Hearers, but Not Doers
INTRODUCTORY WORDS
This prophecy of Ezekiel had to do with a people who were outwardly religious, but inwardly were far from God. They would come before the Lord, and sit before Him as His people. They would even go so far as to show much love, with their mouths. He was, unto them, a very lovely song; or, as one with a pleasant voice; or, as one who could play well upon an instrument. However, their hearts were continually going out after covetousness, and they never did His Words.
Our study shows a most pitiful condition a condition which is, alas, quite common today. We still have many people who go to church. They are like the proverbial willow tree, which bows its head, but does not lift its heart. If the wind blows from, the north the boughs bend toward the south; if the wind blows from the south, the boughs quickly bend to the north with the wind.
Some Christians go to church, as the people go. They sit as the people sit, but their hearts are far from God. If the minister says, "Let us pray," they reverently bow. If he says, "Let us sing," they join their voices with the rest. They do all of this, but their music has no more heart throbs in it, than the music of an instrument. They sing for the pleasure of singing, but Divine worship is far from them. They listen to the minister's sermon, but there is no translating of that sermon into their daily life and walk.
Such people remind us of a statement in the seventh chapter of Hosea which reads: "Ephraim * * hath mixed himself among the people; Ephraim is a cake not turned." Hosea's cake was baked on one side, and raw on the other. It is no pleasure to bite into such a cake.
Some Christians are like Ephraim only half-baked. We need saints young and old who will go all the way with God; who will enter into every phase of Christian life and service, with sincerity of purpose, and with love of heart.
The other day I was in a restaurant, and I told the porter I wanted a glass of "half-and-half." He said, "Half coffee?" I said, "No, I want half milk, and half cream." Many Christians are of the half-and-half kind; only they are half water, and half skimmed milk. There is nothing of the cream (the fuller Christian life), in them whatsoever.
God has very plainly said, that we are to be doers of the Word, and not hearers only. He that beholdeth his natural face in a glass, and turneth away, forgetteth what manner of man he is; so also is he who will hear, but refuseth to do the Word of God.
The one who is a hearer, and not a doer, is likened in the Bible to a man who built his house upon the sand. When the floods came and the winds blew, and the rain fell, that house could not stand. God help us to put into practice what we profess to believe to be doers of the Word, and not hearers only, deceiving our own selves.
I. IT MUST BE GOD OR BAAL, NOT BOTH (1 Kings 18:21)
Elijah came before the Children of Israel and said, "How long halt ye between two opinions? if the Lord be God, follow Him: but if Baal, then follow him." Jesus Christ plainly stated, "Ye cannot serve God and mammon."
The human heart will either hold to the one and despise the other; or else it will love the one, and hate the other.
Elijah spake of "two opinions." We need men who will get on one side of the fence, or upon the other. A middle-of-the-roader never gets anywhere. We need decisiveness of character. We need conviction, and then the power to stand on our convictions. If the Lord be God, we should follow Him. If Baal be God, then, we should follow Him.
Always admire a person who has the courage of his convictions. If he believes in Christ Jesus, let him confess Him with his lips, publicly.
The modernist, as we see him, is a wolf parading in sheep's clothing. What right does the man who denies the Lord Jesus Christ, His virgin birth, and His atoning Blood what right does he have to stand behind a pulpit dedicated to an orthodox faith in the Lord Jesus Christ? What right does he have to draw his salary from people who believe in a whole Bible and a humiliated Christ?
What right do young people who love the world, and the things of the world, who live for the lusts of the flesh, who have no vital faith or love for the Lord Jesus Christ, what right do they have to take an active part in a young people's society, to sing in church choirs, or to teach Sunday School classes? We would not drive the young people away, but we would urge them to either serve God or mammon.
II. IT MUST BE SERVING THE LORD, OR SERVING OTHER GODS (2 Kings 17:33-34)
In Samaria there were certain ones who feared not the Lord, therefore the Lord sent lions among them which slew some of them. The result was that they feared the Lord, yet they still followed their own gods after the manner of the nations. From this they have never changed.
The text says, "Unto this day they do after the former manners: they fear not the Lord, neither go they after their statutes, or after their ordinances."
There are many people, we fear, who are serving the Lord merely because certain circumstances drove them and compelled them to make a confession. Outwardly, they appear to fear the Lord; inwardly, they serve their own gods. They have a form of religion, but they know nothing of its power. Such a faith is a mockery, unacceptable to God.
