What We HEAR
“Then Simon Peter having a sword drew it, and smote the high priest’s servant,
and cut off his right ear. The servant’s name was Malchus” (John 18:10).
Intro: I want to talk to you today about What We HEAR.
What are some of the favorite sounds that you like to hear?
Maybe it is the sound of a loved one stirring in the house, making an early morning pot of coffee…
Or the sound of someone making a late night snack.
The comfort of knowing someone is in the house with you…,
The noise of family, friends, companions…, is something that we all look forward to hearing…
Maybe it is the sound of birds singing…
Their chirping is a melody of praise to God the creator…,
Or maybe it is the sound of silence…
The old proverb silence is golden…
Or I think of the translation: It is better to be silent and be thought a fool…, than open my mouth and prove it…
The sound of laughter,
the sounds of music,
The sound of silence…, all have their value and place in life.
I. God’s Word demands a response…, a result…, an obedience…, an action…,
James chapter 1:22 says, “be doers of the word and not hearers only.”
It is important to listen to what God’s Word says…, but it is much more important to obey and live it…,
To do what it says…,
Do you put into actions what you read in your study time?
Do you put into action what you hear in the songs we sing?
And the sermons that are preached?
There is a story the bible about an ear…,
It takes place in the Garden of Gethsemane..
At the foot of the Mount of Olives…, is the most famous garden in Jerusalem.
The Garden of Gethsemane.
After eating the Passover meal with His Disciples…,
Jesus led them out into the Garden of Gethsemane.
He then left most of the Disciples…, at the edge of the Garden…,
and he took Peter…, James…, and John…, a little farther into the darkness,
where He then left them…,
as He, Himself…, went alone…,even deeper…, into the garden…, to pray.
Luke 22:44 teaches us that he prayed earnestly…, fervently…, more intently…, with grave seriousness…
so intense was his prayer…, that his sweat…, was as if great drops of blood…, were falling down to the ground
It is important for us to understand why this was such a solemn and serious moment…
For it was at this very moment…, that God began to lay the iniquity…, the sins of us all…, on Jesus…
Isaiah 53:6 says…, "All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned…, every one…, to his own way;
and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all."
Think about / Circle the words “the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all”
Christ went to the cross and ultimately suffered death…, because of our sin…,
Christ took our faults…, our mistakes…, our griefs…, sorrows.
Upon the cross…, He was wounded for our transgressions, our iniquities, our guilt, and our sin.
Not His own.
For he had no sin of his own.
The Lord Jesus was the sinless…, spotless…, guiltless…,
Holy…, pure…, and good…,
The innocent Lamb of God who was sacrificed to take away the sin of the world.
There would be no forgiveness…,
There would be no salvation…,
Had Jesus not gone to the cross…
For we would still be carrying our sin…, and our guilt
If they had not been put on Jesus…
Yet it is in the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus may well have faced His greatest struggle in life.
Do I submit to the will of God, my Heavenly Father,
or do I do my own thing?
Or do I take the easy way out?
We know that Jesus prayed, “Father let this cup pass from me, nevertheless not my will, but thy will be done.”
Jesus’ normal human nature said, “Please don’t let me go through this…, suffering on the cross.
I can’t do it.
But He was submissive to His Father’s will. ‘Nevertheless, not my will, but thy will be done.’”
The greatest thing that any of us can do in life is to say, “God, not what I want, but what you want.”
Not my will…, but thy will be done.
It’s somewhat easy to say those words, but it is sometime hard to do.
It’s hard to yeild or surrender.
There was once a preacher from a large city church…,
called to deliver a sermon in a small southern church.
As he began his message, a visitor who came to hear the guest preacher…,
got caught up in the sermon and said “Amen” a few times.
The city preacher was not accustomed to hearing any “amens,”
so he became somewhat disconcerted and frustrated…
One of the ushers noticed the preachers discomfort.
And walked over to the stranger and said, “You’re confusing the preacher. You will have to be quiet.”
The visitor nodded his consent…, that he would be silent.
A few minutes later, however, the visitor got caught up in the sermon again and said, “Amen.”
The usher came back to him and said, “I told you would to be quiet.”
“I can’t help it,” said the visitor.
“I got religion.”
The usher replied, “You will still have to be quiet. Because YOU SURE DIDN’T GET IT HERE.”
Why are we here?
II. There is more than one way to get your ear cut off…
1 Thessalonians 5:19 says “Quench not the Holy Spirit”
In other words: don’t put out the fire
Do not extinguish the influences of the Holy Spirit in our hearts.
