James 1:19 says that everyone should be quick to listen and slow to speak. In my life I found that the opposite is usually the case. Everyone is ready to tell what they think, but not so quick to listen to what someone else is saying. People are more interested in themselves and what they think and say rather than listening to someone else.
I saw a statistic years ago (I don’t recall where) that stated 85 percent of communication is listening and only 15 percent is speaking. Poor communicators are actually poor listeners.
Most people don’t realize that listening is an active skill, not something passive. People will say they are listening to music, but in all probability they are simply hearing the music. A true listener is listening to the tone quality of the instruments, instrumentation, chord structure, the variations in volume, the balance between the instruments, the pitch and intonation of the instruments and vocalists, and so much more. Most people just hear the music and pick out a few words or phrases. Often people will tell you they like a certain song but they can’t give any reason for their choice. I guess what I am saying can be summed up from the words of almost every American Bandstand comment in history, “It’s got a good beat and you can dance to it.”
Listening is so much more than just hearing. Listening is an active effort to put the person speaking as the highest priority in your life at that moment. How often do we ignore those who should be the closest to us? How often do we fail to stop what we are doing so we can truly listen to our children? Do we give our undivided attention to our spouses so we can fully hear what they are really saying?
If we want our relationships to be stronger, we have to focus on our listening skills. We have to choose to focus on what those around us are saying and be more concerned with hearing them than with our speaking. So often we think we have to have an answer for everything right away, but actually it is better to give pause, think and respond appropriately. This greatly helps prevent hoof-in-mouth disease.
The Bible gives a lot of good direction for relationships and communication with others if we will only put it into practice, but this passage is not only to be applied to listening to others, it is to be applied to our hearing God either through His written Word or through the still small voice of Holy Spirit. I believe most Christians don’t hear God’s voice because they don’t take the time to listen. Our world is a fast paced, get-it-now world, and the art of listening to man and is lost in our lifestyle.
I believe God speaks to us all the time but we don’t hear Him because we are not listening. John 10 is the “Good Shepherd” chapter, and in that chapter Jesus tells us His sheep (Christ followers) will hear Him and know His voice. This is a promise to all who believe, that we can hear Jesus speaking to us, but we have to listen. We have to tune out the world and even tune out our own thoughts and begin to listen to what God would speak to us. He’s speaking if we will listen.
Psalm 37:23 states that the “steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord.” I believe this teaches that God orders the steps for everyone of His children, whether we listen and follow in those steps or not. I have plans for my children–sometimes they listen and sometimes they don’t. It is the same way with us as Christians. God has a plan for our lives but He allows us to choose to follow the plan, or not. I am confident that if we begin to hear His voice more clearly, with less distractions, and then respond obediently, we will have far fewer problems in our lives.
Psalm 119:105 states “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” Putting this with the verse in Psalm 37 I believe we can see God directs good steps for all of His children, and if we will take the time to listen to (read, meditate upon) God’s Word, it will light the path so we can see the steps clearly and make fewer mistakes.
How important it is to listen and not just hear. James also writes, “Be doers and not hearers only.” Don’t just hear the Words, but do them. Don’t just hear but listen. We may say that we expect our children to listen to us. That means more than just hearing us. We expect them to hear what we say and then act upon it.
May we act upon the Word God teaches in both our personal relationships with our fellow man, but even more importantly in our personal relationship with our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
