Listening

A good speaker senses what is wrong with their audience and Paul got it right.

I have a lot more to say about this, but it is hard to get it across to you since you’ve picked up this bad habit of not listening. (Hebrews 5:11a, MSG)

Listening means to concentrate on what someone else is saying. It means to pay attention and to take something into account.

It takes effort. Have you ever tried to get a child to go to bed? Three or maybe four times you say, “Johnny, get ready for bed.” Nothing happens because Johnny is not listening. But if you say “I have a bag of potato chips here” all of a sudden Johnny’s ears are working.

Have we been listening to our teachers, our leaders or are we hearing just what we want to hear?

By this time you ought to be teachers yourselves, yet here I find you need someone to sit down with you and go over the basics on God again, starting from square one—baby’s milk, when you should have been on solid food long ago! Milk is for beginners, inexperienced in God’s ways; solid food is for the mature, who have some practice in telling right from wrong. (Hebrews 5:11-12, MSG)

Prayer-God, we are ashamed for we have only been listening for potato chip news, the good things we want to hear. Help us pay attention. Amen.