“Listen, Israel! The Eternal is our True God—He alone. You should love Him, your True God, with all your heart and soul, with every ounce of your strength” (Deuteronomy 6:4-5, The Voice).

When asked about which is the greatest commandment, Jesus quoted this verse. In essence, the first and most important command from God to us is to LISTEN.

To listen is more than just to hear. It’s more than just to accumulate more information.

When you listen, the object is to take what you hear and to put it into practice.

Jesus’ ministry was filled with invitations for us to listen. Note how many times He said things like “let those who have ears, let them hear.” He meant more than just hearing what He was saying. Many people heard Jesus’ words but did nothing with them and so remained untransformed by them.

What Jesus meant (and still means) is to take in His words with the intent of obeying them. To have knowledge disproportionate to our obedience will lead to an inability to receive new truths.

I confess that I’m not always the best listener, particularly when it comes to listening to God’s voice. I try to sit in the silence and be still, but my mind goes into overdrive. Random songs pop into my head, as well as snatches of conversations. It’s almost like when you have an old-fashioned radio that’s in between two stations.

To hear means to take in sound through your ears, but to listen is a discipline. You could say it’s an art. To listen to God better, you simply need to live out what you know for sure that you’ve already heard from God.

Loving God means listening to His words and allowing them to transform you. Loving people as you love God means listening to their stories and letting God’s light shine into them.

May we all learn to listen well.