The sermon 'Do Your Ears Hear?' by Scott Brown delves into Matthew 13:9-17, emphasizing the importance of hearing and understanding in the context of Jesus' teachings. Brown explains that Jesus spoke in parables because the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven were meant to be understood by some and hidden from others. The sermon highlights the fulfillment of Isaiah's prophecy regarding spiritual deafness and blindness due to idolatry. It stresses that true discipleship involves both hearing and understanding, which are gifts from God. Brown discusses the critical messages in Matthew 13, including the bearing of fruit, the shift in Jesus' teaching style, the double fulfillment of Isaiah's prophecy, and the historical significance of Jesus' ministry. The sermon underscores the role of the Holy Spirit in opening ears and eyes to spiritual truths and encourages believers to be active hearers and sowers of the Word.

Our text this morning is Matthew 13 verses 9 through 17. He who has ears to hear, let him hear. And the disciples came and said to him, Why do you speak to them in parables? He answered and said to them, Because it has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. For whoever has, to him more will be given, and he will have abundance.

But whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him. Therefore, I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says, ìHearing you will hear and shall not understand, and seeing you will see and not perceive. For the hearts of this people have grown dull, their ears are hard of hearing, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, lest they should understand with their hearts in turn, so that eyes should heal them. But blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear.

For assuredly I say to you that many prophets and righteous men desired to hear, excuse me, desired to see what you see and did not see it and to hear what you hear and did not hear it. Let's pray. Lord, thank you for your Word. Thank you for the book of Matthew. Thank you for the parables in this teaching.

Lord, let us be counted among the people that further our understanding of the mysteries of heaven through these parables and not those who become less understanding. Lord, I pray that you be with Scott Brown as he comes to exposit these scriptures filled with the Holy Spirit and Allow him to share with us that what you would have us hear from this section Thank you for this day in the name of Jesus. Amen There's nothing more precious than to hear with understanding. And in Matthew chapter 13, we learn all about hearing and understanding. And speaking of hearing, what do rock and roll personalities, Ozzy Osbourne, Phil Collins, Neil Young, Eric Clapton, and Peter Townsend, and former President Bill Clinton have in common?

Well, they can't hear. They can't hear because they lost their hearing through listening to loud music. The sounds were deafening to them, and they literally gave up their ears to what would destroy their ears. And when we read Matthew chapter 13, we hear about this whole matter of hearing. It's connected to something that Isaiah says, which is connected to idolatry.

There's so many themes running through this passage of scripture, but it's idolatry that makes people deaf. And they literally become like their idols, deaf. And that's the terrible scourge and tragedy of idolatry. You become like your idols and you cannot hear. The idolater ends up sacrificing his ability to hear on the altar of his whatever, his interests, his prejudices, his lusts.

And as we've read quotations from Isaiah here in this text and we have heard the words of Jesus all connecting with this whole matter of hearing, I've titled this message, Blessed Are Your Ears, Because that really is the focus. The text that we just read begins with, he who has ears, let him hear. And the word hearing appears 16 times in chapter 13 of Matthew alone. The whole chapter is about the impact of hearing and seeing and understanding. These three things are brought together to help us understand what it means to be a disciple of Jesus Christ.

And that is that you hear and you see. Those are sort of the physical parts of it, but there's understanding. There's something unseen that happens to you. You see with your eyes, you hear with your ears, but there's something that happens inside of you as a result of things. Or, or, it doesn't happen at all, and you don't see, and you don't hear.

You might be aware of the auditory nature of what's being said. You might hear the words, but there's something greater than just words and that is that there's understanding. And so this statement, he who has ears, let him hear, has already been said by Jesus. He speaks of it in 1115. Of course, he says it here in 139.

He also repeats it again in 1343. And then in chapter 15 verse 10, Jesus calls the multitude together and he says to them, hear and understand. And so here the whole thrust of this passage is hearing and understanding. And the word understanding occurs six times in this passage of Scripture as well. You know, you can often grasp the force and the focus of the passage of Scripture by seeing what words are repeated.

Not always. But you always should ask, what's being repeated here, in terms of trying to get to the heart of what the author is trying to say? And it's easy to argue that this passage is really focused on this one subject of hearing. And the whole idea is that some have eyes to see and ears to hear, and others do not. And these abilities are given by God alone.

