Proverbs 4:20-21. 20My son, be attentive to my words; incline your ear to my sayings. 21Let them not escape from your sight; keep them within your heart.
What do you pay attention to? What gets your attention in your free time? Social media? The news? Entertainment? Sports? Video games? Pornography? Gossip?
A good son or daughter pays attention to their good father’s wisdom. That’s what this proverb is telling us. Solomon wants his children to pay attention to everything in this book. Hear wisdom. See wisdom. Love wisdom. Keep hold of wisdom.
We can put these words into the mouth of our Heavenly Father and hear them spoken to Christ the Son. Jesus, the Son of God, was completely attentive to his Father’s words. Jesus inclined his ear to the Father’s sayings. Christ kept the words of the Father in his sight and within his heart. Therefore, everything he did and all that he spoke was from the Father.
John 12:49-50. 49For I have not spoken on my own authority, but the Father who sent me has himself given me a commandment—what to say and what to speak. 50And I know that his commandment is eternal life. What I say, therefore, I say as the Father has told me.”
In Christ we too are sons of God. That is undeniable. The question is, are we paying attention to our Father’s words? More importantly, are we keeping them in our hearts? How do we hear the Father? By hearing Christ, the Son. How do we keep the words of Christ in our hearts? By trusting that Christ, the Word dwells in our hearts by our union with him. By first hearing the word of Christ, the gospel, from the outside in, and then hearing the application of the gospel to our hearts from the inside out.
Hear the gospel over and over (pay attention).
Trust the gospel (keep it in your heart).
Allow Christ to apply the gospel to each situation of life as his thoughts become your very own thoughts.
Paying attention to the gospel WILL transform your hearts. It can and will change what you care about. When we listen to Jesus (incline your ear) and look at Jesus (let them not escape from your sight) on the cross, when we hear and see the love of God in Christ, it lets us know over and over again just how loved we are by God and how we can love others as he has loved us.
You: What things steal your attention away from the gospel?
You in Christ: In what ways can you see your heart changing as you pay attention to the love of God in the gospel of Jesus Christ?
Christ in you: How can you keep the gospel before you on a daily basis?
Pray: Father, I want to pay attention to you. I want to hear and see Christ. Change my heart by your written word and the living Word in me. Amen.
To Live is Christ 