you may remember those old commercials that said “when e.f. hutton speaks, people listen.” and in the commercials, everyone would be sitting in some public place like a restaurant, and they’d all stop whatever it was they were doing, and lean over to eavesdrop so they could get a good tip on the stock market or for some other financial investment. they were kind of goofy commercials, but the phrase stuck in people’s minds, which is exactly what they were going for…

now, i would never be so presumptuous as to assume that people want to listen in on what i have to say, or to think that anyone besides me will ever read these words. i do this blog to go back over my old journals, because it seems like a waste to write something down, and never look at it again. so, if when ben hedgspeth speaks, no one hears, that’s fine by me.

what would be tragic though would be if when Jesus spoke, people refused to listen. i, on my own, don’t really have anything of importance to say, but when Jesus speaks, there is a cost involved.

if we listen to Jesus Christ, what are the possible outcomes of listening?  the parable of the sower [matthew 13] is a perfect explanation of what those possibilities are…acceptance, outright rejection, and everything in between. we make a choice every time we listen to God, and it’s either going to be a positive response or a negative one. either we accept God’s message, or we reject Him. both choices have an active consequence.

when Jesus went out to speak, people would drop what they were doing, and follow after Him in order to hear whatever it was He had to say. whole towns and villages would come out to experience whatever it was that He was doing. they may have had different motivations, but they at least gave Him the opportunity to be heard.

if you have read this far, you are probably someone who has listened to Jesus before…if you aren’t, then by all means open up a Bible to one of the first four books in the New Testament and see what Jesus had to say.

it’s definitely worth your time, and will help you out better than some stock tip ever could…