Listen Up!
Author: Pastor Mike Gutzler
As we approach the six month threshold of the coronavirus, there seems to be some optimism about a vaccine in our relatively near future. With that said there is also some conversation about who the pandemic has changed our lives and our behavior. This may be a moment for us to consider what we want to keep in terms of healthy practices and what are the elements of life worth leaving in the past.
One element of life definitely worth holding on to is our improved skill of listening. Each week since we started online worship we have gathered to talk and listen to our fellow members and neighbors. This time of extra listening has helped us know each other better as well as improved our skill of listening.
Evidently, based on the Harvard Business Review, our assessment of being a “good listener” is about as accurate as our own assessment of our driving skills.
In our experience, most people think good listening comes down to doing three things:
Not talking when others are speaking
Letting others know you’re listening through facial expressions and verbal sounds (“Mmm-hmm”)
Being able to repeat what others have said, practically word-for-word
The Harvard Business Review found some interesting conclusions regarding good listening:
Good listening is much more than being silent while the other person talks. To the contrary, people perceive the best listeners to be those who periodically ask questions that promote discovery and insight.
Good listening included interactions that build a person’s self-esteem. The best listeners made the conversation a positive experience for the other party, which doesn’t happen when the listener is passive (or, for that matter, critical).
Good listening was seen as a cooperative conversation. In these interactions, feedback flowed smoothly in both directions with neither party becoming defensive about comments the other made.
Good listeners tended to make suggestions. Good listening invariably included some feedback provided in a way others would accept and that opened up alternative paths to consider.
Given this new information, let’s try to listen to the gospel text for today. In the example Christ provides, instead of identifying with the accuser, try to identify and implement the listening suggestions above as the accused.
It can be easy to take up our self-defenses and ignore the idea that we are in the wrong, but Christ is about health and meaningful transformation. In the same way that Christ is able to offer reconciliation and forgiveness for all of our faults through time, as disciples we are encouraged to listen to the voices looking for reconciliation.
To go one step further, we are also to be encouraged by Christ’s words and know that when these conversations happen we are also in the presence of God. Christ is with us in these particularly difficult moments.
These past six months have also helped us see that there are many other voices needing to be heard. These are voices calling for racial equality, climate considerations, and political partnerships for the greater good – among many others.
No one knows when the vaccine will arrive and what we will be back to “normal”, if there is such a thing anymore. But regardless of when normalcy returns, now is the time to listen and know God is present.