INTRO.- Pay attention. Pay attention to what you’re doing. Those were the words my dad said to me when I was just a youngster. Apparently, my mind and attention wandered a lot. Wandering and not paying attention can get a person into trouble or get them into something else.
ILL.- A car mechanic received a repair order that read: "Check for clunking sound when going around corners." So he took it out on a test drive and, sure enough, whenever he went round a corner, he heard a clunk. However he quickly located the problem and returned the repair order to the service manager with the notation: "Removed bowling ball from trunk."
Somebody wasn’t paying attention. You would think a person would know if a bowling ball were rolling around in the trunk of your car!!
ILL.- My wife and I live just west of Interstate 55 in Cape Girardeau, MO. If we want to go into town we must pass over I55 on highway K and we do this quite often. In the short time we have lived in Cape Girardeau I have seen numerous accidents on highway K that goes over I55 when the traffic is heavy. Sometimes the cars are bumper-to-bumper and invariably someone will rear-end the car in front of them. IT’S A MATTER OF NOT PAYING ATTENTION.
Not paying attention while you are driving is bound to get you into trouble or an accident.
ILL.- Many years ago a young man who had been raised on a farm lost a part of his leg because he wasn’t paying attention and he actually knew better than what he did. He tried to clear some hay from underneath a hay baler while it was running and it ended in disaster for him. Very sad. Not paying attention around machinery could cost a person their life.
Paying attention to what you are doing; working, driving, etc. will keep you and others safe.
ILL.- One person wrote: “I was fired from my job. We had new-looking schedules and unfortunately, I looked at it wrong. It said 10 am but I went in at my regular time, 4:30. I walked into "SONIC" and my boss told me, "You were supposed to be here at 10." The head boss told her I was fired. She gave me my check and I left.” OUCH! That would be a bitter pill to swallow.
Failing to pay attention in life can lead to all kinds of trouble. And failing to pay attention to God can lead to even worse trouble. Any time we ignore or fail to pay attention to God and His Word we are asking for heartache and much trouble. Life has enough trouble of its own without ignoring God’s will for our lives.
Solomon tells us how we are to pay attention to God in this text.
Prop.- In paying attention, what are we to do?
1- Listen attentively
2- Guard the heart
3- Keep corruption away
4- Look straight ahead
I. LISTEN ATTENTIVELY
20 My son, pay attention to what I say; listen closely to my words. We need to pay attention to those who teach us.
ILL.- Teacher: If I give you two rabbits and two rabbits and another two rabbits, how many rabbits have you got? Patty: Seven!
- Teacher: No, listen carefully again. If I give you two rabbits and two rabbits and another two rabbits, how many rabbits have you got? Patty: Seven!
- Teacher: Let's try this another way. If I give you two apples and two apples and another two apples, how many apples have you got? Patty: Six.
- Teacher: Good. Now if I give you two rabbits and two rabbits and another two rabbits, how many rabbits have you got? Patty: Seven!
- Teacher: How on earth do you work out that three lots of two rabbits is seven? Patty: I've already got one rabbit at home now!
Patty was a smart girl. She paid closer to attention to the teacher’s question than the teacher thought. It pays to pay attention in life and especially, spiritually.
I Peter 4:7-8 “The end of all things is near. Therefore be alert and of sober mind so that you may pray. Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.”
1 Peter 5:8 “Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.” We need to be spiritually alert to what is happening in this world, to what the devil is doing, and to the needs of those around us so we can minister to them.
It seems like many people are living in some kind of dream world and they are completely oblivious to the evil in this world and to the people around them.
ILL.- It’s like someone who asked, “What’s the difference between ignorance and apathy?" One person said, “I don’t know and I don’t care.”
“I don’t know and I don’t care” seems to be the philosophy of many people today. They don’t know what is happening morally in this country and don’t even care. And even when some people do know what is going on, they don’t seem to care.
20 My son, pay attention to what I say; listen closely to my words. We really need to pay attention to what God says in His Word.
Psalm 85:8 “I will listen to what God the Lord says; he promises peace to his people, his faithful servants— but let them not turn to folly.”
Proverbs 12:15 “The way of fools seems right to them, but the wise listen to advice.” God’s advice, for sure.
James 1:19 “My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry...”
James 1:22 “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says." If we’re smart, when we listen to God’s Word we will act on it. We will be doers of God’s Word.
II. GUARD THE HEART
21 Do not let them out of your sight, keep them within your heart; 22 for they are life to those who find them and health to a man's whole body. 23 Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life.
ILL.- A man once dreamed of passing into the world beyond. An angel met him and showed him a great golden book. “What is that?” he inquired. “It is the book of your life,” was the reply. Looking closer he saw that there were some writing on the first page. “What is there?” he asked. “These are your evil acts,” said the angel, “and you see that they are many.”
The angel turned the page, and the dreamer saw that the next sheet was more closely written. “These,” said the angel, “are your evil words, and you see that there are more of them than there are acts, for a man speaks more than he acts.” The poet trembled. The next page was still more closely written. “What are these?” asked the dreamer. “These are your evil thoughts, and you see that there are very many, for a man thinks more than he speaks or acts.”
With trembling voice, the dreamer asked what the fourth page contained. The angel turned it over, and lo! it was black as midnight. “This represents your evil heart,” said the angel, “for it is out of the blackness of the heart that all thoughts and words and acts come.”
23 Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life. Wellspring is the head or source of a spring. Does this mean that a person’s heart is the head or source of our lives? It’s sometimes hard to differentiate between the heart and the head. Which controls a person the most? I think perhaps it’s combination of the heart (the inner person) and the head or the thinking.
