Are We Listening?

Did you know that in the average lifetime (80 yrs.)

• A person will listen to roughly 3,400 Sunday morning sermons

• Saved at 15 till the time they are 80 – 65 years of Sermons

• And of those 3400 Sermons they would hear a variety of subjects

• Salvation, Servanthood, Discipleship, Evangelism, ECT

• But have you ever heard a sermon on how to listen to a sermon?

• Well that’s what we are going to talk about today

Every Sunday, On the Average , 100 more people will hear a sermon than preach one.”

• I never really thought of this before

• But when you think about it there are countless books,

• And a few of them I have actually read

• On how to Prepare / Deliver sermons,

• But I’ve never seen a book on how to “listen to a sermon”

Why do you think that this?

• And I think the answer is because that the majority of People

• Think that “listening comes naturally.”

• But when we think about it, it doesn’t / Listening doesn’t just “happen.”

We’re told in the book of Luke

Lk 8:8 Still other seed fell on fertile soil. This seed grew and produced a crop one hundred times as much as had been planted.”

What we see in this verse is How we live our life is determined by how you listen.

• Teachers and preachers are responsible for presenting the message

• And those who are hear the message are responsible for effectively listening to it

• And what we need to understand is that true listening involves more than “hearing,”

• To listen effectively we have to “Understand” what we hear

Effective listening involves more than just our ears,

• When we hear the Word of God,

• Through a Sermon, Lesson, Reading Scripture,

• We have to listen with every part of our being

• For our main text for the day

In Mark 12:29-30 Jesus tells us that

“The most important commandment is this: ‘Hear, OIsrael! The Lord our God is the one and only Lord. Mk 12:30 And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength.’

And this is what we are going to talk about Today

• These 4 aspects / That have to be used if we want to listen effectively

The first thing that we have to do when we hear God’s Word is to Listen

I. WITH ALL OUR HEART

Why is it so hard for us to listen with all of our Heart?

• And the reason is Because a lot of the time what we hear can’t be trusted

• It’s hard because a lot of the time

• We don’t feel the same way about things that God does

A lot of the time We don’t want what God wants

• We don’t love what God loves

• And we don’t hate what God hates

• In fact there are times where we love what God hates

And Jesus Knows this / And in the Parable of the Sower Matthew 13:3-23)

• He shows us how mankind’s hearts respond to the Word of God

• We see that there are 4 Categories / Types of Soil

• And Each one represents the 4 types of hearts,

• And the seed is the word of God

First we see the

1. Hard Hearts – Prevents God’s word from sinking in

2. Shallow Hearts – Allows God’s word in, but doesn’t allow it to take root and grow

3. Thorny Hearts – Choke out the “true word” and replace it with a “false word”

4. Good Hearts – Allows God’s word in and allows it to take root and grow

From this Parable we see that God is the sower / Our hearts are the soil,

• But it’s up to us to Decide what type of heart we’re gonna have

• If we are going to listen with all of our Heart

• It means that we Listen with all our Understanding,/ Emotions, / Will

Before we sit down and Listen to His Word

• We need to pray that God will give you a good heart!

II Second we see that we need to Listen WITH ALL OUR MIND

• In the book of Acts there is a group of people that we talked about Recently

• That fit the description of those who listened to God with all their mind (Acts 17:11)

Ac 17:11 And the people of Berea were more open-minded than those in Thessalonica, and they listened eagerly to Paul’s message. They searched the Scriptures day after day to check up on Paul and Silas, to see if they were really teaching the truth.