How's Your Hearing? (Part 1)

Have you ever had someone tell you something and what you heard made you upset? But you later found out that what you heard was not what they were trying to say. Or have you heard something that made you, not just upset, but angry? Ok, If you have trouble self-reflecting, I ask that you think of someone else who has gotten upset or showed anger after "hearing wrong". I will talk to the "hearing wrong" term in a second, but doing thinking of situations like this reminded me of the James 1:19 which says, "Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger". This is a pretty deep statement in itself. How often do we star…I mean see others start to talk before they even hear a person finish their statement. I've heard it said before that God gave us two ears and one mouth for a reason. What I have found is that hearing a person correctly takes intentional effort from the receiver. Or as a friend of mine would say, it takes some intentionality. Intentional hearing also takes some "active listening" which is simply the receiver restating to the sender what they heard them say. When "active listening" is not done, we greatly increase the chance of us "hearing wrong" which directly effects emotions/feelings about the situation. Ultimately, what active listening is really doing is attaining understanding about what the sender is saying. Proverbs 4:7b tells us that though it costs all we have , get understanding. The question today is "How's your hearing"?