The Holy Spirit is what influences our heart…, our soul
It is a fire that might be made to burn more intensely
Or it is something that can be extinguished
Like the little children’s song…,
(VS 1) Oh, be careful little ears, what you hear (repeat)
For the Father Up above,
Is looking down in love,
So be careful little ears
what you hear.
Let’s go back to the Garden of Gethsemane for a moment…
A few minutes later…,
Jesus rises and goes back to meet His Disciples,
But by now…, Judas Iscariot…, the one who would betray Jesus with a kiss…, was also there…,
And in the crowd that had gathered in the garden of Gethsemane….,
was “a band of men and officers from the chief priests and Pharisees”
coming “with lanterns and torches and weapons” (John 18:3).
Jesus asked them who they were looking for,
and they “answered him, Jesus of Nazareth” (John 18:5).
Jesus said, literally, “I am.”
If you will notice in the King James verse of the bible…, The word “he” is in italics
which means Jesus did not say "I am he"
the word “he” – was added by the translators.
That’s why it is in italics.
As soon as Jesus said, “I am,” which is the name of God (Exodus 3:14),
The mighty power and authority of Jesus was so strong…
“they went backward, and fell to the ground” (John 18:6).
Then a scuffle broke out… and,
“Simon Peter having a sword…, drew it, and smote the high priest’s servant, and cut off his right ear.
The servant’s name was Malchus” (John 18:10).
Did you hear that?
In all four gospels we are told the name Malchus who was a slave of the high priest.
But it is only in John…, we are told the name of the one who swung the sword
and the one who lost an ear John 18:10
Then Simon Peter drew a sword and slashed off the right ear of Malchus, the high priest’s slave.
And maybe you are wondering “Why would Peter do that?”
Well I am convinced it was an accident,
I don’t think Peter meant to cut Malchus’ ear off,
I think he meant to cut his head off…,
but lucky for Malchus…, Peter was a fisherman and not a swordsman.
Remember it was just a short time earlier that Peter had vowed that he would be willing to die for Christ.
But it is only in the Gospel of Luke that we read: Luke 22:50-51
And one of them struck at the high priest’s slave, slashing off his right ear.
Jesus rebuked Peter and told him to put away his sword.
Jesus said, “No more of this.”
Oh, the things that Malchus must have heard that night…
He didn’t have to be there you know…,
it wasn’t part of his job to go track down Jesus…,
but he had heard that something was going to happen,
maybe on a whim…, he got caught up in the moment and there he was.
He was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Have you ever been at the wrong place at the wrong time?
As the mob broke through the trees in the garden to surround the group of men
Malchus pushed his way through…,
trying to get a look at the one the High Priest was demanding be arrested.
He wasn’t a soldier
He wasn’t a guard;
he was just a slave,
a household servant of the high priest,
You have heard the old expression…, Oh if I could be a fly on the wall…,
That means, you would just love to be able to see and hear what was going on…
That was Malchus.
He was there when his master Caiaphas had spoke behind closed doors
Caiaphas had expressed his concerns to his colleagues…,
about this young upstart from Nazareth,
he was there when it was decided that Jesus would have to be stopped,
he was listening in on the negotiations with Judas,
when the price for the betrayal of Jesus was set at 30 pieces of silver.
And now he was there for the big finale,
when the entire plan was to come together.
But he was just an observer and he wasn’t armed.
He was just a servant, not a soldier or a guard.
And besides neither Jesus nor the men he travelled with had ever been violent,
it was Jesus who told his followers to love their enemies and to turn the other cheek.
And so it must have been a complete shock
when suddenly this fisherman pulled out a sword and started swinging.
He saw the flash of the sword and felt the breeze…, as it whistled by his head
and then the pain, he was almost blinded by the pain.
He had never hurt so badly in his entire life;
he put his hand to the side of his head to cover his hurting ear…, except there was no ear to cover.
And he looked down and there it was…, his ear…, lying on the ground.
It was the strangest thing…,
He had an ear in his hand…
The ear that was supposed to be on his head was now in his hand….
And he fell to his knees clutching with one hand at the piece of him that was no longer a piece of him
while with his other hand he tried to stop the flow of blood.
It hurt, so bad. He wasn’t aware of what else was happening around him,
all he knew was he had no ear.
And then someone reached out and touched him,
and it was so strange…,
the pain disappeared,
the hurt just disappeared.
One minute it was there
and the next minute there it was, gone.
And it was replaced by the strangest sensation;
he couldn’t completely explain what he was feeling.
And under the hand that still cupped the side of his head, the flow of blood was stopped
Malchus was just a small player in this story;
he is mentioned once here, and just once more and then disappears.
