Hear No Evil, See No Evil, Speak No Evi?

Hear No Evil, See No Evil, Speak No Evil?

Scripture: 2 Timothy 4: 2-8 Date: 14 November 2010

Purpose: Accepting everything means you believe in nothing. When it comes to right and wrong, sitting on the fence won’t get you – or the people you love – anywhere. Passiveness is not love. Love is getting in people’s faces and telling them the truth.

Illustration: On May 26th 2002, a towboat on the Arkansas River in Oklahoma accidentally pushed a barge into a concrete bridge support. The bridge was where Interstate 40 crossed the river. At the impact, a third of the bridge collapsed.

The problem was that the people on the interstate could not see that the bridge was out. Fisherman below watched in horror as car after car fell off the edge, plunging 62ft. to the river. The fisherman immediately began pulling survivors out of the river. When they pulled a truck driver out of the water, he shouted, “Somebody stop the cars!”

So fisherman Alton Wilhoit grabbed a flare gun from his boat and ran up to the interstate, where another semi was headed for the collapsed bridge. Wilhoit fired the flare gun at the semi, hitting it on the driver’s windshield. The driver slammed on his brakes and the wheels locked up, the trailer came to a stop with the truck’s front wheels hanging over the ledge. The driver threw it into reverse and pulled away, effectively blocking the road and warning the other drivers.

14 people died that day. But how many more would’ve died if Alton Wilhoit hadn’t done what it took to warn people who were blindly headed toward their death?

You and I can be Alton Wilhoit for the world. We know the bridge is out. We know that people are unknowingly accelerating to their deaths. And we’re in the right place at the right time with the right tools to do something about it.

Your friends are about to go over the edge. People in your family are about to go over the edge. Our whole country is about to go over the edge. They don’t know it. They don’t even see it coming but that doesn’t change the fact that it’s true.

We have fooled ourselves as a society that if we don’t hear it, see it, or speak about it; well then it just doesn’t exist and all is well in our world. The truth is this: There is much evil in our world even though we turn our backs to it and pretend it’s not there. We actually are condoning it by doing nothing about it.

2Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. 3For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. 4They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. 5But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry.

6For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time has come for my departure. 7I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. 8Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day—and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing.

Let me start this morning sermon off with another scripture reading:

“And Jesus said unto His disciples, “Go into all the world, teaching all men to live any way they want, and urging each to find his or her own path to God. Let not any one of you make someone feel inferior or victimized because of their beliefs, Above all, be tolerant, Verily, verily, I say unto you that what you believe and how you live do not matter, so long as you are sincere.” And if you choose to come to the Father (or Mother, if you prefer) through Me, that’s cool. Now go forth to live according to whatever feels good to you.” And there was much rejoicing!! What Bible translation was that!!

I promise you that you won’t find that passage of Scripture in any Bible translation. But sadly, there are plenty of people alive today who live as if that’s exactly how the Bible does read.

It seems that everybody wants to be cool with everybody else. Nobody wants to offend others or be thought of as narrow- minded or intolerant. I believe it is tough being a Christian in today’s world, isn’t it? You want to follow Jesus. You want your friends to know about Him, too. But whenever you start talking about the Bible and what’s right and wrong, everyone jumps up and calls you a judgmental bigot. After all who are you to say what is right and what is wrong?