And so blessed are your ears who hear. John Newton wrote this, how sweet the name of Jesus sounds in the believers ear. It soothes his sorrows, heals his wounds and drives away his fear. It makes the wounded spirit whole and calms the troubled breast, tis manna to the hungry soul and weary and to the weary rest." And so this passage brings up all those times, perhaps, that you've heard a sound in your ears, but it was meaningless to you. It was blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Most people have logged thousands of hours hearing sounds in their ears and it meant nothing to them. It didn't change them. It didn't move their heart. It didn't change their life. It didn't comfort their soul.

It didn't do anything because they did not have ears to hear the way that Jesus is speaking of hearing here. But to hear and to savor and to hang on to the words is a completely different experience. And so this passage, it not only has the ability to warm the heart of the person whose soul is moved by the Word of God, But it also helps us to ask a question, and that is, do I have ears to hear? Have I had ears like this that hear? That's the big question.

And the Lord Jesus himself speaks of how blessed it is to hear the joyful sound, to have it thrill your soul, to have it console you and terrify you and move you to love and good deeds and to love Him who loved your soul so much that He would open up your ears. So that's hearing and understanding in Matthew 13. If you're looking at the outline in front of you, I just wanted to pause and speak about the scope of this and the thrust of it in this chapter as a whole. Secondly, There are a number of critical messages in Matthew chapter 13. And particularly this text that we're in, there are a number, it has various contours.

I just want to name four of them for you to help you see what kinds of things are being covered here. First of all, our Lord is helping us understand what it means to be a people who hear, who hears the Word and understands it, and who indeed bears fruit a hundredfold, some sixty and some thirty. So that's the first thing. The second thing, the second message here is really surrounding an explanation to the disciples for why he's telling parables because he's been preaching to the crowds and then all of a sudden the disciples recognize something has changed. His whole teaching style has shifted.

He's not speaking the same way to the crowds that he did before. Something has shifted. And so here in this passage Jesus is going to explain exactly why he's doing what he's doing. He's going to explain it. And then thirdly, he's showing how he and Isaiah the prophet are alike, and how Isaiah's prophecy was not only fulfilled in Isaiah's time, but it's also fulfilled in this time that he's speaking of now.

It's being fulfilled before their very eyes. There is sort of a double fulfillment in that sense. Isaiah was given a ministry to the heart of heart, and he would speak and people would not respond. This was a miracle that God did. It was the blessing of God, because God was causing this to happen in the days of Isaiah.

And now a similar miracle is happening right before the disciples' eyes. And Jesus is saying, remember what happened to Isaiah. He prophesied that it would happen in his day and in mine, and now you're seeing it in my day. So Jesus is explaining how he and Isaiah are alike in that sense. And then fourthly, he's making it clear that they are experiencing a pivotal moment in history.

And he says, many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see and did not see it and hear what you hear and did not hear because something dramatically important is happening. And Jesus is saying, savor the moment, see what the moment is in the history of redemption. Something absolutely amazing has happened before your very eyes. The prophets longed to see this. They tried to inspect into it to understand it.

But now you're seeing it before your very eyes. So those are some of the critical messages that are in this chapter. And then now let's move into the text itself. And the heart of Jesus' instruction to his disciples is to explain why parables. All of these things that I've just spoken of really come out as answers to this question.

Why, Lord, why are you speaking in parables? And so there are several reasons that are given, and I've listed them here. The first reason is because the Lord wants them to know the mysteries. Wants them to know the mysteries, emphasis there. And he answered and said then, because it is given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given.

So he's drawing a contrast. You and them. You the disciples, the twelve disciples, and the crowds who are also hearing the message. They have been in a crowd kind of scene and now the scene shifts and it's a personal conversation rather than a conversation with the multitudes. And we'll see Jesus going in and out of these conversations.

He'll be with the multitudes and then typically he goes into a house and he speaks to his disciples. We'll see that as we go forward. But it is given to you. So the Lord wants them to know the mysteries. And he's speaking that truth that the knowledge of God is a gift of God.

