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Why Hearing is Needed to Avoid Anger and Hate
August 31, 2019

We recently began looking at the concepts of hate and anger. Last week we saw how unbridled anger can grow into hate and we read a verse from James.

James 1:19-20
Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath: For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God.

Paul reminded the Galatians that is is through the hearing of faith that we receive the Holy Spirit and through the hearing of faith that ministers are able minister to the brethren. It is also through the hearing of faith that miracles are possible. Hearing requires the ability to listen and attend to other people. As used in Galatians, hearing is used beyond the physical act of hearing. There are many with no difficulties related to medically-diagnosed partial or total hearing loss that do not hear; these do not attend to the words and ideas of others. Conversely there are people with medically-diagnosed partial or total hearing loss that do hear; they attend to the thoughts and ideas of others. We are admonished to have the hearing of faith, the substance of things hoped for, rather than the works of the law, which is obedience to the law.

Galatians 3:1-5
O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you, that ye should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth, crucified among you? This only would I learn of you, Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? Are ye so foolish? having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh? Have ye suffered so many things in vain? if it be yet in vain. He therefore that ministereth to you the Spirit, and worketh miracles among you, doeth he it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?

Coupled with the ability to hear is the need to be silent. In order to hear another, you must be slow to speak, or silent. In our day of social media anyone can say anything online. When I was a teacher I had to learn to give time to students to explain their thoughts even if I could right away pick up an error in logic. When we choose to hear, we offer respect, and respect is missing by many in social media. When we choose not to listen, we have hardened our hearts. When two people have their hearts hardened against each other it started by giving up on hearing; both parties abandoned the idea of attending to the other person. Not hearing God becomes an abandonment of our relationship with God, and this all begins through the deceit of sin. It was this very reason why the adults of the children of Israel died in the wilderness. Listening to others, attending to their thoughts, even when we disagree or quickly find fault in their logic will reduce anger and hate for both us and the other person. It is not our place to shut up or shame another person for their thoughts. I've read the Bible and it is God who shuts up and shames people. We do God no favors when we decide to shut up and shame people in God's name, because it requires us to in our mind, to believe we have the mind of Jesus and God, that we have the right to punish like Jesus and God. All remaining for us would be to attempt to ascend above the heights of the clouds and become like the Most High. Attending to others does not mean we have to agree with them, we can politely and tactfully disagree; we have to hear.

Hebrews 3:7-19
Wherefore as the Holy Ghost saith, To day if ye will hear his voice, Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness: When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my works forty years. Wherefore I was grieved with that generation, and said, They do alway err in their heart; and they have not known my ways. So I sware in my wrath, They shall not enter into my rest. Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God. But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end; While it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation. For some, when they had heard, did provoke: howbeit not all that came out of Egypt by Moses. But with whom was he grieved forty years? was it not with them that had sinned, whose carcases fell in the wilderness? And to whom sware he that they should not enter into his rest, but to them that believed not? So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.

Today there are people who hate other people and these people hate thinking they are doing a God a favor. How can they love God Who they have not seen and hate their fellow man who they see everyday? By being swift to hear, slow to speak and as a result slow to wrath, we provide God with the ideal situation to grow His righteousness within us. Be swift to hear.

All verses are from the King James Version.
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