Wind & Waves – “Who can discern his errors? Acquit me of hidden faults.”
Psalm 19:12 – A Call to Discernment Part VI
The problem with many who were hearing the New Testament letter of Hebrews was that they were “dull of hearing” (5:14). What’s frightening about these people is that they had been listening for years but never really hearing and so their discernment in biblical truth and spiritual matters was dangerously inept. The writer chastised them because they should’ve been spiritual teachers but they were still primary students! “Dull” here is “nothros,” meaning “dull of apprehension” and “culpable incapacity,” meaning it was their own fault they were dull of hearing. They had become spiritually unable to discern because they had not put the available truth they already had into daily life-practice. When we don’t use it, we lose it! This is a biblical principle you can bank on. Obedience to God’s Word is the key to wisdom; mere knowledge is not the key (Psalm 111:10; Proverbs 4:7; 9:10; James 1:5; 3:15-18). Do you want to be healed of “dull hearing?” Do you want to be wise and discerning? Then obey the commands of God which you already know. Scriptural obedience is a spiritual hearing aid! King Solomon asked God for a “hearing heart.” What is a “hearing heart?” A “hearing heart” is a heart that listens to God’s Word and obeys it (1 Kings 3:9). Only the person who uses God’s Word to determine God’s will has godly discernment. The Apostle John says this is true, “Whoever knows God listens to us, but whoever isn’t of God doesn’t listen to us. From this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error” (1 John 4:6). Even in the Garden of Eden the man and the woman were commanded to gain knowledge by obeying God’s Word, but Satan tempted them to learn “good and evil” by personal experience, and they failed the test. The distinction between learning from general experience in life or from the experience of following God’s Word in the Bible is of the utmost importance today. One way leads to dullness, the other way leads to discernment. Everywhere today Christians are writing about their personal experiences and teaching others how to live out of supposed “promptings and leadings in the spirit.” This unbiblical route leads to nothing but subjective chaos and confusion. It is nothing but an attempt to determine the will of God through feelings and circumstances. The ancient Romans consulted chicken livers to learn the will of their gods, and Gypsies consult tea leaves. Many Christians today follow their inner hunches and the alignment of their circumstances rather than the Divine revealed Word of God in the Bible. No wonder so many Christians lack discernment. Many Christians today are befuddled about how doctrine impacts daily life. They turn instead to feelings, refashioned mysticism, and contemplative meditations. To regain our “hearing,” we need to obey the biblical teachings we have already learned. The Bible is the ultimate authority on the human experience: thoughts, feelings, actions, circumstances. It doesn’t need to be integrated or supplemented. If we have ears, we need to learn to hear.