The mysteries of the kingdom of heaven are given to some and they are withheld from others. And the Lord Jesus is giving that truth, that he is sovereign in salvation. And he's going to illustrate it after he says this in interpreting the parable of the soil, the parable of the soils, or the parable of the sower. Remember, in the parable, he summarizes it in verses 1 through 10 to the crowds, and then the disciples ask him this question. He speaks personally to them, and then in verse 18 to 22, the Lord Jesus explains that parable.

In explaining the parable, he's explaining the way that the sovereignty of God works, that there are these four kinds of soils. And we talked about that last week. We went through and tried to examine each kind of soil. And only one kind of soil is a hearing soil with understanding. And so it's, I love the structure of this chapter because it just shows the beauty of the way that Jesus teaches.

He stands before the crowds, he speaks personally and gives more detail, and then he gives a parable. It's very graphic and very beautiful. But here in this section, he's explaining the answer to the question. So you can see just how systematic and careful and logical Jesus is. He uses so many images and pictures.

He increases our learning by the way that He leads us along. And it's such a blessing to read scripture that way because it is logical, it moves in a flow, and the Lord is demonstrating that here. So the mysteries of the Kingdom of God are given to some, but they are not given to others. And the Lord Jesus said a very similar thing in John chapter 6 verse 44 when He says, no one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him and I will raise him up in that last day." So Jesus gives this picture as that no one can come to him unless the Father draws him. And He will raise Him up on the last day.

God is doing everything for our salvation. He opens our ears that have been stopped up. He opens up our eyes that have been shut. And a miracle takes place that he that he accomplishes. And so and so this is this is what he is doing he is he is telling that they will know the mysteries of the kingdom.

Now, how does all this work? Why does this happen? It happens by a work of the Spirit of God. And Paul explains this in 1 Corinthians 2. I'd like you to turn there.

There are a couple of texts we're going to read, a significant portion of the text. I know that's sort of a break from the pattern that you often get from me, but I want us to grab some texts in their larger context to see what's being said, because what Jesus is saying here is corroborated all over the Scriptures. In 1 Corinthians 2, the apostle speaks, he first of all says, And brethren, when I came to you, I did not come with excellent speech or wisdom, declaring to you the testimony of God. For I determined to know nothing among you except Christ, Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. I was with you in weakness, in fear, in much trembling, and my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men, but the power of God.

Because it's only the power of God that can open blind eyes and unstop closed ears. So the Apostle Paul is saying, no, I'm bringing you Christ and Him crucified. Because the most powerful thing you can ever bring are the very words of the gospel of Jesus Christ. All of your arguments, All of your logical gymnastics do nothing compared to the power of the Spirit of God. Because it's only the power of the Spirit of God by which ears can be opened and a person can hear.

If you've ever heard anything of value from the Word of God that you discern as valuable, it's because it's because the Spirit of God was working in your heart and God was being kind to you to open up your ears. And then he begins, he continues in verse 6, however, we speak wisdom among those who are mature, yet not the wisdom of this age, nor of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery." There's that word, mystery. The hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages for our glory, which none of the rulers of this age knew. For had they known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory." So what Paul is saying here is that the mystery was not being made known to the Jews so much so that they crucified the Lord of glory.

They saw all the miracles. They heard amazing words falling from his lips, but they did not hear with understanding, and so they crucified him. Their hearts had been hardened from heaven." And then in verse 9, he explains this, "...but as it is written, I have not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love him. But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God.

For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so, no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the Spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things which have been freely given to us by God. These things we also speak, not in words which man's wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual things. And then finally, verse 14, is a statement of the reality that the Lord Jesus Christ is speaking of to his disciples, but the natural man does not receive the things in the Spirit of God.

For they are foolishness to him. Nor can he know them because they are spiritually discerned. But he who is spiritual judges all things, yet he himself is rightly judged by no one, for who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ." So it's a work of the Spirit of God to open the eyes and open the ears. And how blessed are your ears if they have been opened.

So the spiritual truth comes to you, and he actually opens your ears. Now, modern evangelism says this. You're lonely. You have a need. You need to be fulfilled.

You have a God-shaped void in your heart. Go and find God. This is a man-centered kind of a gospel. Man is in control of his salvation. Most modern evangelism is based on this whole proposition.

