18th Sunday after Pentecost
September 23, 2018
30[Jesus and the disciples went on] and passed through Galilee. He did not want anyone to know it;31for he was teaching his disciples, saying to them, “The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again.” 32But they did not understand what he was saying and were afraid to ask him.
33Then they came to Capernaum; and when he was in the house he asked them, “What were you arguing about on the way?” 34But they were silent, for on the way they had argued with one another who was the greatest. 35He sat down, called the twelve, and said to them, “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” 36Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, 37“Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.” – Mark 9:30-37
A few years ago I was trained by the Lombard Mennonite Peace Center in conflict transformation for churches. Since then I’ve had the opportunity to lead a few mini-workshops for congregations on general conflict transformation skills. Which in large part are really about listening. One of my favorite exercises is one where we get everyone in the room into groups of three:
One person shares a personal story or talks about a topic of interest. Another is supposed to listen and paraphrase back without adding commentary, questions, or personal responses. The third person is there to observe and notice whether this actually happens. Most people can’t do it. Most people as the listener, when it is their turn to paraphrase, instead ask questions to get more information, talk about something in their own life that relates, talk about how they would feel in that situation, or simply be unable to recall much of the detail of what the other person has said. In one sense it’s an artificial setup. And yet, it’s telling to me that so many of us haven’t learned to listen without judgment, problem-solving, or inserting our own thoughts and ideas into the conversation. We fail to listen, and it gets us into all kinds of trouble.
The disciples, as usual, are great examples for us, not as heroes of the faith, but as human models for what we do all the time. For the second time now Jesus has predicted his suffering, death, and resurrection. . Jesus has explained to them what it means not just to be the greatest but to be God’s anointed one, to be the Messiah, the savior. And they took notes on his lecture, packed away their composition books in their backpacks, and walked out of class not contemplating this profound mystery but instead arguing about who was the greatest as if they hadn’t heard a word Jesus said.
One piped up talking about how much time he had spent with Jesus. Another about how much better he understood Jesus’ teaching than the others. Another about how much better he had done when they all went out on their own. Another about how devoted he was to prayer just like Jesus. And I think what might have started out as a little bit of a competitive conversation turned into quite the argument in which each ended up convinced he was the greatest disciple of all. They heard what Jesus said, but they clearly didn’t actually listen in a way that made them understand what it was all about.
What’s troubling is how often it happens that we hear but don’t listen:
This week we had a national conversation about who we were going to listen to when allegations were made about sexual assault against a supreme court nominee. Ignore the details of the high profile positions involved and the timing of the allegations, and what we were arguing about is whether and how and when we were going to listen to someone naming her painful experience of assault. Whatever the facts of the case, whatever the right outcome most people have already made judgments about what is right before hearing out the details. For far too long we have erred on the side of failing to listen to those experiencing abuse and violence. We fail to listen to stories when they put us at risk for changing our established opinions about things.
I was reminded this week of the way in which so often those who are older and those who live with dementia are ignored and not listened to. So often people are treated as less than human, people who have nothing to say, to offer, to contribute. We dismiss their conversation as irrelevant or untrue. It’s unconscionable and yet it’s the reality that many people live with every day. It’s hard work sometimes to listen through a dementia patient’s speech to understand at least the feeling they want to communicate. Sometimes even without dementia we dismiss our older neighbors, mistakenly thinking they don’t have something important to contribute. And yet we miss so much when we fail to listen.
And for all the ways we lift up and protect and honor children in our own culture, that has not always been the case. And even today I am struck by how little we sometimes stop and listen to the voices of children. It happens in everyday kind of ways. Just yesterday I was having a conversation with our toddler. She was trying to tell me about something that was important to her and I listened long enough to guess what she was telling me, which, of course wasn’t right at all. She was actually trying to tell me about an interesting detail she had observed three days before, a detail my adult brain had learned to tune out as part of the background. But I assumed that I as the grown-up knew what she was saying and kept trying to redirect her to what I understood the conversation to be about – until I stopped and reallyactually listened. And with a toddler learning to express herself, no matter how hard we try, that happens a lot.
But what about all the voices of kids we have ceased to listen to in really important ways? The voices of children who play games that have no winners and losers. The voices of children who wonder about deep mysteries and ordinary details. The voices of children who see what we fail to see because of our busyness. The voices of children who demand our attention and care. The voices of children who are hungry and afraid. The voices of children who are abused and neglected. The voices of children who are trapped in cycles of violence and poverty.
As adults we get busy. Sometimes like the disciples we are busy arguing about who is the greatest or busy striving to become the greatest even if we won’t admit that’s what we’re doing. And sometimes we’re just convinced we know what is right and that we don’t really need to finish hearing someone else out. Sometimes we just don’t want to listen to the things that challenge us to new perspectives and new ideas, things that push our boundaries and make us change.
But that’s exactly what God lifts up as a vision of the kingdom: not an award to the greatest disciple, not even himself as the one who listens perfectly, the one who gives up his life for the world. It’s the image of a little child and the person who listens. That’s our call: to listen deeply to one another.
That’s my call as your pastor – to listen to your stories and maybe in doing so to help you hear God at work in them. That’s our call together as the church in this community: not to make assumptions about what people need or want but to listen carefully to what they actually say they need from us as the church. That’s our call as human beings: to listen one another in ways that remind us who we are as beloved people.
Because that’s who God is – the one who listens. God listens not to catch us in our less-than-great moments, but to really understand us as we are. I imagine that to God we are so often like small children who are still learning to talk, still learning that there is a world beyond ourselves. And God pauses – every time we speak – to listen. Not just to nod and say, “uh-huh, uh-huh, yes honey,” but to drop everything else when we speak, hang on every word, help us along as we struggle to name our deepest needs and hopes and fears to God. That’s what is means to really welcome a child, and that’s the kind of welcome God has already given us. So come as children, and let us offer to God our songs, our prayers, our thanksgiving, our meal together. And receive that generous welcome from the one who promises to hear our every word and gather us in to the one kingdom that truly is the greatest.
-Pastor Steven Wilco
Stewarding the Word 