Come Alive!

Listen to me:  You must be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to anger.  For human anger does not produce the righteousness of God.  So, get rid of the filth and evil in your lives, and humbly accept this word God has planted in your hearts, for it has the power to save your souls.

Don't just listen to God's word, you must do it.  Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves. For if you listen to the Word and don't obey, it is like glancing at your face in a mirror.  You see yourself, walk away and forget who you are, what you look like.  But if you look carefully into the perfect law that sets you free and if you do what it says and don't forget what you heard, then God will bless you for doing it.
                                                                                                                 James 1:19-27

I am so convicted by this set of verses.  While I am not prone to anger, I am prone to speak first and listen later.  What a practice to keep my mouth shut!

Actually, the thought-provoking statement is "forgetting who you are, forgetting what you look like."  The challenge is for my statements to reflect God's ultimate Truth about me (and not the sinful-evil/filthy truth).  If I claim the truth that I am a child of God, that I follow Jesus Christ, that I desire to obey his commandments for me, then my speech should follow accordingly.  My actions should follow in such a way to produce the "rightness" of God.

This is neither novel nor complicated.  It is quite simple, but incredibly hard.

I think though, there is clear directive about how to do it.  If I can keep my thoughts in my head and measure it by the righteousness (rightness) of God then my words would change.  "Slow to speak" gives me time to evaluate the tone and emphasis of my words within the context of the intent of God.  Then my words would be first loving, then clearly constructive and, finally, a blessing.  They could still be a challenge or correction, but more readily received and God more easily seen.

What a great opportunity!  To have my words reflect God!  Glory!

An Uninvited Discipline - Conversation

“I said I wanted to talk.  I did not mean I wanted to listen.”   And thus, we have completely lost the meaning of conversation.  The word’s origin is from a 1500s meaning, which was “to live with.”  It was also the legal term for sexual intercourse.  Thus, conversation was to engage in a give and take, a knowing and understanding of the other.  That means it is two-sided, a dialogue, which is much more than just what I have to say.

The two skills needed for conversation are, first, deep listening (hearing what is real about the other) and, secondly, finding your voice (expressing what is real about you). Both are significant.  If I never express the real me, you’ll never know me.  If I refuse to hear you or only listen superficially, I’ll never know you.  Our relationship will never be intimate.  Face-t0-face conversation builds community in a way that text-to-talk never can.  To hear the heart takes much more than words because to develop conversation that is caring, I have to hear beyond the words and listen for the expression of the heart, which takes place in tone of voice and body language.

Whether in listening or speaking, we all need to learn to be more intentional and confident when engaging in conversation.  It takes initiative to enter deep places in which God can lead and reach us through our community conversations.  It takes courage to listen to others with whom we do not agree, to hear those we don’t understand.  It takes a surety of self to allow someone to be different than me and not have to change them to conform to my views.

Conversation becomes a personal discipline when I engage deeply and it becomes a spiritual discipline when I keep God in the center of it – when I listen for His movement, His Spirit in myself and in you.  It is a discipline because it begins with love:  the love for God which allows me to love others enough to hear them.  It allows me to love others enough to tell them the truth.  It allows me to love others without judging them by my filters, which means to see the other person through God’s eyes.  I may need help learning to listen to a difficult person or my enemy.  I may need help with my beloved family, for whether I would love them for my sake or theirs, I would miss the opportunity to love them for God’s sake.

Some of the skills needed for God-centered conversation are not new to most.  To be a good listener, we know to listen with our agenda aside, to ask for more of their story, to listen to the emotions behind the words, even to  attend to their agenda.  It is a discipline to honor and acknowledge another’s point of view.  There are other skills, though, we neglect in listening:  to pray, to be open and open to change, to be willing to hear a person all the way, to desire what God wants, to be willing to learn, to intend a good result of the conversation.

Even the skills of saying our part, our words and idea-expressions may,  at first, be obvious: tell the truth, start with “I” statements, be clear, distinguish between fact and emotion.  If there is a desire for action from another, be specific with action and timeline.  Could there be others?  I return to prayer – let’s make it the first and best action we take before the words come out of the mouth.  Ask God to lead to explain without complaining and to express results with God in mind.  Don’t minimize your story or point of view any more than the other person’s. 

An unusual or less thought about part of conversation is the silence between the words.  What is being said that the words are not telling?  What is the tone of voice, the body language saying?  What if we sat in silence with each other to give space for ideas to grow, to give space for hearts to hear.  It is a discipline to let silence speak, too.

