LOVE LISTENS

Matthew 26:34 - Jesus said to him, “Truly I tell you, this very night, before the cock crows, you will deny me three times.”

What a change in tone in Jesus’s response! He went from a vague suggestion of desertion to blunt specificity in trying to get Peter’s attention. Jesus is trying to teach the disciples in these last few moments of their time together before he is arrested, and Peter is interrupting with his protests. Jesus’s switch in tone and wording is his attempt to warn Peter that he’s sliding down that slippery slope to the unpardonable sin of calling “good bad and bad good.” Peter is clearly not listening. Will he listen before it’s too late?

Will we listen?

Will we listen not just to our God (however we see God), but to ourselves, and to each other? Because that is the first step to self-awareness as well as to communion with others. Listening, really listening is hard. I’m not talking about listening closely in order to refute what a speaker is saying. Listening only to refute is so common, I don’t even need to offer an example. You can probably think of many on your own.

What would happen if we began listening to learn?

By listening to another person with the goal of learning a bit more about them and the way they see the world, how many arguments could we avoid? We often have fixed pictures of others in our minds. That’s why people can surprise us; we often don’t update those pictures. Listening to learn helps us see how people are changing – or not. Listening to learn builds community.

It also requires a mindset of humility, a recognition that no matter how smart or well-informed we are, we don’t know everything. There is always more to learn and there are always more ways to grow in loving others.

On the flip side, humility also requires us to question whether what have we learned is actually true. What is that we might need to unlearn? For example, many of us learned that in America, anyone could be whatever they wanted. If a person wasn’t rich, they didn’t work hard enough. Of course, that only applied, and still only applies, if you’re an able-bodied, cis-het white male. All others face barriers erected to keep them down. Misogyny, racism, classism, homophobia, and ableism; all these attitudes translate into real barriers for those who fall into one or more of these categories.

Was that something you needed to unlearn? What about the idea that Americans are exceptional? Or that individuals don’t need others – otherwise known as individualism? What about the idea that women don’t like sex? Or that Black men are lazy or criminal? Or that Social Security Disability pays people enough to live on. These ideas and attitudes cause real harm in people’s lives; sometimes even killing them.

Given the prevalence of these harmful and hurtful attitudes, listening for what we can learn from another is an act of love. It requires humility but also being present to the other person’s words and body language. Love listens to understand and connect; to build community.

Love listens and calls us to listen as well.

Will we?

B