“Therefore speak I to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand.”
(Matthew 13:13)
In this verse in Matthew 13, Christ explains that there is a difference between exposure to truth and spiritual understanding. Men may see the works of God with their natural eyes, hear his Word with their natural ears, and yet fail to perceive the glory of God because they are dead in sin. That is, seeing, they see not; hearing, they hear not.
This blindness is not innocent, for this passage connects it with willful resistance. Those who shut their eyes against the light because their deeds are evil become less capable of profiting from the truth because they are unregenerate. What is spoken plainly is neglected, resisted, or despised. The problem does not lie in any defect of the Word, but in the stubbornness of the hearer who refuses to receive what God has given because of a sinful heart.
To the sincere learner parables can sharpen attention, strengthen memory, and deepen understanding. The one who truly desires to learn will inquire, consider, and seek the meaning. But the same form of teaching becomes a veil to those who have already hardened themselves against the light. What awakens diligence in one may deepen confusion in another.
This reveals something solemn about the judgment of God. He may so order the means of salvation toward those who persist in unbelief that the very truth they hear does not profit them for salvation. This does not excuse their unregenerate blindness. Their stubbornness deserves judgment. They sin against their own souls by refusing the light already granted, and their further darkness is judicially connected with that refusal.
This warning, however, reaches beyond obvious unbelief because it is possible for those attending church to become familiar with sermons, Scripture, and doctrine while remaining spiritually dull or dead. Repeated exposure can produce either increasing understanding or increasing hardness. Familiarity is not the same as faith. Hearing many times is not the same as hearing well or hearing savingly. The crucial question is whether the soul receives, considers, submits to, and seeks to obey the truth heard.
The sincere hearer asks what Christ means in His parables and seeks understanding. Spiritual teachability in a regenerate soul is marked by hunger for clearer apprehension, so where desire remains, parables themselves may lead to deeper examination.[1]
We must examine ourselves, because the heart is capable of hearing with our ears without receiving God’s Word into our heart. We can sit under truth while resisting its principles, admire form while avoiding substance, and hear enough to become accountable without hearing in the way that produces obedience.
Contemplations:
- When Familiar Words Stop Reaching Me. I have heard Your truth many times, so I must examine my heart to see whether familiarity has made me careless. Forgive the dullness that comes from repeated exposure without fresh attention. Do not let Scripture become background noise in my mind. Make each hearing search me, instruct me, correct me, and call me to obedience.
- Expose the Blindness I Help Create. Sometimes the problem is not lack of clarity but unwillingness to see what the truth demands. Search me where self-interest, habit, pride, or cherished sin has made me resistant. Give me honesty before Your Word and courage to receive what convicts me.
- Give Me the Spirit of the Sincere Learner. Make me one who inquires when I do not understand. Give me the kind of heart that searches, compares, remembers, and asks what You are teaching. Where others hear a parable and turn away confused, make me willing to remain with the truth until its meaning becomes clear and its claim upon me more exact.
- Do Not Let Judgment Fall Through Neglected Light. Your Word warns that resisted light can become the occasion of deeper darkness. Keep me from treating conviction lightly or postponing obedience repeatedly. Let every clear warning become an occasion for repentance rather than another truth heard without response. And make the light I have received lead to greater light, not greater hardness.
Prayer (Confession):
Merciful Father, I confess how easily I can hear Your Word outwardly while remaining inwardly dull.
You have given me light, instruction, warning, and repeated opportunities to understand. Yet I have not always received them with the seriousness they deserve. Forgive me for familiarity that weakens attention, pride that resists correction, and self-interest that prefers not to see what obedience would cost.
Search every place where I have closed my eyes against truth because my deeds, desires, or habits were easier to preserve than to surrender. Do not let me pretend that the problem is always lack of clarity when sometimes the real issue is unwillingness.
Do not let repeated hearing harden me. Let every sermon, every reading of Scripture, every conviction, and every warning become an occasion for deeper understanding and more ready obedience.
Where I have seen and not seen, forgive me. Where I have heard and not heard, awaken me. Where I have understood enough to obey but delayed, bring me to repentance.
Keep me spiritually attentive, teachable, and responsive before Your Word.
In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen.
Further Scripture References:
Jer. 5:21; Deut. 29:4; Ezek. 12:2; Isa. 44:18
[1] John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon the Four Evangelists, and the Acts of the Apostles, (London: A.M. for John Bellamie, at the sign of the three golden-Lions near the Royall-Exchange, 1647), 381.
