Learning to Listen

“God, Teach my heart to listen. Give me a heart and mind and soul That listens, that hears, that considers. Because I know that the person Across the table from me Has a story to tell And that they are the way they are Because of their story. So teach my heart to listen.” I read this in an article in the fall issue of Magnolia Journal, a quarterly magazine edited by Joanna Gaines of Fixer Upper fame. There was no byline so I cannot give credit to the author, but it struck me as a worthy thought to consider. Listening. We understand about listening for the voice of God – we hear Him in the scripture, in the answer to prayers. “Be still and know.” While we may not hear from the mountain top or from the whirlwind, we know that God speaks to us. And we listen. But do we attend to the voices of others? Do we hear with our heart and mind and soul? Do we try to understand the story they tell and live and are? Jesus had the words of life. He was God in the flesh. And yet He listened. He listened to the Samaritan woman at the well as she defended her heritage and heard questions concerning the Messiah. His conversation with Nicodemus at night began with questions on theology but led to an understanding of the love of God for the world. And in His own agony, He heard a thief request salvation and promised him paradise. Each person was in a different place in his or her life with a different understanding of the importance of time with the Messiah. And yet He listened with patience and understanding, validating their concerns, offering them clarity in their thinking. When we listen, we give worth to words being spoken. How can we respond, how do we speak to their needs if we haven’t heard their story? It is only then that we can understand, encourage and comfort. But it is often difficult to listen. It is so much easier to talk than to hear what is hidden in the words of others. Listening must be learned because it goes against the grain of our own importance. It requires a diminishing of self and a respect for others. We listen to be alert to the needs of others. We listen to bring comfort. We listen to empathize and perhaps to guide. But the most powerful incentive for listening is that, when we do, we are following in the steps of the Father. The Psalmist writes “You hear my voice. In the morning I lay my requests before you.” There is a listening that goes beyond sound, that transposes the silence into communication and operates with a sense of compassion. It is hearing with the heart, based on the desire to understand. The writer of the prayer in the magazine calls us to listen with our heart and soul and mind – no accident that it parallels Jesus’ reference in Mathew to the greatest commandment – to love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and mind and the second so like it - to love your neighbor as yourself. In his letter to the churches, John reemphasizes this teaching. “The commandment we have from Christ is blunt: loving God includes loving people. You’ve got to love both.” (I John 4:21, The Message) Perhaps the first step toward achieving this second greatest commandment is to learn to listen.