Have you ever wondered about this man, identified only as “A slave of the high priest”?
I wonder “What ever happened to him?
Was his life changed forever or just for a moment?”
Was his life changed by the things he saw and the things he had heard….
Did he go home and return to his old way of life…
Or did what he heard change his life???
Did he ask to be reassigned…,
may to the kitchen staff…, as a cook instead of the right hand servant of Caiaphas the high priest?
Did he become a carrier of water?
And try to change the way he lived?
Did he start listening more to his heart and trying to learn more of the lessons that Christ had taught?
We also need to notice that this incident is recorded in all four of the Gospels
and is the last recorded miracle of Jesus before he was crucified…, restoring someone’s ability to hear!
Did Jesus reattached the old ear or give him a completely new one?
Now the man has three ears…, two on his head and one in his hand?
I wonder if he put his hand to his ear and thought about and really considered what he was hearing.
III. What Do You Do With What You HEAR?
You see, what he knew and what he heard wasn’t the important thing,
The important thing was what he chose to do with that knowledge.
1. Maybe he had convinced himself that the wound he received wasn’t that bad
and it would have gotten better by itself even if Jesus hadn’t touched him,
maybe he was mistaken when he saw his ear severed from his head,
maybe had been just a scratch from a briar in the garden?
And he would deny the death…, burial and resurrection of Christ,
he knew what had happened, but would he believe it?
Would he let it change his life?
Would it cause him to live differently?
Would he let it forgive his sin?
So maybe he had listened to the story of his boss
and decided that the guards at the tomb must have fallen asleep
and the body of Jesus must have been stolen.
Because the other option was that just as Jesus and the disciples said…,
On the third day…, Jesus rose!
2. Maybe he didn’t so much deny the truth as simply ignored the truth.
This is the trick that Satan uses a lot today…
People know the truth…, but they simply chose to ignore the truth.
He had witnessed what had happened
but he wasn’t ready to act upon it,
he realized the implications…,
that would go along with acknowledging that Jesus not only died and was buried but has risen from the dead.
And if that was the case then everything that Jesus had taught
and everything Jesus had said
and everything Jesus had required…, would be true.
And perhaps Malchus wasn’t ready for what that would mean in his life.
Because it would require a transformation…,
It would require a total change in how he lived and how he loved.
It would be almost like he had been born again.
So perhaps Malchus wasn’t ready for that…,so he simply ignored it.
And the further he got away from the event…, the foggier it got,
until soon he wasn’t even sure what had happened at all,
and it very seldom crossed his mind again.
3. Maybe He Chose To Act On It.
I thank God for people who hear the Word of God…,
And have responded and acted upon what they have heard.
Do you know anyone who is not only a hearer of God’s Word…,
But also a doer of God’s word.
Aren’t you thankful those people in your life…,
What happened in the garden wasn’t the whole a story in itself
but it was just the introduction to the story.
Perhaps the slave of the High Priest became a child of God that day.
Remember John 18:26 But one of the household slaves of the high priest,
a relative of the man whose ear Peter had cut off,
asked, “Didn’t I see you out there in the olive grove with Jesus?”
John knew the story because the man who was there told his relative,
the man whose ear Peter had cut off, and that man, Malchus had told John.
Obviously John knew Malchus well enough to know his name.
John knew the details of the miracle in the garden
because he had heard it first hand from the one who had experienced the miracle first hand.
The truth is: What does matter is that we congregate in the building on Sunday morning…
But we are the church in Whitley County…, during the days of the week.
Each one of us…, is in the same place that Malchus was…, two thousand years ago.
We have heard that Jesus was crucified;
we have heard that Jesus was buried
and we have heard that Jesus has risen.
Today as you leave Pleasant View/ Williamsburg will you think
“Well that was a nice sermon…, but that is all it was…, a nice story.”?
Or maybe you will hear that Jesus lived and died and rose again,
And you will do something about it…
you will choose not to ignore what you know is true,
and you will do what you know God is calling you to do.
Closing: Jennie Evelyn Hussey took care of her invalid…, adult…, sister…, nearly all her life.
It was truly a labor of endless beauty and sacrificial love.
But there were times when her strength was tested.
So she wrote poems
Many of her poems were about the cross,
For she knew the cross was a source of joy and strength.
She wrote the words to the song "Lead Me to Calvary"
she bares her love and loyalty to her sister as well as to Christ.
Through Gethsemane she knew the rich possession of obedience and surrender.
This made her service a joy, and not a burden.
Let’s stand and sing “Lead Me to Calvary.”
