"He Who Has Ears to Hear Let Him Hear"

Matthew 13:9 "He who has ears to hear, let him hear."
Jesus says this a couple times in scripture and I believe it is a very telling statement from our redeemer. It implies that not everyone can hear or that not everyone will understand what He is saying as He speaks in parables. He is saying that some people are actually blinded to the light of His truth. Have you ever tried to read something from the bible to a friend and they don't understand what you just read? In my experience the reason has generally been because they aren't following or chasing after a relationship with Jesus, they don't know Him. Would it make sense for God to reveal Himself to everyone so there would be no question about His existence? Wouldn't that rob God of experiencing true unforced Love from us through our obedience to Him? Sure it might be easier for us to know without a doubt but when has easy ever been rewarding? Still thinking?
Matthew 13:11 "Because it has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. For whoever has, to him much will be given and he will have abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him".
Jesus says this to his disciples to explain that with the gift of salvation and a relationship with Him many blessings and much understanding will be poured out on he who believes and follows. The pagans (sadly we are surrounded by these non-believers) who don't believe and who continue on living in darkness will be stripped of everything they have. Sadly there is another force that plays the other side and is very active in trying to keep people in the dark. Don't we always say "man, why is this guy having this success and he is a disaster of a person"? Well, think of it like this; that may be the only good things that they experience before they miss the rapture and spend eternity without the Lord. But lets transition back into the focus of the fact that we have been blessed with the opportunity to dive in and get to know the mysteries of God's living word (Hebrews 4:12). Many times we don't fully understand what we just read but it is the most beautiful thing when we read it a year or two later and another aspect of the scrip smacks us in the face with truth and changes our lives further than it already is (an example of how God's word/bible is like a living thing).
If we continue on reading in Matthew 13 we see that Jesus says that this blindness of many is prophecy from Isaiah 6:9-10, simply amazing. What an incredible and gracious gift we have been given it would be a shame not to use it.

Father forgive us of our filthy sins that have kept us from a closer relationship to you, help us to recommit and dive in deeper than ever before into Your word and our relationship with You. Spark our fire so that it may burn in a way that will be contagious and spread amongst our territory of influence, we love you, we need you. We say these prayers in Jesus name, Amen!

If we continue on in Matthew 13 we read the 3 examples of how some people receive the message from the bible/word and how some make it into producing fruit but others don't. It is truly a great chapter in the bible definately worth the 3 minutes to read.