Adventures in Prayer: Listening to People

Ok, so this post is not technically about prayer … and it’s not about the book on prayer, but it’s about an insight into life that has been pulsing in my heart, that came out of a teaching about prayer.

I’m talking about listening. Last year, I took a counseling class (amazing class!) at Multnomah and we spent week after grueling week learning about effective listening skills. Who would have thought it was that hard?! It is! We are a culture do not listen. We interrupt, finish people’s sentences, look at our watches, get distracted, one-up each other’s stories or constantly draw the conversation back to ourselves, or plan what we’re going to say next while the other person is still finishing their sentences. Today, I started a class on Communication skills for ministry and part of what we talked about was … (hey, let me finish my sentence!) … listening. Then, we had our prayer class today, which I think will probably be the most life-changing class I’ll ever take. Dr. Blom did an exercise. First he had one girl talk to him for 2 minutes about whatever she wanted. He sat across from her and listening intently, saying “mmhmm” and “oh” and all the appropriate listening cues, he nodded and showed emotion and truly cared. Then, he had Jeff talk for 2 minutes about Dutch. As soon as Jeff started talking and sharing, Dr. Blom started glancing at his watch, then he looked at the floor, stood up, shuffled around, looked through some papers, glanced at the clock on the wall, fidgeted some more … you get the point. After one minute Jeff finally said, exasperated, “Forget it! You’re not even listening. I quit.” (He knew what Dr. Blom was doing but it still riled him up.) Dr. Blom went on to explain how sometimes we think that God listens to us like that and our prayer life is affected.

Afterward Jeff and I had a long conversation about listening. Thankfully, neither of us feels like God does that with us. We know He loves us and listens to us intently, but what struck us was how few people we know who truly listen. Like, I can count them on one hand. Secondly, and what’s really scary, is that some of the worst listeners, perhaps the worst listeners, are often pastors! Now, there are a lot of pastors who are great listeners, and I am not pointing fingers because I am one of the worst listeners and that’s why I’m focusing on this area, but it almost seems that the “higher up” the person is, the worse they are at listening. In seminary, I can think of one particular professor who always listens intently and it always amazes me. Even when he’s busy, rushing to teach a class, he’ll stop for a second, and when I’m talking, he’s all there–he’s genuinely listening and engaged in what I’m saying. But some of the spiritual giants in my life, some of the most amazing, wise, godly people I know are some of the poorest listeners. Why is this?

Mostly, I think it is because people are just so busy. Pastors and ministry workers have so many people and there are so many needs that they cannot possibly listen to everyone. But I think what God’s challenging me to do is to be all there when I’m with someone. Tom Jones (some of you know Tom from Corvallis) probably does this better than anyone I’ve ever met. Tom could be rushing to class, but if you stopped and talked to him he was all of a sudden in a zone, his eyes tunneled into yours, he was actively listening, scrunching his eyes in concentration, nodding, “uh-huh”-ing, and taking in every word as if you were the only person on earth. That is amazing to me. I told Jeff, probably more than any other means, I am shown love by someone listening, truly listening, to me. When we finish other’s sentences, say things like “yeah yeah” or “I know, I know” we are basically communicating, “I already know what you’re saying and I don’t love you enough to listen to your thoughts.”

To further illustrate this concept: When Jeff and I got home from seminary tonight (after 10 straight hours of class! Whew!) We ran in the door and cralwed down on our hands and knees to go tackle Dutch and smother him with kisses. Instantly, he wanted to “tell” us all about his day. Now he doesn’t know English yet, but he babbled and babbled, pointing at things and gesturing, and clearly “telling” us all about his day. Of course we listened intently, saying “really?!” and “wow!” and “that’s great, Dutch!” soaking up every word. Did we gain any new information from him? No! Did we already know what he was saying? Yes, gibberish! But did we still actively listen? Of course! Because we absolutely cherish him and love him and want to communicate that to him by listening to him. It is the same with God and it should be the same with us! How amazed people would be if we truly listened to them!

So, my goal is to be known as a listener. I may not be the most insightful, wise, amazing person, but if I can listen to people, then I can communicate love to them better than all the wise quotes in the world. I pray that we as ministry leaders and servants of God can learn to truly listen to people, to communicate to them, by our actions, “I love you enough to listen to you. I value your thoughts and ideas. I care about what you have to say.” I think we would see walls crumble down around us and hearts transformed before our eyes. Let’s try it, shall we?