I once took an online counseling class where, in one recorded session with another student, my only job was to listen and give appropriate feedback through my body language and by summarizing what I heard. The session started and, in seconds, I was drawn in — not to the person speaking, but to the mini-screen in the corner of the recording that mirrored back my greasy hair (Why didn’t I shower beforehand?) and an alarming amount of lines around my eyes, which reminded me of the crinkly paper of an accordion (Remember to pick up eye cream from the store). Then, horrified at my half-listening, I started to nod my head a lot. And I mean a lot. The recording still makes me cringe. Good thing that was a practice session. I have a lot to learn when it comes to listening.
Listening is hard work. While our ears automatically welcome sound waves and ship them to our brains, it doesn’t mean we always hear other people. We might even wonder if listening well is worth the effort. There’s a lot of other sanctifying work to be done in our lives, and sometimes listening seems about as essential as a cup of decaf coffee in the evening. Nice and warm to hold in our hands, great with pie, but lacking zing.
Made to Hear
We have a long history with listening that makes it essential to who we are yet difficult to get right. Sarah Clarkson writes, “We are by nature a listening people. If we were spoken into being by the Word of God, then at our core we are to be listeners, and to attend to the word that spoke us into life” (Reclaiming Quiet, 30). Genesis 1 is “and God said” on repeat. Ten times, in fact. And what happens? The universe blooms into being like a daisy in the sun. Like two skilled dancers in tandem, God speaks and creation responds.
That is, until we ignored his voice. Adam and Eve may have heard God’s instructions for happy garden living, but they missed his heart (Genesis 3:1–6). Sin now wounds all our ears. We listen to the voice of God as if our ears were stuffed with cotton. We express our opinions without understanding (Proverbs 18:2) and easily grow “dull of hearing” (Hebrews 5:11). Instead of being quick to listen (James 1:19), we flap our lips without remembering how easily they snare the soul (Proverbs 18:17).
The stakes are higher than imagined. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in his book Life Together, goes so far as to call listening our “first service” to the body of Christ. He makes the case that in listening, we join God’s work in people’s lives, pointing to him as the one who “not only gives us his Word but also lends us His ear” (97). He says to those itching to teach and minister, “We should listen with the ears of God that we may speak the Word of God” (99). And he warns those who would rather leave listening to the world’s therapists and nice people: “Anyone who thinks that his time is too valuable to spend keeping quiet will eventually have no time for God and his brother, but only for himself and for his own follies” (98).
Worthy Work
Even still, why work on something as thankless as listening, especially when no one is guaranteed to return the favor? Maybe you’re tired of sharing something tender, vulnerable, embarrassing, and preciously you — only to have other people turn it to themselves, pick up their phone, never follow up with a question, or drum their fingers on the table. It’s easier to remember the last time we were misunderstood than really listened to.
So, is this thankless, possibly unreturned listening worth giving? The answer is always yes. Listening is worthy work. It’s an honor and privilege to see and handle what Paul Tripp calls people’s “fine china.” In hearing a person out, you experience that person in ways that would be otherwise impossible.
If we are commanded to “rejoice with those who rejoice [and] weep with those who weep” (Romans 12:15), then listening is the stairway to get there. We cannot honestly step into others’ joys or sorrows if we don’t take the time to hear them. Although the human heart is as deep and layered as the ocean, “a man of understanding will draw it out” (Proverbs 20:5).
In a word, listening is love in humble dress. When we offer our ear to another, we offer ourselves — and much more than ourselves. Faithful listening takes another’s hand in our own and leads this person to the Master Listener. We extend love by copying a God whose attention is never divided and who responds in a way that makes us exclaim with the woman at the well, “Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did” (John 4:29). We take our cues from him.
Our Master Listener
The Old Testament assures us that God hears his people from the pit, prison cell, and wilderness. Hagar came to know him when she was exiled from every ear but the Lord’s. She was heard in her moment of crisis and called the Master Listener “a God of seeing” (Genesis 16:13). Hannah, intoxicated by grief, was clearheaded enough to know that “when the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears” (Psalm 34:17). God heard his people in their wanderings and sent them food from the sky and water from the rock. He painted a rainbow of his faithfulness across the heavens, employed peg-wielding Jael to win a war, showed up in furnace and fire, and stopped genocide at the request of what some might call a beauty queen. God listens actively, moving to meet our greatest needs.
Move to the New Testament, and we see God’s exquisite listening with flesh on. Jesus heard the questions behind people’s questions; men felt the reality that “no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account” (Hebrews 4:13). When listening to the rich man, Jesus wasn’t charmed by his impressive obedience and knowledge of the law, nor was he blinded by the small talk of the woman at the well. Hearing them, he saw them completely. What disciple or Pharisee spoke to Jesus and wasn’t understood to the heart?
Even now, Christ lives to hear and intercede for us (Hebrews 7:25). So, since we have his ear 24/7, might we lend our ear to our brother for a few minutes? Just as we love because he first loved us, so too we listen because we’ve been listened to. And not lightly (with greasy-hair and laugh-line distractions), but in a way that fulfills our longing to be known. Someone gets us and hasn’t turned away. We can move toward others without demanding payment back because we have a God who loves to hear us out. Listening might be love in humble dress, but those who wear her are a sight for sore eyes in a world about which Ernest Hemingway famously complained, “Most people never listen.”
True, our listening will always be a garment with holes. But that’s no reason to quit. Our failures and inconsistencies will serve us if they make us more dependent on the only one with holy hearing.
Desiring God