And Romans 9 is often thought of to declare the sovereignty of God in salvation. And that is true. But it's more than just the sovereignty of God. It's bigger than predestination. It is about complete justification by faith that leads to the end of the matter.

Oh, the depth and the riches and the wisdom of God, how unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past finding out. For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has become his counselor, or who has first given to him, and it shall be repaid him? For of him and through him and to him are all things to whom be glory forever and ever." Romans 9-11 is about the way that God glorifies Himself in salvation, by hardening some and softening others and saying it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. If you have been saved, it's only happened because God has had mercy upon you. So the first reason for the parables is because the Lord wants them to know the mysteries and he's opening up the mysteries.

That's the first range of answers to the question. And then secondly, because the Lord is demonstrating a principle of blessing in His kingdom. And you see that in verse 12. For whoever has to Him more will be given. This is this principle of blessing.

And He will have abundance, but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him. So this is the law of gifting and return. And so whoever has, whoever has been given the gift, to him more will be given and he will have abundance. And this just speaks of the blessing of the meaning of the parables. They speak of the fact that the Christian life is is progressive and it's upward, but with the unrepentant and the hard-hearted and the the deaf ear, It's progressive and it's downward.

But he says first of all that more will be given. And these are whoever has, in other words, whoever has received the kingdom of heaven, then the kingdom grows. And there's another parable about that, that Jesus speaks of, that the kingdom grows in you. This is the upward call of God. This is the principle that he who began a good work in you will complete it until the day of Christ Jesus.

This is the principle in John 14. He will guide you into all truth. It's the principle that we are predestined to be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ. It's growth in holiness, growth in fruitfulness, 60, 30, 100 fold. It's the seed falling on the good ground and bringing forth a harvest.

It's about how God improves his gifts in his people. Those to whom he has given more is poured out into them and from them. So the Christian life is progressive and it's upward. More will be given. So we are a people who have received a deposit, we've received the gift of eternal life, and that life is springing up and it's pouring out.

This healing, this transformation is what the Lord Jesus is speaking to His disciples about. Because the Lord is demonstrating this principle of His blessing in the Kingdom of Heaven. You know, this is the whole matter that the Lord Jesus has already spoken to his disciples about when he said, blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled." This is this principle of the kingdom of heaven that when the seed falls to the ground and dies it it breaks open and it and it grows and more comes of it. And that's what you should always see as a Christian. If you don't see the increase, you should ask if there has been a true death and resurrection and salvation, and that ears were actually opened and eyes were actually opened. That's the question you have to ask. But Jesus is speaking of this principle of blessing that exists in the kingdom of heaven.

And then he also speaks of that it's also that those for whom it is taken away, the curse is that there is less and less, that you become harder and harder and more and more confused. He has taken it away. This is like the man we read about last week. His house was swept and cleaned. It was a moral house.

But the Spirit of God was not there. And all of that moral cleaning, all that moralistic sort of deism, if you want to call it that, didn't do any good. In fact, actually, the last day of that man is worse than the first. It's that whole idea that God gives them over to a debased mind. Whoever does not have even what he has will be taken away from him." This statement, what he has will be taken away, is a quote out of the parable of the talents.

The talents will be taken away. So the parables are given, first of all, because the Lord wants them to know the mysteries. Secondly because the Lord is demonstrating a principle of blessing in the kingdom of heaven. And thirdly, because the Lord is hiding the meaning of the kingdom of God from the hardened. You see that in verses 13 through 15.

Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled which says, Hearing you will hear, and shall not understand, and seeing you will see and not perceive. For the hearts of this people have grown dull. Their ears are hard of hearing, and their eyes have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, so that eye should heal them." So Here the Lord is withholding seeing and hearing and understanding. So the word that was being given to the multitudes by the Lord Jesus was actually designed to harden their hearts.

Whoever does not have what he has will be taken away from him. There's really no encounter with the teaching of Jesus that leaves us the same. We have either here with understanding or we here without understanding. This should just help us understand the preciousness of opening the Word of God. Whenever it is opened or read or heard, It's a very, very holy moment.

