A Gift Not Given
Theme of the Week: Attentive Listening
Randy Woodley
Monday, March 6, 2006
 1 of 1
Key Bible Verse: "Oh, that I had someone to hear me!" (Job 31:35).Bonus Reading: Job 19:7, 13-24
While in seminary, I was selected to join students from all the religious schools in the Philadelphia area in a "Jewish/Christian Dialogue" course. The idea was to break down barriers and create an atmosphere of mutual appreciation by exposing future rabbis, priests, and pastors to each other's thinking.
After each teaching session, we'd gather in small groups to discuss class content and exchange opinions and experiences. Each time the same tension surfaced.
The Jewish students needed to tell the Christians about the pain anti-Semitism had caused them. But time after time I watched the Christian students deny the pain of the Jewish students. Sometimes their responses even shifted from defensiveness to a bit of anti-Semitism. I hurt for those Jewish students because I saw in their pain the pain of my own [Native American] people.
When our stories aren't heard, it adds insult to injury. Until a wounded person can express his pain to a person who represents those who've wounded him, it's very difficult for him to get past it. With so much at stake, one of the greatest gifts people in the dominant society can give is listening from the heart when someone from a minority group is speaking from the heart.
—Randy Woodley in Living in Color
My Response: How good am I at really hearing what people are saying?
Adapted from Living in Color (InterVarsity, 2001) by permission.
Copyright © 2006 by the author or Christianity Today International/Men of Integrity magazine.Click here for reprint information on Men of Integrity. 1 of 1
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Lord, help me cultivate inner silence to hear Your voice—and what others are trying to tell me.
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