Every single day we all encounter various people in which we communicate with. Over the years the basic communication from the mouth has evolved from things such as the Morris code into talking over the phone, email, text, video calls, instant messenger, Twitter, Facebook, and mail. These forms of communications has taken up more than half of our everyday lives for just social, business, or even spiritual reasons. Now I think that I can speak for everyone in saying that communication (electronically or verbally) always has mishaps. Sometimes communication goes south when we literally cant understand someone or we choose not to understand them. When we fail to connect to others fully it is because we don't listen. Just having some ones attention does not mean that they are listening to you. And to listen to somebody is to be engaged into the conversation or situation with respect.Ultimately in the end the person should be able to give their honest opinion about the situation. Unfortunately this normally isn't the case with our relationship with God. When we talk to God we normally miss a huge part of the communication, we don't understand first. We need to first understand in order to be understood. To put our own agenda aside to listen to another almost seems unthinkable to us. In order to focus on some one else's agenda you need to be able to focus your determined on an outward force. Now you might think to yourself, why is it so important that i understand God before he understand me? Well that would be like saying why do I need to pay for my takeout before I eat it? When we take the time to calm down and listen to God we get the most of the advice for the situation. Which ultimately allows us to apply that advice to go about the problem in a different way. When you actually listen to God or somebody else you go into a state where your mind is free from the chatter of the world and the agitation of your emotions. Clearing the mind allows you to view your altercation in a whole different light that may have been the right way all along and you didn't even know it. But once we don't tune out of our own little world we get sucked right back into our own world were we stop listening. It is hard to listen deeply especially with God since we cant verbally talk to him in person, because it takes courage to listen. This week I challenge you to listen to God and actually understand what he is saying to you ask him for guidance. Have the courage to not only listen to God but listen to those around you and they will listen deeply in return. So don't let the signal between you and others go bad...make sure its always going strong.
Food for Thought: A good listener is not only popular everywhere, but after a while he knows something."
~Alan Lurie
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