Listening (Matthew 17:1-9)

Who do you listen to?

We are surrounded by a lot of voices saying different things to us. We all have people in our lives, such as family members, friends, teachers, employers or colleagues, who say various things to us or about us. There are voices in the media that are constantly communicating different messages to us about ourselves, the world around us, and how we fit into the world. Social media can bombard us with an almost infinite number of voices expressing their opinions about a wide range of topics and issues. If we were to spend all day every day listening to them, we still wouldn’t be able to listen to all of them.

With all these voices speaking to us, which ones do we listen to? With so many voices around us, they can become background noise, a constant buzz of opinions and viewpoints which are always there but we never fully pay attention to. There are some voices, however, that stand out from the rest. It might be because they speak louder than the rest, or they say something which we connect with, or they represent a different perspective from the rest. It becomes important to pay attention to the voices we listen to, what they are saying and how their words shape us, because the voices we listen to play an important role in forming our beliefs about who we are, what we’re worth, where we fit and what our lives are about.

In the story of Jesus’ Transfiguration in Matthew 17:1-9, Matthew tells us that after “Jesus’ appearance was transformed” (v2 NLT) and “a bright cloud overshadowed them” God spoke from the cloud and said, “This is my dearly loved Son, who brings me great joy. Listen to him” (v5 NLT). These words echo the words that our heavenly Father spoke over his Son at his baptism in Matthew 3:17 with one significant difference. God told Jesus’ disciples, and across the centuries he also tells us, to listen to his Son.

In a world that is full of different voices saying so many different things, we might not feel like we need another voice to listen to. However, there is a crucial difference between the voices of so many of the people around us and the voice of Jesus. Most of the voices we can hear in our lives often tell us what we need to do, how we can be doing better, and what they want from us. We can hear voices telling us who we need to be, that we don’t measure up, or that we’re not good enough. The voices of the world, especially in the media or social media, can set unrealistic expectations on us, make us feel unhappy about ourselves or our lives, and promise us something better if we buy their product. So many of the voices we can listen to end up making us feel worse about ourselves when they tell us what we should be, criticise us when we’re not, and then tell us what we have to do to make ourselves better.

Jesus is different. He doesn’t come to say things to us to knock us down or tell us what we have to do to make ourselves or our situations better. Instead, Jesus comes to speak words of grace, peace, hope and love to us that build us up and give us life. This is what the Apostle John was talking about when he wrote that “the law came through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ” (John 1:17 NIV). One way we can understand “the law” is that it tells us what we should be and what we need to do to reach that. It puts the responsibility and burden on us to get ourselves and our lives together. Grace, on the other hand, is what God promises to do for us to make us the people he wants us to be. Grace is God’s promise to us in Jesus to give us what we need, and to be at work in us and through us so we can find the greater peace, joy, hope and love he offers us through faith in his Son. Ultimately, the voice of Jesus doesn’t burden us with demands or expectations. Jesus’ voice lifts those expectations or demands from us so we can live in freedom as God’s dearly loved children.

We can hear Jesus speak these words of life-giving grace to us throughout the Gospels, the New Testament and in the whole of Scripture. Jesus promises to give us rest (Matthew 11:28), peace (John 14:27), freedom (John 8:36), and a full and abundant life (John 10:10). Jesus speaks words such as “neither do I condemn you” (John 8:11), “Father, forgive them” (Luke 23:34), and “I am with you always” (Matthew 28:20). The disciples knew that Jesus’ words are the words that give eternal life (John 6:68). His words have the power to make people clean (Luke 17:14), restore us in our relationships (Luke 7:15), and raise the dead to new life (Matthew 9:23-25; Luke 7:14,15; John 11:43,44). Listening to the voice of Jesus isn’t just about getting advice on how to live or being told what to do. Jesus’ voice speaks life-giving words of grace to us that have the authority and power to give us strength, comfort, hope, joy and a life which is stronger than anything that might try to harm us in this world, even death itself.

Learning the unforced rhythms of God’s grace (Matthew 11:29 MSG) begins with listening to Jesus’ voice. God instructed Jesus’ disciples to listen to his Son from the cloud because his is the one voice in the world that speaks life-giving grace to us. We find the grace that we need in the words of Jesus. Hearing Jesus’ words of grace to us then gives us the capacity to learn the unforced rhythms of God’s grace in our relationships with others.

To help us learn to listen to Jesus’ voice and hear his words of grace to us, over the six weeks of Lent we will be offering times on Wednesday mornings at Gnadenfrei and evenings at St Peter’s to gather together, listen to Jesus’ voice in the words of the Bible, and learn to listen for God’s grace to us and to others through us in his Word. As we learn to listen to Jesus’ voice and hear his life-giving words of grace to us, not only will our faith in his grace for us grow, but the Holy Spirit will equip us to extend the grace we find in Jesus to the people around us.

There are lots of voices around us, and sometime even within us, that we can listen to. What are some of the voices you listen to? Do these voices speak goodness, grace, peace and life to you, or something different? By learning to listening to Jesus and hearing his words of grace and truth to us, not only will we find a deeper and stronger faith in God’s grace to us, but the Holy Spirit will shape us into more grace-giving people as we learn the unforced rhythms of God’s grace for us in the voice of Jesus.

More to think about or discuss:

• Do you find it easy or difficult to listen to others? Why is that?
• What are some of the voices you listen to? Do they build you up or knock you down, give life to you or take life from you? How do these voices do that?
• What do you think about the idea of listening to Jesus’ voice in the Bible? What do you find good about that? What do you find challenging or uncomfortable about that? How can we help you listen to Jesus’ voice in God’s Word?