Welcome to our Together on Mission podcast, where we seek to be with and like Jesus, as we begin a conversation with Jesus in the morning, through scripture, prayer, and meditation, and then continue that conversation with him throughout your day. Your host is Travis Twyman, the pastor at the Inland Vineyard Church in Corona, California. In this season of the podcast, we will be journeying through the Gospel of Luke, specifically looking for moments in the life of Jesus of the Master. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the daily Together on Mission podcast.
This is Travis, and we are in the Gospel of Luke, and you can turn to Luke chapter 6. We're going to read a very famous passage this morning in just a moment, but the title of the podcast this morning is Listen. Are you a person that listens? Really, really listens.
And often, instead of listening, we are simply waiting to speak, or instead of listening, we are trying to look like we are listening, but we're really just zoning out. Often we're pretending we are listening when we are really just guiding the conversation to where we want it to go. So the question is, are you a person that really genuinely, honestly, patiently, and sensitively, even when you don't want to listen, are you a person that listens? And this is a very good question, and it's one of the most practical and relevant and one of the most relational questions that can be asked.
Are we listeners? And this is a great moment in the teaching of Jesus. And honestly, and I don't say this often, but I'm going to say it about this passage. I believe this is one of the most profound things that any human being has ever spoken.
And although the word listen is not mentioned in what Jesus is about to say, this teaching is all about the power of listening. And I'm not so sure that there is a more profound relational tip that has ever been spoken in the history of the world. And so on one occasion, Luke chapter 6, beginning verse 41, Jesus of Nazareth says this. Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank, the log in your own eye?
How can you say to your brother, brother, let me take the speck out of your own eye? When you fail to see that there is a plank or a log in your own eye, you hypocrite, you actor, you faker. First take the plank, the log out of your own eye. And then and only then will you clearly see and then be able to remove the speck from your brother's eye.
So profound. Jesus says, brother, let me take the speck out of your eye, right? By talking, by doing a lot of talking and a lot of argument and a lot of convincing and a lot of coming at it from this angle and then coming at it from that angle. And if I keep talking and keep talking, I'm going to remove that speck from your eye.
And of course, I know that not all people that are bad at listening are talkers. We also have those of us that zone out or run away or retreat. And of course, that's just another form of non-listening. And of course, if we're in that camp, we, in addition to zoning out and not listening, will blame the incessant talkers that we are doing relationship with.
So everybody, no matter what, our wiring or personality or temperament, everybody is invited to truly listen. And there may not be a more powerful thing in a relationship. Now, a question that comes to my mind as I'm just kind of pondering and thinking through this passage is, what can I not see about me? What can you not see about you?
And the answer is plenty. There's plenty that I can't see about me. I've got this log in my eye. There's plenty that you can't see about you.
You've got this log in your eye. Now, of course, we can see the speck, so we think, in our brother, our spouse's, our child's eye. But what can I not see about me? Well, the answer is plenty.
And here's the truth, and I'm sure this is the case with you. It's the case with me. When I share with someone some aspect of my sin or my brokenness or whatever, no one gets out a piece of paper and a pencil as if this is new information. And they need to take notes.
They already know. In fact, they've probably been trying to help me see that aspect of my brokenness for quite a long time, but I wasn't listening. And maybe you haven't been listening either. Maybe you've been over-talking or maybe you've been zoning out.
You see, we really must listen in order to stay in reality and sometimes in order to stay in relationship. And I hate to say this. I probably hate to say this as much as you hate to hear it, but what we want to hear the least, we probably need to hear the most. So how well do you listen to those closest to you?
And how well would they say that you listen if I were to ask them? And I know, I know, I know what you're thinking because I'm thinking the same thing. It's not always convenient to listen. It's painful.
It's embarrassing. We want to defend ourselves. We want to attack. We want to speak.
We want to strike back, right? And also, you know, often a person will choose poor timing to speak to us, right, or they will not say it well. You know, there's always some excuse that we can find to justify a posture of not listening. So it's going to take a great deal of courage and a deep desire to grow in order to be a deep listener.
And when Jesus says, you know, we're paying no attention to the log in our own eye, that's just another way of saying that there's an unwillingness to listen. And therefore, what we pour all of our energy to is a speck in someone else's eye. Because when we don't listen, it really does distance us from people. It really does repel people because nobody wants to do relationship with someone that's unwilling to actually hear.
And when we are unwilling to listen, something will happen. We'll find that we will eventually be surrounded by people that have nothing good to say. And that's true. When we choose not to listen, we will find that we will eventually be surrounded by people that have absolutely nothing good to say.
And that's dangerous because we must have people around us that have good things to say. And we have a great deal of control over whether we have people around us that have good things to say. Because if we listen, we will attract people that will have good things to say. And that will include spouse, friends, teens, mentors, children, pastors, leaders, counselors, etc.
You know, people that choose to listen also at the same time choose to eventually have people around them that have very, very good things to say. And of course, Jesus goes on to say, don't be a hypocrite, right? In other words, don't be an actor. Don't wear a mask.
Don't act like you have it all together. Don't put on that mask. Not only is it a mask, but it's exhausting. It prevents deep relationship.
It prevents growth, right? Jesus says, first, allow the speck to be removed from your own eye. And the truth is that when we listen, it allows us to make much better decisions in life. I mean, if we don't listen, we won't have the information that we need to make good decisions.
And in order to make good decisions, we need good information. And not just about our environment, but we need good information about ourselves. And we simply can't get that information unless we choose to listen for the speck that is in our eye. And so, you know, Jesus then says, notice, then other people will be more open to listen to you.
He says, first, remove the log out of your own eye. Then you can see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye. Jesus says that other people are going to be more open to listen to you if you're open to listening to them. So we actually determine how open other people are to hear us by whether or not we listen to them.
So Jesus is saying in just an incredibly creative way, in this incredibly famous passage, Jesus is saying, listen, listen deeply in your marriage and listen deeply in your family and to your friends and in our organizations. I mean, imagine for a moment, let's just imagine for a moment before we have a time of meditation. Imagine a marriage, a church, a team, a business, a family, a dating relationship, siblings. Imagine two people or a group of people without a mask on, without over-talking, no zoning out.
Imagine power and the humor and the relaxation and the growth and the vulnerability that could result when people listen. So let's go for it. Let's fight for it. Let's be people that listen.
We'll talk soon. Thanks for listening to the Together on Mission podcast. We truly hope that you were blessed and encouraged by it today. If you had any questions about the Inland Vineyard Church, our ministries, or our Sunday services, feel free to connect with us on our brand new app, which you can find in the Google Play and the App Store.
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