I’m so glad you are with us today as we continue our series, Draw Near to God. Today we are reading Isaiah 55:2b-3: In the NKJV, we read,

Listen carefully to Me, and eat what is good,
And let your soul delight itself in abundance.
Incline your ear, and come to Me.
Hear, and your soul shall live;
And I will make an everlasting covenant with you—
The sure mercies of David.

In the Message Bible, it reads,

Listen to me, listen well: Eat only the best,
fill yourself with only the finest.
Pay attention, come close now,
listen carefully to my life-giving, life-nourishing words.
I’m making a lasting covenant commitment with you,
the same that I made with David: sure, solid, enduring love.

Listen.

In a world filled with noise, God calls us to listen to him and listen carefully and well. In this scripture, we learn that if we listen, our soul will delight in abundance. When we incline our ear to Him and come as he calls us, our soul will live!

So what does listen or hear mean?

The meaning of this word found in the Bible is: Using the ears to hear and process information. So, to process information, we need to be paying attention, to hear with intention or interest, and not be so quick to talk but to just listen.

Let’s be honest, friends. This is a hard one for many of us. In a society where our opinion and sharing of our thoughts are so prevalent, God is telling us to quiet our souls and listen to him. When we do this, he gives us life-nourishing words and the same covenant he made with David, King David from the Old Testament, and those words are sure, solid, and filled with enduring love.

Our soul will come to life, will be encouraged, edified, and set on track through the simple, but difficult for us at times to do, listen.

Listen also means to yield to and obey.

Yielding to God, His wisdom, direction, plans, and obeying them, following them are all that come from listening, truly listening to God.

May I encourage you today, this week, as you spend time daily in fellowship with God, to focus, to be intentional about listening to God? Not on your wants, your needs, your prayer lists; those are all things we bring before the Lord, but may we be intentional to truly listen. With no thought on how to respond, give our opinion, but just to sit at the feet of Jesus, like Mary did, and listen to Him today.