And you might think about, you know, how you handle the Word of God in your own personal life or when you open it with your family, or even in a context right now, like right now where you're hearing hearing it repeated and attempted to be taught. There's no encounter with the teaching of the works of Jesus Christ that leads us the same. Now he is speaking this way because, he says, I'm doing it because, it's because they can't hear anyway. He's really demonstrating the difference between hard soil and good soil. Hard soil responds one way, good soil responds the other way.

We saw last week that bad soil has different kinds of responses. You can be easily faked out. You might fake yourself out and think that you've really received the King of Heaven because you received it with joy at some point. But now that's all gone. So you may be the second soil type, or you may be the third soil type who received it, but still the garden is so full of weeds, and there's just this refusal to weed the garden.

This is the person who wants to hang on to all of his idols, to keep his life the same. Jesus does not mess with your pocketbook. Jesus does not mess with your schedule, your friendships, your education. He doesn't mess with anything. But you can believe certain things.

You can study the doctrines and embrace them, but you're no different than the devil who believes, except the devil has more integrity because he shudders at what he knows and what he believes. But the man in the third soil isn't shuddering at all. He has a fantastic life. It's full of everything his heart ever desired. And it includes doctrine.

And so Jesus is demonstrating the difference between these soils here. And that his teaching is actually designed to harden the hearts. And he's demonstrating his power in it. Now, you know, It's always a miracle when anyone believes. When anyone is able to hear the Word of God, it's absolutely a miracle.

I was speaking with a man yesterday and I asked him what he thought about Jesus. He said, I don't think about him very much. And I said, well, what will you say to him when you meet him? He said, I'm not meeting him. I said, how do you say that?

He says, I'm going to hell. I'm not meeting him. I said, no, no, no, no, no, no, you are meeting him. Here's what the Bible says, you are going to go to hell if indeed you don't repent. But then, but then on that great day, you will meet Him.

You will meet Him. So don't think for a second that you won't be meeting Him. That's just not true. You only believe half of the truth, that you will go to hell if you don't repent. And I, this was just last night, and I was thinking of this passage of Scripture.

It is such a miracle when someone can believe. It's a miracle when someone changes from, I'm going to hell, to, oh God, have mercy on me, a sinner. That is an absolute dramatic miracle. And Jesus is speaking of this because His Word has the effect of either hardening or softening depending on His own purposes. And here, these three things, seeing and hearing and understanding, are all in this context here.

And Jesus is now quoting Isaiah. This is the heart of the matter. We've now really gotten to the heart of the answer that Jesus is giving his disciples about about these, about why it is why it is that he's telling these parables. So Jesus is going to quote Isaiah chapter 6. He's already quoted Isaiah 35 and Isaiah 61, and now Jesus is going to borrow the language from Isaiah and actually change it to make it clear what Isaiah meant.

What Isaiah said was absolutely true in its syntactical construction and the tenses that were used. Jesus changes it in order to show that He is now fulfilling it. Jesus is not misquoting Isaiah. He is revealing more than what Isaiah understood by changing the tenses. Now, Isaiah 6, 9, and 10 is the most regularly referred to and examined text in the New Testament.

And so When Jesus is referring to Isaiah chapter 6, we need to go back to Isaiah 6. Please go back there. Jesus is quoting Isaiah chapter 6, and it's a pivotal moment in the argument in the book of Isaiah. Chapter 6 marks a new beginning in Isaiah's preaching to a hardened audience. You see that this happened in the year in which King Uzziah died.

And Uzziah dies and Ahaz, the wicked king, is raised up in his place. Good days are not ahead for Israel because now there's an exceedingly wicked king that God has put on the throne. Not only that, Assyria is rising in its military ascendancy and Tiglath-Polizor is gaining prominence. And he's going to come in, along with other Assyrians and afflict this people. So Isaiah chapter 6 begins with a vision of God verses 1 through 4 and then a vision of his own uncleanness in verses 5 through 7 where he says, he says, woe is me for I am ruined, for I am a man of unclean lips and I live amongst the people of unclean lips.

So Isaiah is broken before God. He has ears to hear in this case. And then he answers God's call. He says, Here am I. Send me.

