Preaching to the Hard-Hearted and Stubborn

[1]

Thursday, May 16, 2019

Son of man, listen to what I say to you.  Do not join them in their rebellion. Open your mouth, and eat what I give you.”  Then I looked and saw a hand reaching out to me. It held a scroll, which he unrolled.  And I saw that both sides were covered with funeral songs, words of sorrow, and pronouncements of doom.  The voice said to me, “Son of man, eat what I am giving you—eat this scroll!  Then go and give its message to the people of Israel.”  So I opened my mouth, and he fed me the scroll.  “Fill your stomach with this,” he said. And when I ate it, it tasted as sweet as honey in my mouth.  Then he said, “Son of man, go to the people of Israel and give them my messages.  I am not sending you to a foreign people whose language you cannot understand.  No, I am not sending you to people with strange and difficult speech.  If I did, they would listen!  But the people of Israel won’t listen to you any more than they listen to me!  For the whole lot of them are hard-hearted and stubborn.  But look, I have made you as obstinate and hard-hearted as they are.  I have made your forehead as hard as the hardest rock!  So don’t be afraid of them or fear their angry looks, even though they are rebels.”  Then he added, “Son of man, let all my words sink deep into your own heart first.  Listen to them carefully for yourself.  Then go to your people in exile and say to them, ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says!’  Do this whether they listen to you or not.”  Ezekiel 2:8-11

One of the biggest mistakes a preacher of the Gospel can make is thinking that a call to preach somehow places one above the path of the message, rather than a target of the message…just like everyone else.

There is a temptation for a pastor or evangelist to seize on a juicy passage that promises heart-stopping retribution to hard-hearted and stubborn people and prepare to blister the paint on the sanctuary walls with a sermon that will be remembered for decades.  But, if the preacher is honest, that passage will break his own heart before the choir sings the opening song.  

It’s the reality of that old proverb:  when I point a finger at you, I’ve got three pointing back at me!

When Jesus went to his hometown he knew the local wags were going to pull out that proverb about getting your own house in order before you tell me how to clean mine, so He trotted it out first.

Then he said, “You will undoubtedly quote me this proverb: ‘Physician, heal yourself’—meaning, ‘Do miracles here in your hometown like those you did in Capernaum.’  Luke 4:23

It’s easy to look at our world and imagine all the fault for the violence, dishonesty, backstabbing and greed is somehow out there…the result of those people, the ones who are not like us.  Well, as God told Ezekiel, the preacher, let that juicy message to hard-hearted and stubborn people hit your own heart of stone before you break the news to those people.

There are some pretty tough messages that come to us from God’s Word.  The next time your preacher gives one, do the right thing and cut him a little slack.  Like Ezekiel, who’s just had God tell him he’s as hard-hearted and stubborn as the people to whom he preaches…your preacher’s dealing with enough!

You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day.

Go to VIDEO

---

[1] Title Image: Pixabay.com  
             Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are from The New Living Translation©