Pastor’s Monthly Reflections
Pastor Ron Hartman
Pastor’s Reflections:
May 2012
Have you seen the current television commercial that centers on a romantic dinner? Well, it’s supposed to be a romantic dinner. The problem is that while the woman is talking, the man is doing something else and she knows it: “Did you just check the game on your phone?” The man tries to squirm his way out of it: “What? No! What am I, like, some kind of “summoner” who can just summon footage to his phone like that?”
What’s good for the sports fan (being able to stay in the loop almost anywhere) can be bad for relationships. As any good marriage counselor will tell you, nothing is more important than listening. As any parent can tell you, few things are more frustrating that someone you love failing to listen. What you’re listening to — whether it’s your spouse, parent, or a baseball game — is where your attention is. And where your attention is says a lot about where your heart is.
So to whom or what are you listening? Who or what are you loving? Now that Easter Sunday has come and gone, spring is calling us outside and with summer on the horizon, what things are calling us and laying claim to our time? I hear the fish jumping and it almost seems as if I can hear my garden (or at least the weeds) growing. What are we listening to and what does that say about us?
When asked what the greatest commandment is (Mark 12:28-30), Jesus responds by quoting Israel’s central confession of faith, the Shema, which Jesus adapts from Deuteronomy 6:4-5: “Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.” Note Israel’s confessional order: the first thing you do is listen; the second thing you do is love.
Listening and loving. After all, the two go hand in hand. Listening itself is an act of love. When you listen to someone, you give them your attention to the exclusion of other voices. Jesus is reasserting Israel’s ancient claim that the Lord God is the One (and only) who deserves our unwavering attention.
With such attention comes the natural response: love. We love God with all that we are — hearts, souls, minds, and strength. We dedicate our lives to this One who has brought us forth from our exile in the wilderness of sin and death.
For Jesus, this brings a correlate (from Leviticus 19:18): “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” When we listen to God and learn to love the One who has given himself for us, we learn to show such love by listening for the needs of those around us and loving them in and through these needs.
If God deserves our love, then we need to show it by faithful worship, and acts of charity. Come and worship. Show your parents; show your children by your actions that you are listening to God. Show your God your love by your presence in worship and in your good works. Don’t be distracted by other voices.
See you in Church,
Pastor Ron