Proverbs 23:7 “As a man thinketh so is he."
Matthew 12:33-35 "Make a tree good and its fruit will be good, or make a tree bad and its fruit will be bad, for a tree is recognized by its fruit. You brood of vipers, how can you who are evil say anything good? For out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks. The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him.” The heart of the matter is the matter of heart, as well as the mind.
Jeremiah 17:5 This is what the Lord says: “Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who draws strength from mere flesh and whose heart turns away from the Lord.”
If we trust in men more than the Lord or we seek strength from the human flesh (or men or even self) then our heart could well turn away from the Lord. It’s the idea that we set our minds more on man or what man can do rather than who God is and what He can do in our lives. We have the wrong focus. WE ARE NOT PAYING ATTENTION TO GOD.
Jeremiah 17:9 “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?”
Psalm 15:2 “The one whose walk is blameless, who does what is righteous, who speaks the truth from their heart.”
Psalm 16:7 “I will praise the Lord, who counsels me; even at night my heart instructs me.” (but only if the heart is instructed by God’s Word)
Psalm 19:14 “May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer.”
III. KEEP CORRUPTION AWAY
24 Put away perversity from your mouth; keep corrupt talk far from your lips.
ILL.- Jeffrey Dahmer was a wolf in sheep’s clothing. At the time of his arrest, few people imagined the polite man with blond hair, blue eyes and thick glasses was capable of killing, dismembering and cannibalizing 17 young men. But his murders remain among the most gruesome in American history.
- Ted Bundy: It might have been Bundy’s good looks and charm that helped lure his victims into positions of vulnerability. He confessed to roughly 30 murders by the time of his 1989 execution, but criminal justice experts estimate that he committed several more. The victims were strangled and mutilated, and he slept with their corpses until they became unbearably decayed. But that didn’t deter thousands of women from sending him letters of adoration while he was in prison.
As horrible and gruesome as these murderers were, evil is still evil. And evil abounds in our world and in America. Evil and corruption are everywhere.
And just because we wouldn’t think of murdering anyone we are still guilty of certain forms of corruption. What is it that the Apostle Paul said in Romans 3:23 about sin? ALL HAVE SINNED.
What forms of corruption are you guilty of? Greed? Lust for material things? Lust for the human flesh? Anger? Bad temper? Envy? Jealousy? Lying? Deceit? Revenge? Pride? Arrogance? Strife? Gossip? Slander?
If you are not included somewhere in any of these then you are real saint! But I doubt it! Even the apostle Paul whom we consider to be pretty high on the spiritual totem pole said of himself, “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst.” I Tim. 1:15
That’s the right attitude that all of us should have about ourselves. Instead of thinking more highly of ourselves we should more highly of the Lord and less of self.
The right altitude that we should have is that of the tax collector of Luke 18 who could not/would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’ (Luke 18:13) In God’s world the way up is down. God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.
How then can we keep corruption away from us?
ILL.- Preacher John Wesley’s mother once wrote to him when he was in college, “Would you be judge of the lawfulness or the unlawfulness of a pleasure, use this rule: Whatever weakens your reason, impairs the tenderness of your conscience, obscures your sense of God, or takes off the relish of spiritual things; whatever increases the authority of your body over your mind, that thing, to you, is sin.” Wow! What a woman! What a spiritual insightful woman!
Psalm 119:9-11“How can a young man keep his way pure? By living according to your word. I seek you with all my heart; do not let me stray from your commands. I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you.”
IV. LOOK STRAIGHT AHEAD
25 Let your eyes look straight ahead, fix your gaze directly before you. 26 Make level paths for your feet and take only ways that are firm. 27 Do not swerve to the right or the left; keep your foot from evil. In order to pay attention we must look straight ahead.
ILL.- I have read that our vision is highly selective: that is, our brains are bombarded by something like eleven million pieces of data at any given time, and of that, we are able to consciously process only about forty. What that basically means is that we “see” precious little of what’s around us. Instead, our sight is selectively filtered based on any number of factors: our state of mind, our mood, our thoughts, our motivation, our goals. So, we might think we’re paying attention, but what is it, exactly, that we’re paying attention to?
When we multitask, we fail to pay attention because we focus so much on a single aspect that we forget to note anything else. By being too engrossed in one task to realize there is another to switch to. In order to really see, we need to focus.
The way I see it is that our focus is greatly divided in life. Instead of focusing on the more important things of life, trivial pursuits capture our attention.
It’s like they say: DON’T TEXT AND DRIVE! And I’ve seen it happen. And that’s an accident waiting to happen. When you’re driving pay attention and keep your mind on your business.
I John 2:15-17 “Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For everything in the world--the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does--comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever.”
John is saying, “Don’t multitask. Keep your mind on your business. And your business is really spiritual, not worldly. Don’t get so focused on the things of this world because they won’t last.
Here should be our focus. Here is how we should pay attention.
Colossians 3:1-4 “Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.”
Hebrews 12:1-3 “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.”
CONCLUSION------------------
ILL.- Paul Marcarelli is an American actor best known as the "The Verizon Guy" in the commercials: "Can you hear me now?"
And God is saying to us today, “Can you hear me now?” And “Are you paying attention to me and to my word?”
John 10:27 “My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.”
Are you listening to Jesus, the great shepherd? Are you paying close attention to Him in your world? It’s the smartest and safest thing you’ll do in this world.
