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The Difficult Art of Listening

The Difficult Art of Listening

October 21, 2007

Text: James 1:16-21

James 1:16-21

16 Do not be deceived, my beloved.

17 Every generous act of giving, with every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. 18 In fulfillment of his own purpose he gave us birth by the word of truth, so that we would become a kind of first fruits of his creatures.

19 You must understand this, my beloved: let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger; 20 for your anger does not produce God's righteousness. 21 Therefore rid yourselves of all sordidness and rank growth of wickedness, and welcome with meekness the implanted word that has the power to save your souls.

NRSV

Last Sunday, I talked about following Christ. I said that you can’t follow him and keep doing, thinking, saying the same old things. Today, and next Sunday, I want to specifically talk about two things that must change as you follow Christ into the future he has in store for you. Today we’ll deal with how we listen—or don’t listen. And next week, we’ll talk about how we talk. Today, the ear. Next Sunday, the tongue. We’re going to get personal!

I want to give you a hearing test.

Here is a 10 second sound byte. Listen.

Now, most of you will say right now, “Go ahead and play it!”

How many heard it?

It’s called the “mosquito” sound effect. It’s a high frequency sound that people over thirty can’t hear, or hear too well. That’s because of a condition called “presbycusis”—the tendency for the human ear to progressively lose its ability to hear higher frequencies. People over thirty can’t hear the sound that most of us didn’t hear.

There have been two primary uses of this phenomenon.

One—mall owners have used the high pitched sound to drive away loitering teenagers.

Two—and most popularly—the mosquito sound effect has become a ring tone for teenagers’ cell phones. You’re in class, a friend can call you up with a text message—cell phone rings, and the teacher can’t hear.

Isn’t that interesting—presbycusis.

We’re physically hearing the sound, but losing it before it makes its way to the brain.

The sound is there, beating on the eardrum—it’s just that some people are incapable of hearing it.

Hmmm. That’s interesting.

As I reflect on that, it occurs to me that this just isn’t an age thing. Kids are sitting in front of the TV. “Time to turn off the TV and get ready for bed,” a mom or dad says. Two minutes later, the parent returns to the room. “I said it’s time to turn off the TV and get ready for bed.” It’s not until mom or dad uses the wrath-of-God-on-judgment-day voice that the kids really hear.

The sound is there—it’s just that they’re incapable of hearing it.

I bet you can think of all sorts of examples in your personal life that are similar. Maybe at home, with the kids or parents or spouse. At work, with co-workers or the boss. At school, with classmates or teachers or administrators. In social groups, hobby groups, church groups.

You can think of many concrete examples of people talking past each other. And after conversations, a day or week or year later, one person will say, “Well, that’s what I said to you back then.” And the other person has this blank look on their face and goes, “Huh?”

[I know—cause often I’m the one going “Huh?”!]

Listening is crucial. It builds relationships. It demonstrates love. It gets things done.

Business folks know this. That’s why companies hold seminars and workshops, to help foster communication between co-workers and teams.

On the sermon notes I’ve left space for you to fill in some concrete “listening” techniques that they teach you in these seminars. I invite you, a little later, to reflect on things you’ve been taught about being an effective, or “proactive” listener.

Here’s one technique you may have learned.

Someone calls you, and they talk, and keep talking. You’re busy, but you want to be nice. So you do this. They’re going, “Blah, blah, blah…” When they pause, you go, “Uh huh.” Thus affirmed, they go on. “Blah, blah, blah…” Pause. “Hmmmmm.”

This is called “Show interest in what the other person is saying.”

It’s a good technique. But as you can tell—with this as with any of these techniques, you can fake it.

Do you think that’s the way Jesus listened to others—faking it at times?

No. And if we follow him, we listen as Jesus listened.

James, in his words today, shows us how. He shows us that the key to Christian listening lies not so much in techniques, but in orienting your heart properly to the other person. You do that, you listen naturally, and you listen well.

This old leader of the church—who was Jesus’ brother and saw how Jesus listened—says there are three things we must understand and do if we are not to be accused of “spiritual presbycusis.”

These three things are wrapped up in that one very powerful verse that jumped out at you in the Scripture passage.

BE QUICK TO LISTEN

Give the other person respect.

This carries the sense that if someone starts to talk, you instantly lean forward and listen as if that person were the smartest, wisest, most important person in the world. You’re naturally showing that person respect—you’re showing that you believe what they’re saying is of ultimate significance.

It’s like this. Imagine the President, or the Pope, or Albert Pujols, or Hannah Montana or some other celebrity walked through our doors, down the aisle, to the pulpit, and started speaking: don’t you know you’d strain to hear what he’s saying? You give respect to the office or celebrity status, so you naturally want to hear what this important person is saying.