And then God tells him what he is sending him into. He's sending him into a people of hard hearts, ears stopped up, eyes that are blind. Their idolatry has so destroyed their sensibilities that even when they hear something beautiful and eternal, They can't even discern it. They are dead in their trespasses and their sins. And so Isaiah has the privilege of watching the power of Almighty God, He exerted in His ministry, and He will speak and they will not hear.

That was success. This was the will of Almighty God. While Isaiah didn't have throngs coming, he was manifestly successful because he did the will of God. He spoke it into the ears of hard hearts as he was commanded to do. And he had a marvelously successful ministry and no one responded.

Well, actually not no one, because some did respond. But overwhelmingly, What would happen would be hardness. He says that there, in Isaiah, the hearts are, the word is fat. Hearts are fat. Ears are dull.

The word heavy is used. Just heavy ears. Their eyes are closed. Those are the critical words that Isaiah uses here. So Jesus is using Isaiah to illustrate the parable of the soils, and all of the other parables as well, because the parable of the soils is really the controlling parable that helps you understand the meaning of all the other ones as well as the Lord Jesus has taught.

And in the parable of the soil some hearts will be hard like the wayside soils, others will appear to respond but their hearts are not really rooted in the kingdom of heaven. They respond with joy. And then still others seem to respond with more long-term commitments, but they refuse to pull the weeds. They honor Him with their lips, but their hearts are far from Him. They're really just like their idols.

They're deaf and they're dumb, and they're becoming more like them every day. And so Jesus is quoting Isaiah because what was happening in the days of Isaiah is a figure, it's a picture, it's a type of the antitype which is happening right there before the disciples' eyes. So you see what Jesus is doing here. Seeing and hearing, but not. Not understanding the way that Jesus is speaking.

So that this thing would happen, so that I should heal them. And that's where the tragedy is. Because our lives are so broken, we are so dead, we are so needy as people that we won't be healed because our idols have made us deaf. And that's the tragedy of the unconverted. That they won't be healed.

This is why I think Jesus, when he looked out on the crowds who were rejecting his message, He had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. And he loved them. Their hardness did not harden him in that sense. And that's the way it should be with us as well. So hearing, healing, all of these things go hand in hand.

This whole matter of going back to the prophet Isaiah is critical Because what Isaiah was dealing with was idolatry in Israel. And the tragedy of idolatry is what it does to your senses, your ears, your eyes. It destroys it. You become Isaiah, or Psalm 135, beginning in verse 15, says that you become like your idol. That's what's so tragic about holding on onto your idols.

In Psalm 135, it says that the idols are deaf and blind and you will become like them. The idols of the nations are silver and gold, the work of men's hands. They have mouths, but they do not speak. Eyes they have, but they do not see. They have ears, but they do not hear.

Nor is there any breath in their mouths. Those who make them are like them. So is everyone who trusts in them." Isaiah is confronting the idolatry of his day, and this unresponsive people have become so because of their idols. Because of their idols. And so the third reason for the parable is because the Lord is hiding the meaning of the kingdom of God from the hardened.

Verses 13 to 15. And then finally, because of the monumental nature of the time that is at hand. Verses 16 and 17. But Blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear. For surely I say to you that many prophets and righteous men desire to see what you see and did not see it, and hear what you hear and did not hear it." So this verse 16 opens with the words, blessed are your eyes.

I love that phrase. Blessed are your eyes and blessed are your ears. What a sweet thing it is to have ears that have been unstopped and eyes that have been opened. So they're seeing something that others could not see. They were seeing a better covenant.

They were hearing about better promises that the Lord Jesus Christ was bringing into the world. They were seeing the Lord of Glory. They saw what was spoken of in Hebrews chapter 1. They were seeing the radiance of His glory. They were seeing the unveiling of the mystery of salvation in Jesus Christ.

They were there at the moment that it was being unveiled. It was a monumental event that was taking place before their eyes. We could Go to Romans chapter 11 to read about these mysteries and the blindness of Israel, how they were ignorant to them. We could go to 1 Peter chapter 1, which speaks of the salvation which the prophets inquired in 1 Peter 1 10. Of this salvation the prophets have inquired and searched carefully who prophesied of the grace that would come to you, searching what or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ who was in them was indicating when he testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow.