In the Book of Revelation we read these striking words spoken of the Church at Laodicea: "Because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of My mouth." Another statement follows which is more than striking it is startling. Christ added: "I would thou wert cold or hot." Water that is lukewarm (tepid, we call it), is sickening. Hot water tastes all right; cold water is all right, but who wants to drink lukewarm water?
Along this line, there is a verse in the Book of Ecclesiastes which says, "Be not righteous over much; * * Be not over much wicked." The advice of "the man under the sun" is to be neither hot nor cold, just so-so.
We remember an old colored man in Georgia who used to greet us as he passed. Invariably when we gave him the top of the morning, and asked him how he was, he would say, "Just tolerable, Brother Neighbour." That word "tolerable" stuck with us. We began to wonder just how Uncle John did feel. We decided he was neither sick, nor well, just able to wiggle, that was all. God deliver us from saints like that. Their lives are miserable failures.
III. IT MUST BE PIETY OR PRETENSE (Matthew 23:14)
The Lord Jesus Christ is speaking of the scribes and the Pharisees of His day. Outwardly they were very religious. They had religion to the excess, but they knew very little of spiritual life.
So far as their works were concerned they were abundant, but were only for display. They could bind heavy burdens on men, hard to be borne, while they themselves did not bend one of their fingers to move them. They made broad their phylacteries, and enlarged the borders of their garments, but all these things they did to be seen of men.
They loved the upper rooms at the feasts, and the best seats at the synagogue. They delighted to be called "rabbi," but they accepted not the Lord Jesus Christ, who alone was Master. These men could encompass sea and land to make a proselyte, but they made him twofold more a child of hell than he was before.
The whole difficulty with the scribes and Pharisees lay in the fact that they carried their religion on the hems of their garments, and on the tips of their tongues. They had no vital relationship to the Lord. They would pay their tithes, but they omitted the weightier matters of law, judgment, mercy, and faith. They delighted in straining at gnats, while they swallowed camels. The outside of their cups and platters they kept clean, but within they were full of extortion and excess. The Lord Jesus spoke of them as whited sepulchers, beautiful without, but full of dead men's bones and uncleanness within.
What a picture of many church people even of our own day! They go to church on Sunday, but they serve the devil all the week. We fear that many who are professing piety as a pretense are making their religious profession a mere cloak to cover up the sins of their hearts.
IV. IT MUST BE TRUE OR IT MUST BE FALSE (Isaiah 1:14-17)
The Prophet, Isaiah, must have been strangely stirred as the Spirit of God dictated the words found in the first chapter of the Book which bears his name. The people of God on the one hand were called "the daughter of Zion"; on the other hand they were called the "people of Gomorrah" and "the rulers of Sodom."
The Spirit speaks positively. He tells them He delights not in their sacrifices. This sounds strange, at first, because these sacrifices had been commanded of the Lord. However, they never were commanded as a mere religious form, to be carried out by unclean hands and unsanctified hearts.
The Spirit of God continues to say, "When ye come to appear before Me, who hath required this at your hand?" God does not want people treading His courts when their hearts are far from Him. He says, "Bring no more vain oblations." He tells them that their incense is an abomination. Their new moons, and their Sabbaths He "cannot away with." They are an iniquity. His soul hated their solemn meetings, and could not bear their gatherings.
Beloved, we wonder how God feels now, when people have no heart in their prayers, no soul in their songs, and no joy in their testimonies. We wonder how He feels when people with unclean hands, and unpurged lips serve in His Church. God help us to wash, and be clean. God help us to put away the evil of our doings, and to learn to do well. Then will He accept us as we come before Him.
V. IT MUST BE RIGHTEOUSNESS OR IT CANNOT BE CONSECRATION (Matthew 5:23)
Here is a statement which appears to be a hindrance to consecration or a hindrance to giving any gift to God, The Lord said, "If thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee; leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift."
In our mind's eye we see a young man, or a young woman, approaching the altar, not with a gift of money, but with that supreme gift of their own heart and life. The Lord watches them as they come. He has commanded that saints should do this very thing. Here are His words: "Present your bodies a living sacrifice * * unto God * * which is your reasonable service." However, God also says that before we bring our gift, we must, if need be, go and become reconciled to our brother, providing our brother hath something against us.