But what makes the President’s words any more important to you than the words of the person sitting next to you today?

Fact is, we’re pretty choosy who we show respect to, and those standards are pretty fickle.

Let’s say that [someone from congregation] is going to talk on “The Seven Principles to Live By.” Will you go and listen to them? Maybe, maybe not—according to if you have anything better to do. No offense, but we know you, we’ve been around you for years, we’re used to you.

But advertise that Sarah Sue from Sioux City is coming here to speak on “The Seven Principles to Live By.” Sarah Sue and [someone from the congregation] could speak from the exact same manuscript, but you’ll come to listen to Sarah. You assume, because she’s coming from afar, she is more worthy of your respect.

We are fickle.

Jesus wasn’t. Whether he was talking to an adulterous, sinful woman at a well, or to an overly-righteous Jewish leader coming to him in the middle of the night: he gave them both equal respect.

Shouldn’t we be doing the same with the person in our pew…in our living room…in our office…in our classroom?

BE SLOW TO SPEAK

Let the other person finish.

You know what drives me up a wall? Those news shows where two people with opposite opinions are talking, and they keep interrupting each other. They don’t let the other person finish—they’re showing that what that person is saying is either unimportant or misinformed, and what they have to say is better. I find myself choosing the side of the person who appears the more courteous—and usually, that means neither one.

But, lest we be too self-righteous, we all know that we have a tendency to do it. Someone’s talking, and you can’t wait for them to stop, so you can quickly fill the silence with your wisdom. Sometimes you unconsciously give cues to the other person that you just can’t wait for them to finish so you can jump in.

[Incidentally—know how to deal with someone like this? Keep talking. Drives them up a wall. After a while they’ll forget what they’re going to say, and just go, “Hmmmm.”]

At times we all say to ourselves when a person’s talking, “Come on, come on, stop already—I want to talk.” We all at times think ahead while the person’s talking, thinking about what we’re going to say.

But if we really respected the other person, we’d be slow to speak. It’s never recorded, “Jesus interrupted.” Rather, it’s said that Jesus asked questions. “What would you have me do for you?” “Is there anyone to condemn you?” “Who do people say that I am?” It’s almost as if he enjoyed listening to people, hearing what they had to say, seeing what was in their hearts, on their minds.

Next time you catch yourself thinking ahead, about to interrupt: stop.

Remember Jesus’ example. And show that person the respect you’d give the President, or Sarah Sue from Sioux City—be more interested in what they’re going to say next, instead of what you’re just dying to say.

BE SLOW TO ANGER

Hear the other person’s feelings.

Sometimes, we let our feelings get out of control when we listen to someone. We want to interrupt and say, “When you say that, you make me SO MAD.”

Jesus never did that. He was always attentive to what the other person was feeling. Throughout his ministry [i.e., Mark 1:41, Matthew 20:34] Jesus was always “moved” by people he talked to—he was moved by compassion and by pity. You can’t be moved that way unless you feel the feelings behind the other person’s words.

What would happen if you were more concerned about how the other person is feeling, instead of how that person makes you feel?

The other night I went with Emma to a child’s literacy workshop over at Hagemann School. One of the things they said was that when you read a story to your young child, you should read it like this…

[demonstrate—monotone]

What a breakthrough in modern education!

No, of course not. What they said is that you read the story with emotion.

Kids naturally pick up on the feelings behind the words. They respond to them.

Maybe along the way—just as we lose our ability to hear higher frequencies—we lose our ability to focus on what the person is feeling.

An exercise we should always exercise is asking ourselves in a conversation, “What is this person REALLY saying? What are the feelings behind the words?” You do that, you’re really listening.

Leo Buscaglia was once asked to judge a contest for the most caring child. The winner turned out to be a 4 year old boy. The child’s elderly neighbor had recently lost his wife. Upon seeing the man cry, the little boy went into the old gentleman's yard, climbed onto his lap, and just sat there. When his mother asked him what he had said to the neighbor, the little boy said, "Nothing, I just helped him cry."

THAT is listening.

Want to follow Christ? Want to relate to others?

Be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger.

In other words: show respect, let the person talk, feel the person’s feelings.

Well, I’ve been talking about this for a few minutes. I bet your hearing has improved already.

Let’s replay the sound effect.

It’s a miracle!

Well, I doctored the sound effect, a little bit.

But friends, maybe God in these few minutes has doctored your hearing. Maybe the One who was the world’s best listener has come close. Maybe, “moved by compassion,” he has reached out and touched our ears.

Go—and see if he hasn’t really produced a miracle in your life.

Go—and discover that now, you can hear ALL the frequencies out there.