To them it was revealed that not to themselves but to us they were ministering the things which now have been reported to you through those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things which angels desire to look into. So this was a time of transition. It was a time where God had sent His Son to establish His Kingdom in a different way. When the Apostle Paul was defending himself before King Agrippa, he ends up telling the story of his conversion and he talks about falling to the ground and hearing the voice speak to him and then he records the words of God to him which says, I will deliver you from the Jewish people as well as from the Gentiles to whom I now send you, to open their eyes in order to turn them from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive the forgiveness of sins and inheritance among those who are sanctified by faith in Me." The Apostle Paul testified of this very same thing that began to be happening with the ministry of Jesus Christ. So, he's telling these parables to them and explaining them to them so that they would understand the monumental nature of the time that is at hand.

So these are the reasons for the parables. Now, I want to move this in applications and I've got several of them. Number one, number one, let's just stop and recognize the power of the hearing of the Word of God. How powerful and how wonderful it is to hear the Word of God. I want us to think about this on so many levels.

If you can think through various kinds of strata, like the strata of your own heart, the power of the Word of God in your own heart, the power of it speaking it in your house, the power of it reading it to someone who says, I'm going to hell, to understand how powerful the Word of God is. It's our only hope for the conversion of any sinner or even the sanctification of ourselves. The Word of God is so powerful. You know, I'm reminded of the story of Martin Luther. He believed that the Reformation should come, he honestly believed the Reformation should come gently without all kinds of dramatic tumult.

Well, that didn't happen, but that's what he hoped for. And he says at one point in his life, He says, I opposed indulgences in all the pathos, but never with force. I simply taught and preached and wrote God's Word. Otherwise, I did nothing. The Word of God so greatly weakened the pathos that no prince or emperor ever inflicted such losses upon it.

I did nothing. The Word did everything. So I just want us to stop and consider the power of the Word of God. Think of Luther who said, I did nothing. I did nothing.

The Word did everything. Let's be that kind of people who are constantly with their Bibles open, dealing with this which is able to save and to sanctify. So let's just consider the power of the hearing of the Word of God. Second application. Not just the power of hearing, but next the importance of hearing.

How important it is. He who has been given some, more will be given. He who does not have it will be taken away. The more you get, the more you get. And the more you get, the more you get.

And The more you get, the more you get. And the more you get, the more you get. And the more you get, the more you get. It just builds upon itself. He who has more will be given.

That should teach us about how much hearing we should do. We should be doing lots of hearing. We should not hear and be like a man who sees his face in the mirror and doesn't do anything. That's perhaps a worse tragedy than not hearing. But the importance of hearing, to raise somehow in our own souls this morning, the importance in our minds of hearing and to seek to hear his word more, because more is given.

And then thirdly, the seriousness. I've spoken of the power of hearing, the importance. Now the seriousness of hearing. And, you know, I want to use this to just help us to think through even how we gather together as a church, as a local family of people. We gather, we gather, you know, two or three times a week.

How do we do that? How do we engage in it? One of the concerns that I have is the way that we gather, that we gather Perhaps maybe far too casually, not as intent on the holiness of God, what God will reveal through His Word, and to be ready to listen, to be attentive, to be sort of on pins and needles, ready to hear because of the seriousness of our hearing. Listen to Richard Baxter, which he said in a sermon on directions for profitably hearing the Word preached. Here's what he says.

Come not to hear with a careless heart. Make it your work with diligence to apply the Word as you are hearing it. In other words, as you're hearing it, working to apply. In other words, engage your soul. Always be asking yourself, oh, Lord, what must I do?

To be engaging in the very hearing process, rather than just passively taking it in, getting it all down, thinking, oh, Lord, what should I do? It's an interesting question to ask, you know, what about taking notes? Is it possible that your notes can get in the way of your hearing? It's possible. I've always been an advocate of taking notes to increase the learning and the recall and reviewing it.

At our house on Sunday afternoons, when we sit down for dinner, I always ask, what was this text about? We always talk about it. And people are scurrying and getting their notes, you know, and I'm thankful because it's hard to remember everything. But here's something that is more important than taking the notes, and that is hearing with understanding so that you're saying, oh Lord, what must I do about this? What have I learned about you?

