Good News for the countryside: Have you become ‘dull of hearing’?
Every fortnight people from a farming background, or who have a heart for the countryside in the Presbyterian Church in Ireland, offer a personal reflection on faith and rural life. They hope that you will be encouraged by it.
I am blessed to live in a beautiful rural setting. The manse in Aghadowey is surrounded by fields and from the front I am able to observe the activity of different farmers. As a consequence, it has been normal over recent months to see farmers at work making silage or spreading slurry. In addition, it is a regular occurrence to see tractors pass the manse with a variety of implements attached.
In contrast, when I served in my previous congregations, the manse was situated in the city. There were no fields over the garden hedge and while a few tractors might pass by, it was certainly not a regular occurrence. However, as the manse was opposite Altnagelvin Hospital there was one vehicle which I often heard, even if I might not always have seen it - an ambulance.
As you would expect, ambulances often travelled close by with the sirens blaring to gain swifter access to the hospital. When I initially lived close to the hospital, I was very conscious of their sirens. But as I encountered and heard them more often, I naturally began to pay less attention. While the siren was no less distinct and was sounded at the same volume, the reality was that I had become familiar with its sound and hardly noticed it at all.
If an ambulance were to pass by the entrance of where I live now, I know it would catch my attention because unlike all the agricultural vehicles that pass by so regularly, an ambulance would be very unusual.
There is a spiritual parallel when it comes to hearing the Good News of the gospel. The sad spiritual reality is that today many people have heard the gospel message often and have not responded. As a consequence, their hearts have become hardened and their hearing dulled. In the same way that I eventually paid little attention to the sirens of the ambulances, for many the voice of God has become less clear and little attention is given to spiritual matters.
In Acts 28:27, the Bible speaks about this danger. Here the apostle Paul quotes the words of the prophet Isaiah from the Old Testament to the people of Israel. Isaiah says the “… people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes.”
The issue is not hearing in general, but hearing God speak. God speaks to us through His Word, the Bible. The Psalmist declares in Psalm 19:7 “The statutes of the LORD are trustworthy, making wise the simple.” God’s Word is able to transform any person when it penetrates their heart. Writing to Timothy, Paul stresses the power of God’s Word. He reminds us that the Bible comes from God “… and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16).
I wonder if you were to reflect on your life, can you honestly say you hear God clearly as he speaks through the Bible, or have you become “dull of hearing”? There are many voices that can crowd out that of God, but we need to open our ears to hear the Good News of the gospel and, at the same time, open our hearts and invite Jesus to come and reign there.
Several times in Scripture Jesus said: “let him who has ears hear”. This invitation to act on God’s Word and allow it to transform us continues today. How is your spiritual hearing?
Having grown up in rural Tyrone, after leaving school at the age of 16, Knox worked for over 20 years on the family dairy farm near Aughnacloy. Having felt the call of God to full-time ministry, he was ordained in 2005 serving as minister of two Presbyterian congregations for 14 years. In 2019 he was called to be minister of Aghadowey and Crossgar Presbyterian Churches in County Londonderry.
If you would like to talk to someone about any of the issues raised in this article, please email Rev Kenny Hanna, PCI’s Rural Chaplain, at [email protected] or call him on 07938 488 372.