By Michael E. Brooks

"For the hearts of this people have grown dull. Their ears are hard of hearing, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, so that I should heal them" (Matt. 13:15).

In the early 1990s I worked in a campaign in Crabwood Creek, Guyana with Rick Hale, Stan Little, and several other North Americans. Rick and Stan were physical opposites, Rick standing less than five feet, six inches in height and Stan measuring a full six feet, seven inches. Rick was slender, and Stan was husky, weighing well over 250 pounds. One evening as we prepared for our preaching service an older Guyanese lady pointed to the front of the tent and asked me, "is that Brother Hale?" I looked and replied, "no, that is Stan Little." She shook her head and said, "All you Americans look alike to me."

Stereotypes and prejudices are common to all of us. We have our pre-formed opinions and facts have a hard time penetrating. So often we see what we expect to see, or we hear what we want to hear. Understanding is difficult, because our minds are not truly open. Sometimes it is like the case of the lady in Crabwood Creek – we don't learn because we have already decided we cannot learn. We limit ourselves. In other cases we place the limitation outside ourselves. With regard to people we decide that others are not worthy of our effort. There is no important difference, so why should we bother to try to distinguish? Or we may apply these principles to knowledge and understanding. In the first case, we think, "I just can't understand; it is all too deep for me." In the second we reason, "there is no absolute truth; it doesn't matter what I believe. God will accept my sincerity."

Jesus noted these prejudices among the religious leaders of his day. Their minds were already made up and they had ceased to listen or learn from others. They stood condemned before God because of their unwillingness to open their minds to his revelation in Christ. We look back and judge them, noting their pride, selfishness and hypocrisy. But do we guard ourselves from the same temptations?

God's revelation is complete. The faith has been "once for all delivered to the Saints" (Jude 3). So we become smug in our certainty that we "know the truth and the truth [has made us] free" (John 8:32). But one fact does not necessarily follow from the other. It is true that all necessary truth has been revealed. It is not certain that we know and understand that truth perfectly. In fact it is certain that we do not. "Therefore let him that thinks he stands take heed lest he fall" (1 Cor. 10:12). God's truth is infinite, far beyond any human ability to fully comprehend. Our knowledge is finite and our obedience is imperfect. Our path to faithfulness is not self-righteous assurance that we have perfect understanding or full obedience, but rather that of humble, penitent reliance upon God's mercy.

"If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness" (1 John 1:8-9).