Hearing Differently

Every once in a while I will just sit and listen to all the noises outside. The many different horns. There are the moped horns that sound like a little toy squeaking, and then there are the typical car horns, and then there are the big truck horns. The truck horns are un-mistakable, as they sound like one of the horns you would hear on an RV going down the road.

There are the different animal noises that you can don’t expect to hear in a city. You can hear dogs 24 hours day, barking, howling, and fighting. Now, that might be a shocker, but then there are the cows that you hear mooing throughout the city, as they meander wherever they want. Every once in a while you can hear monkeys as they move around the city looking for food.

It is enjoyable to hear all these wonderful sounds, well except the dogs at 1am, but they are God’s creation and we get to enjoy them in the city. While I enjoy these noises there is something that taints it and does not allow me to completely enjoy this wonder of God as much as I would like.

Lately, I listen to voices differently, especially at night. Being in a state where the church is experiencing persecution for proclaiming Christ and knowing that most of our neighbors know why we are here, it makes you listen more carefully. You start to listen more intently and more carefully to your surroundings, wondering what others are saying, because they are not speaking your language. Your mind starts to play these tricks on you, just as when you are alone at night in your bedroom and your imagination grabs a hold and runs away with your thoughts.

Here we get the privilege of living our faith for Christ in a real sense that Jesus talked about in His day. Where in the States we have been hated and disliked for our views, it is typically not acted upon by breaking into church services and arresting the pastor for converting people to Christ, though recently in Michigan a Church service was disrupted by a radical group with different beliefs.

We have had our views of the exclusivity of Christ challenged by even those in the Church, but only verbally, but here it is followed up physically. I have seen on Facebook groups where some pastors that preach in college groves are wished dead. Persecution is part of the call, it is part of the privilege and part of being the Church.

When you are alone what do you hear in the world? Is all well in your life? Do you hear nothing at all? If so then you are not following the same Christ that is in the Bible? Read the Gospels again. Listen to the words of Jesus.

Matthew 5:10, “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, For theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

John 15:18-19, “If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you. 19If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.”