Listening

On Sunday I began a new ‘mini series’ called ‘How then should we live?’ Week one, for those that missed it was focused on Leaving. One of the dangers of any public speaking is that you might throw out some really grand sounding ideas but don’t actually give people something practical to bring the idea into view. I thought as part of my musings this week I might offer a simple practical tool to help us in our spiritual journey.

One of my favourite Psalms is very easy to find and also fairly easy to memorise and work with. Psalm 1 is just before Psalm 2 at the very beginning of the Book of Psalms!! It’s so small that I can even spoil you and put it in right here:

Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the
wicked

or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of
mockers.

But his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and
night.

He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in
season

and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does
prospers.


Not so the wicked! They are like chaff that the wind blows
away.

Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the assembly
of the
righteous.


For the LORD watches over the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked
will perish.

A man named Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy once said: ‘As soon as the gospels were written , speech without experience began to dabble with the new facts proposed by the Church … People tried to think the new life without being touched by it first in some form of call , listening, passion or change of heart.’

Psalm 1 is useful for us to slow down and begin the process of ‘spiritual listening’. It begins with ‘Happy’ or ‘Blessed’ are those who do not ..’ There is a progression of ‘follow, take, sit’. Another progression calls us to delight and meditate while one more gives us tree, fruit and prosper.
I would encourage you to spend some time reflecting on this simple little Psalm. You might ask yourself the question: What is it that I give my attention to? What do I follow after, what path do I take and where do I sit and immerse myself most easily? What is it that gives you pleasure and what are the keys that guide and control your life?

This Sunday I am looking at the matter of listening. We sometimes read the Bible without really listening to it. We try to enter into the story when somehow we need to learn how to let the Story enter into us!

Can I encourage you to spend time with Psalm 1? It can be a very useful opening to what is known a ‘lectio divina’ – divine reading. Too often we read the Bible simply as a means of learning something. It is a gathering of information and once gathered we move on. It is worth the effort to learn to chew things over – meditate! Jesus’ meeting with Nicodemus in John 3 is a good yarn but is worth ruminating over for more than the few minutes it might take to read the story: ‘The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you don’t know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.’ It’s worth a few minutes to let your mind wander over these words.

If you are thinking, ‘John, I don’t have time, I’m too busy.’ Then you may be right – you are too busy!

Cheers - John