Is there something in your life that is wrong toward another? Do not imagine, then, that God will accept you at the altar of consecration and sacrifice.
Hearts that are unclean, hands and feet that are not separated from sin, cannot be a sacrifice, holy, and acceptable unto God.
The unrighteous and carnal Christian might desire to offer himself to God, with reservations, but God will not receive such a gift.
We read of the rich young ruler who came running to the Master. Christ saw that he was a lover of his wealth and position, and said, "Go and sell that thou hast, * * and come and follow Me." Consecrated lives, if they are to be acceptable to God, must be lives which are clean.
VI. IT MUST BE OF POWER AND NOT OF FORM (2 Timothy 3:5)
Here is a verse which is needed. The Spirit is describing the last days, days which will immediately precede the Second Coming of Christ. He says that men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy. He says many other thing's which describe anything but a real Christian. Then the Spirit tells us that these very people will have a form of godliness, denying the power thereof.
It is hard to conceive that those who are lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God could have a form of godliness, and yet they do. Many of our churches are dominated by this very class. They are pleasure mad; they love the world, and they live in the world.
The dance, the card party, the movie, the beach, or any other form of worldliness is their delight, and yet, on Sunday, you will see them in the pews, and at the young people's meetings.
They have a form of godliness, but they know nothing of its power. It is hard to conceive how boys and girls who are disobedient to their parents, unthankful, and unholy can be so deceived as to imagine that their Sunday parade of piety goes over with God.
It is hard to imagine how people who are truce-breakers, and false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, will come into the assembly of righteousness and parade a form of godliness, when they know nothing of the power thereof.
Of this same "sort are they which creep into houses, and lead captive silly women laden with sins, led away with divers lusts," yet, they too have a form of godliness knowing nothing of the power thereof. What shall we do? The Bible is very plain. It says, "From such turn away."
VII. IT MUST BE OBEDIENCE TO AND NOT MERE MEMORIZATION OF TRUTH (Joshua 1:8)
The words God gave to Joshua and to Israel are applicable to us. God said, "This Book of the Law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein!"
When the Christian opens his Bible to read, what is his objective? When a Christian sits down to memorize a passage of Scripture, what is his purpose? Is he studying it in order to know it, or to observe it? Does he read the Bible that He may do all according to all that it commands and inculcates, or does he do just that which is convenient to him, and which may please his flesh?
So far as we see it, we must take the whole Bible as our guide, as well as our faith. It is not understanding the Bible which proves a blessing; it is keeping it. Christ said, "If ye love Me, keep My Commandments." The Lord made our keeping of His Word the proof of our love. Man looks on the outward appearance, but God looks on the heart.
Unto the Church at Ephesus, the Lord said, "I know thy works, and thy labour." God knew something else: "Thou hast left thy first love."
We must have a Christianity that is more than skin deep. It is with the heart that man believeth unto righteousness.
Let us once more come back to the question "How long halt ye between two opinions?" Examine your own heart today, and in all sincerity seek to discover whether you have Christ, or a form of godliness? whether you are hearing the Word, but not living it? whether you have piety or pretense? From this hour on, whatever else may be said of us, let us not be counterfeits. Let us be true.
AN ILLUSTRATION
Here is a little girl who both heard and did.
A very little girl attended a meeting, and heard about "the best robe." When she went home she said to her father, a policeman, "Father, have you got on the best robe?" He replied, "What do you mean, child?" "Father, have you got on the robe of salvation?" The father looked very perplexed, and, turning to his wife, said, "What does the child mean?" The child said, "The preacher told us that Jesus Christ had made a garment for us, and that God gives it to every one who asks for it; and he told us that if any of us wanted it, to hold up our hands, and I held up ray hand, and now I have got it on." "How do you know that, child?" "Why," she said, "of course I know. Jesus said so. He told us that He would give it to us. I asked Him, so; I have on the best robe." That night, before she went to bed, she said to her mother, "Have I been naughty today?" "No, my child; you have been very good." "Mother, I did one naughty thing I slapped Polly (her sister), and when I did that I made an ugly spot on my best robe; but the preacher told us that if we got any stains on our best robe, we were to ask Jesus to wash them away; so I knelt down and said, 'Please, Jesus, wash my best robe, and make it clean again.'" The Christian Herald.