The Luxury Of Listening

by Merchant, Paul | Category: N/a | Feb 2008

Andy needed to talk to someone. The fatigue and stumbling caused by his multiple sclerosis symptoms were not going to go away. Since his illness started his wife had left him, he had lost his joinery job, money was tight, and last week his central heating boiler collapsed. He feared Christmas approaching. He would spend it just with his elderly mother, warming up a steak pie and watching TV. Life was looking bleak.

His friend Peter already knew about some of these problems so Andy phoned him. Peter visited Andy that evening. Peter sat opposite Andy, relaxed himself and listened. He had once lost a job himself so could empathize with Andy's sense of failure about work. Andy was angry about his failed marriage and guilty about his careless use of credit cards. He resented time with his mother at Christmas. He cried out, "Why me?" about his multiple sclerosis. After his emotional outburst, Andy meandered a little more and then resolved to phone his uncle about visiting him the day after Christmas and decided, after all, to go to the church service on New Year's Eve. Peter sensed Andy had the will to see himself through the next fortnight.

In this largely true account, with names changed, Peter listens attentively to Andy's story.

God honours people who listen to Him. He does not stand on ceremony when He needs to reveal his plans. He used a scruffy thorn bush in the desert to attract Moses' attention and speak to him about His great purposes for the Israelites (Ex. 3:4). Samuel was lying down quietly when the Lord called to him more than once. Isaiah was a listener before his prophetic ministry started (Is. 6:8). Our English word 'obedience' is derived from the Latin 'audire', to hear. Hearing and obedience are strongly linked. When we are reading the Word of God � listening to His words � then He expects us to obey them; not for us to have selective listening, but to hear all He wishes to share with us. �In the morning, O LORD, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait in expectation� (Ps. 5:3). Through reading His Word regularly we are being trained in the skills of listening to God. We can then apply the same listening techniques when we are still � to listen, attend, reflect and discern in the company of those people who seek our listening ears.

God highlights for us how He is generous to those who listen to Him. In the list of spiritual gifts in 1 Corinthians 12, five of the nine gifts require us to listen: the message of wisdom, knowledge, prophecy, distinguishing between spirits and interpretation of tongues.

How Jesus is full of surprises! The first time we are told of a choice He made about how to spend His own time, doing what He wanted to do, He spent His time ... listening! �They found him ... sitting among the teachers, listening to them ...� (Luke 2:46). The Bible is silent about Jesus' young adult life when He would have a listening ear for all the trials and troubles of the local people who would pass the time of day when they visited His workshop. Years later, Jesus would take these childhood incidents, like precious stones from His treasure chest, and polish them into one of His unique, memorable parables about God and the kingdom. Those stories about the sheep that was lost; the father who forgave the son who took his inheritance and then returned home destitute; about the widow who pestered the judge. John Stott highlights this skill of 'double listening'(1): listening to the hurts expressed in people's stories combined with listening to God's message for the hurting, resulting in effective communication through relevant illustrations.

Luke opens his gospel with the angel listening to Mary's questions, so he closes his biography of Jesus with the Lord listening to two grief stricken men recount their recent trauma as they walk along the road. He does not jump in with instant solutions, but rather takes His time, shows empathy with them in their grief, perceives they are knowledgeable Jews and shows insight by dispelling their grief with His Old Testament Jewish response.

God designed us with one mouth and two ears. He knows our weakness for talking more than listening! Our God is both a listening and answering God. We show His love by giving time with uncluttered minds to listen attentively to others with our ears and eyes.

(1) Stott, J. The Living Church (Nottingham, IVP, 2007)

Bible quotations from NIV

Merchant, Paul | Feb 2008
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