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As this is Labor Day weekend, I think it is fitting to talk
about work. Many things could be said, but I would like to suggest
that part of the primary work of Christians is listening. The
reason I say this is simple. We are told that we are to love.
For me loving involves listening. If the truth were known, I
think I have done my most important work as a pastor while I
was listening. This may sound strange for one who is called to
be a preacher, teacher and moderator.
Listening to someone else conveys that they are important to
you. It suggests what they think, feel and believe is of value.
Carl Rogers made this observation: "I have often noticed
that the more deeply I hear the meanings of people, the more
there is that happens. Almost always, when people realize they
have been deeply heard, their eyes moisten. I think in some real
sense they are weeping for joy. It is as though they were saying, "Thank
God, somebody heard me. Someone knows what it's like to
be me." (Lectionary Preaching Workbook, Series VIII,
Cycle B, Carlos Wilton, p. 219).
I think a primary way you can tell if people are in love is
by how they listen to each other. Most of us have no doubt laughed
at comic strips where one character is talking and the other
is reading the paper. The only problem is in real life there
is no humor in situations like this. There is nothing funny about
being ignored. It is a real gift to be able to help someone feel
like they are the only person in the world that matters to you
at that moment. When people are in love with each other they
pay close attention to each other.
Consider the characters in the Song of Songs or the Song of
Solomon—two names for the same short book of love poetry
that some feel doesn't belong in the Bible. Others try
to make it something it isn't by making it an allegory
about God's love for us. We need to understand and accept
that God created us as sexual beings and there is a proper way
for us to be sexually intimate. The problem is that over the
centuries we have distorted God's gift of sexuality and
turned it into its many perverted forms today. What Hollywood
and the Internet portray as sexuality is for the most part so
far from what God intended that even God wouldn't recognize it.
What makes the passage from the Song of Solomon so beautiful
is the intimacy of the conversation, the pleasure derived from
speaking and hearing the voice and the words of each other. The
senses of the characters are heightened to experience all that
is going on around them. This is not sex in some dark room or
forbidden places. This sexuality has not been pornified by the
world or prude-ified by the Church; it has been purified by God.
(The title of an article in "Homiletics", Sept. 2006,
p. 11) At the heart of this intense relationship there is a deep
sharing of feeling expressed in words both spoken and heard.
It should come as no great surprise that the authors of Genesis
have God create by speaking to the formless void and to the darkness.
They respond to the spoken word—a theme the author of
the Gospel of John picks up on in the prologue to the book. All
that comes into being comes through the Word. One can almost
imagine God creating by speaking loving words to the void which
responds to God's attention.
Look at how we treat new babies or pets. We talk lovingly to
them. Even plants are said to respond positively to loving words
being spoken to them.
The author of James reminds us we need to be quick to listen
and slower to speak. Too often I think we portray God as one
who does all the speaking giving us all sorts of commands and
directions. Maybe we need to experience another side of God,
the side that listens and understands and accepts without pronouncing
judgment.
We tend to project onto God what we experience in the world.
We wonder if anybody ever really listens in person. We go through
endless recordings directing us to the next numbers to punch
or informing us as to how we are to leave a message and all the
while all we want is a real person who will listen to us. Why
is it we become so frustrated when nobody will listen? I think
it has to do with feelings of rejection and unworthiness. When
no one listens the message seems to be that I'm not important.
Many of the victims of Hurricane Katrina were more upset that
nobody would listen to them than they were over lost possessions.
What is so remarkable and at the same time, disturbing about
this is all kinds of people were present to provide help. Most
of them were intent on doing what they believed was best for
the victims but few of them seemed to listen to what the victims
were saying. Some of the most poignant things I have heard from
those who went to help at the Gulf Coast were not stories of
what they did but stories of what they heard when they took time
to listen.
I believe James 1:22 is the verse that gets us into trouble. "But
be doers of the Word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves."
This verse has been mistranslated and misunderstood for years.
Of course it is necessary for us to put our faith into action.
We must be cautious that we are not just engaged in works for
the sake of the works themselves. Most often Jesus would listen
to people's stories about themselves before He would help
them. In several instances I believe He was the first person
to pay attention to those in need. The mere fact He would take
time to listen to them and to respect their life story probably
had a lot to do with the healing that followed.
I am presently reading a book by Donna Schaper who is a United
Church of Christ minister. The book is called Sabbath
Sense.
The title of the first chapter is "Sabbath, the new play
ethic — Dethroning the idol of work". On page 21
she writes, "Time without Sabbath, without separation,
is a time that is homogenized by anxiety. The simple name of
the anxiety is the Protestant work ethic — the belief that
hard work produces happiness."
It has reached a point where we now work at play. When God told
Noah and his sons following the Great Flood to "Be fruitful
and multiply, and fill the earth" (Genesis 9:1). God was
not saying "Now get to work and forget about Me."
God instead was assuring Noah and his family God would never
destroy them again. God was stating we are created for relationship
with God, with others and with Creation. We are to use the time
and resources given to us to establish and deepen these relationships.
One of the best ways I know to do this is to take time to listen
to one another. It may well be our most significant work as Christians.
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