Watching People

Many times, after sending off my article I get emails back asking the same question.  They ask; “Where do you get your ideas?” Now, the spiritual thing to say would be, “God gives them to me”. As true as this may be, I am also moved to say that I just watch people. When I was very young, I was pretty introverted.  Still am if you must know. Being like this, I soon developed a routine. I would just sit in the background and watch people. This trait probably came from my father’s mom. Grandma was also quiet and I remember going to her apartment and the two of us would sit side by side and listen to everyone else talking. She would whisper occasionally, “You learn a lot more if you just sit and listen.

So, today I sit and listen. Listening to people when they are right there in front of me. Listen on the phone as those who need someone to talk to calls, or someone has something important to share with me. With modern technology, this listening comes with reading what others are writing me about. It’s been a while since I have received a letter in the mail or even written one myself. I guess our need to listen really has something to do with having one mouth and two ears.

The internet avails us to more voices than could ever be imagined just twenty years ago. In the quiet of my office I decided to do a couple of searches this morning to find out what people were talking about. Here is what I found. If you type in the word God, you will get one hundred fifty eight million sites that talk about God in one way or another. Seventy six million sites talk about Jesus.  While I was at it, I typed in my own name. Now don’t tell me you haven’t done that. It comes up 5 times and if I type in my nick name, only once.

This undeniably tells me who is most important, and it’s not me. It also tells me like the two ears and one mouth thing, that I need to talk more about God than about myself. And that is why I listen. Listen to people as they share their story and listen to God when He shows me something in life that can impact all of us and He wants me to share it. Now you know. There is always . . .

Something to think about.

Rob