How have you increased my understanding of your kingdom and the way things really are in the world? How have you improved my interpretive skills looking around the world to see what's really going on around me? How have you helped me, O God, and what must I do about it?" That's probably more important than taking notes. I'm not saying you should not take notes. But if in the taking of your notes, you're not making it your work, as Baxter says, to apply the word as you're hearing it, then maybe you should modify the way you're taking notes.

Or your heart disposition as you're taking the notes. That's the most important thing, really. I would argue that someone could take notes and have a heart supple and ready to hear, and even writing down in the notes, oh, here's one thing I need to go back to. Baxter says, Cast not all upon the minister as those who will go no further than they are taken by force. In other words, don't just trust in the minister to take you where you're going to go.

Believe me, this minister is so dull, He is so unaware. You do not want to just go where He has been able to go. When He stands up here, He is crying out to God because He knows His own stupidity. So you must do the work too. You must do your work.

You wouldn't want to rely on a stupid minister exclusively. And yet God has given ministers for this purpose. But not just so that you would rest and stay on what he has said, but that you would take it further. So then Baxter says, cast not all upon the minister as those who will go no further than they are carried by force. Thirdly, he says, You have work to do as well as the preacher, and should all the time be as busy as he, you must open your mouths and digest it.

For another cannot digest it for you. Therefore, be all the while at work and abhor an idle heart in hearing as well as an idle minister." And then he says, chew the cud and call up all when you come home in secret. And by meditation, preach it over and over to yourselves. If it were coldly delivered by the preacher, do you preach it more earnestly to your own heart? So let's just say I wasn't able to connect.

Let's say I wasn't able to get the meaning. Let's say I got something wrong. Let's say I wasn't passionate enough. Let's say my heart wasn't enough in it. What will you do with that?

Because you have heard the Word. You have heard something pure over the time spent. And so Baxter says, chew the cud, call it up, preach it to yourselves. And the concept I love the most in what he says is, preach it more earnestly to your own heart. In other words, so you heard it one way, by, from a man.

Now, improve upon it. Make it better than it ever was when you first heard it. So the third application, the seriousness of hearing. Let's just be a hearing kind of people. And then, fourthly, the most important question regarding hearing, what group am I in?

What group am I in? Am I like those who are blessed and who hear and see? Or am I like the person who hears the reverberations of the sounds in my eardrums, but it doesn't thrill my soul, and it doesn't convict me, and it doesn't thrill me, and it doesn't give me hope, and it doesn't remind me of the sweetness of my Savior, and the majesty of God, and the beauty of His Kingdom, and the greatness of His glory. What group am I in? And again, I just take this back to what is it that makes your ears open or closed?

It's just like in the days of Isaiah. Idolatry. It was their idolatry that made them deaf. They literally became like their idols. They sacrificed their hearing, like so many have sacrificed their physical hearing, on the altar of their interests, their prejudices, their music, whatever they wanted to tickle their ears.

And it made them deaf. And that's the tragedy. And then lastly, I want to take us back to verse 1 in chapter 13. The last application is the responsibility upon those who hear. Jesus went out of the house and into the sea, and to speak in the sea.

He left one place to sow seeds. And how important it is for us to know that we have this role to be sowers of seed. Notice how the Lord Jesus moves from place to place and He is sowing the seeds of the Kingdom of Heaven. And that's what we should do as well. We wouldn't want to be people who are so home-bound that we're not out sowing seeds.

Some of us need to get out of our houses and go sow seeds. That's what we need to do. But blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear. Let's pray. Oh Lord, help us to tremble at your word.

I pray that you would use this time to accomplish the purposes for which you sent these words. Oh Lord, for us as a church, that You would give us such wide open ears. I pray You bless this congregation with those who have been converted because of the hearing and the seeing that You have accomplished for them. Oh God, I pray that You would favor this people, that You would not let any of them go into perdition, that they would not be found with such bad soil, but that You would make for them soil that would make them live. And that out of that soil, Lord, that You would use us to be fruitful, some a hundred, some sixty, and some thirty-fold, according to the gifts that you have bestowed upon us together.

Amen. Thanks for watching!