pay close attention to himself and to his teaching, because in doing so he would secure salvation both for himself and for those who heard him (). That same attentiveness belongs to every one of us who hears. Maybe today you are hearing the good news clearly for the first time, and you are ready to respond with faith, repentance, confession of Jesus as Lord, and baptism for the forgiveness of your sins. Maybe you once walked with God and drifted, and you know it is time to come back to your Father. The word can only do its work in a heart that receives it. The hearing has been given to you. What you do with it now is yours to decide.