Realize that in basic conversation (not in teaching or persuasion), we hear to know each other, identify with each other and join with each other, even when we have differences.  Community grows when we can hear another person’s heart. Conversation builds community when we can invite more to the table, more people and more ideas. 

Many of the recorded conversations of Jesus with people took place in “their” space, where he met them.  He met Peter by the lake where his livelihood was, the woman at the well where sustenance was, the Pharisees in the temple where their duty lay, the cripple at the pool in a supposed place of healing.  Jesus didn’t very often go for “neutral.”  He met people in the public square and in their homes.  People are more comfortable there. 

Jesus often did not leave them there, though. He knew how to lead them through conversation through the facts to their thoughts and opinions, to identify their deep desires, and through their crises to discussions of the sacred.  He listened.  He asked questions.  He pointed to healing.  He pointed to God.

It is truly a discipline to engage in the knowing search of another person, which is conversation’s goal.  It is a discipline to reveal our own truths and lies.  It is a greater discipline to let a healing Savior to be in the center of all conversations so that the greater community can be built. 

And what if our conversation with each other told the truth about the kind of conversation we have with the Lord of the Universe?  How well we listen to each other may indicate how well we listen to God.  How much truth we tell to each other may indicate how much truth we tell God.  How much we connect and community-build with each other may tell the greatest truth of how well we are connected with the Triune God, who is, most of all, Community.

An Uninvited Discipline - Discernment

Most of us who are serious about our relationship with God are trying to figure out what He wants from us.  We want our decisions resting on His directives.  We want our lives led by Him.  We want to draw near to His presence.  So, we read the Bible, listen to sermons, go to seminars and cry out for answers, rarely sure if what we “hear” is from God or some contrivance of our own heart.  We want to be able to know God’s voice, to discern its meaning for our lives.

How about a quick text, Lord?  Or at least a call?

We may be hungry for answers and leading from God but are we listening?  What if God has been speaking all along?  How will we be able to “know” his voice from other strange voices?  How will I even distinguish Jesus’ voice from my own?

In John 10, Jesus talks about his “sheep” hearing his voice.  It is a metaphor with big implications.  He is speaking.  The “hear” is to give attention to, understand, or give ear to the teacher.  Do we?  Just like when I have said to my children, “Do you hear me?” by implication, I mean did they pay attention, understand it and ultimately do it.  I usually ask it because I am not getting the desired response. 

Are we like that?  We really have had God’s words spoken to us and yet He gets no response.  How many times has someone said about God’s written word, “I know but…” Or what I heard in class recently, “It’s so hard.” 

At first I want to ask, “What do you desire most to hear from God?” but I must remember the end of John 10:27:  “My sheep hear my voice and I know them.”  It is an intimacy marker – “I know them intimately,” “I know what they need.”  This causes me to reframe the question: “Do you trust God to give you what you need and are you listening for that?” Do you desire what God desires for you?  Can you hear and trust any direction or answer He may give?  This is what makes discernment an uninvited discipline.  We wanted our answers our way.  That is what we are listening for. 

It is then a spiritual discipline to call discernment “obedient” listening.  Samuel’s famous line, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening,” was only made when he mistook the voice of God for someone else and, thankfully, that someone else was his mentor, who knew to direct him back to God.  To do the same, be deliberate in your listening.  A deep and deliberate reflection of the times God has “spoken” to you in the past – through His written Word, a sermon or teaching, through godly counsel or prayer – can reveal the pattern by which God has operated in your life.  If you stay familiar with this pattern, then other voices are easily distinguished from God’s.  I have often recommended a journaling exercise of significant God-voiced and God-led events in a person’s life.  To see the pattern is revealing and can prove to be a signpost for when God is speaking next.

These answers and experiences with God should include not just obvious directives, comfort and guidance but answers that include NO, which I often take to mean “better than this.”  Many a person knows, in retrospect, the value of not getting something they thought they once wanted. 

It is also important to note times of silence from God.  Waiting in silence has great purpose in giving us a chance to grow strong and to be willing for God’s answer.  Silence can draw us in and causes us to grapple with the truth God has spoken and then to enact obedience,  to step into and follow His leading.  It also behooves us in such reflections of our history with God to note how we have responded to God when He has spoken.  Have we obeyed?  Have we desired to gain the full benefit of responding to His directives and insight?  Do we trust God enough to listen for what He desires for us?

At the core of the spiritual discipline of discernment is the desire to be near to God. It is the “knowing,” in its intimacy-building intent, that should drive our listening.  The sheep who hear his voice then follow into the field.  Those who are attracted to his voice follow closely, not running ahead or lagging behind, going no further than grace allows and keeping Jesus Christ, that familiar shepherd, at the center of life.