What's Really at the Root of those "Itching Ears"

For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears;

2 Timothy 4:3

 

"The influence of the moral condition of the heart on the interpretation of the Scriptures has long been a subject of familiar remark. 

As the preacher,

 destitute of vital piety, 

will not appreciate the spiritual element in truth, because he has not experienced its power-so he will not present it in its living energy, and will be at the test, a mere "hewer of wood and drawer of water for the congregation of the Lord." 

 

---Thus it is with the interpreter. 

In all that addresses itself to the conscience of man, he is sure to fail, because, in his own conscience, there is no chord that responds to the touch of truth. 

If, perchance, he should feel at all, he will be offended with those declarations which announce his danger as a sinner, and his entire dependance on God." 

N.N. Whiting