We’ve got a cell phone remembering challenge in our church services right now. Three times in four weeks. Once with the person unable to figure out how to make it stop.
(None of them have been quite as odd as the rooster crowing ringer that went off awhile back when I was preaching. I was in the last three sentences, the ones where my meanderings for the previous 29 minutes finally come together. And a rooster started crowing. I was sure that I hadn’t betrayed anything.)
I was thinking about how we could respond. We already put up slides and from time to time make oral announcements. We could escalate the warnings with images of phones being smashed or people being embarrassed or both. But the emphasis ends up being on the phone, on the disruption.
What if we focused instead on listening. The phone ringing isn’t a problem because phones are a problem. Or because it’s rude. The problem is that I have the attention span of a gnat. The problem is that I want to hear, that I need to hear, the message that my friend has been working on all week, the message that God often hands him to aim at my self-centered heart.
We’re not trying to build a culture of politeness in church. Those of us who teach or preach often don’t care about polite. What we care about is connecting with people who want to listen.
As I was thinking about this idea of wanting to listen, I thought about Zacchaeus, a guy passionately aware that his focus on work was leaving him empty. So he found where Jesus was and climbed a tree to be able to see him. Incredibly impolite and undignified. But Z didn’t care. He wanted to listen. And Jesus connected.
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Here’s a “I want to listen” video draft I made. I’m curious about what you think. And don’t forget to turn your phone off this weekend.
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joseph ruiz
Quite a convicting word Jon, not because my cell phone goes off, typically I put it on vibrate because I am conditioned to do that before just about any meeting. My problem is the gnat attention span. I so desparately need to listen, to focus but my mind keeps darting in so many directions. I hear about a challenge like the cell phones and immediately start thinking of ways to solve the problem. Sometimes we have to solve problems – sometimes we have to lean in to the discomfort and see the bigger issue. Like the person with the ringing phone I too am often that unaware of my lack of connection with God/people.
I am continuing to read Maximum Faith by George Barna – I need these reminders of my weakness, lack of patience – of my need to listen and to obey.
Thanks for this Jon
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Jon Swanson
Thanks for the reminder to lean into the discomfort. I was thinking today that sometimes there isn’t an easy way out. Sometimes we just have to work through.
Sometimes there are problems. Sometimes there are mysteries.
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Lyla Lindquist
Jon, my phone went off at the monastery during day prayers one morning. I hadn’t given it a thought because I don’t get a signal back in the hills, but for some reason, that day I did. It was only on vibrate, but in an empty stone room? I may as well have had the rooster in the seat with me.
But I like this. The issue isn’t the object of my distraction. It’s my own heart, my own willingness to continue to listen through it. That is a thing I so desire to cultivate. Thanks for this message today.
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Jon Swanson
Lyla, I can hear it. In the silence, even little noises are loud.
And sometimes I spend all my energy on eliminating the noises. Rather than listening.
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Joanna Paterson (@joannapaterson)
I liked your video very much. Maybe it would be an interesting thing to show at church? I’m not sure what on earth you can do to stop the phones ringing though.
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Jon Swanson
It may well be shown. But because some people from the church I attend are here, I’m looking at this as showing it in church, 🙂
Interestingly. I was working a funeral today and the phone of a close family member went off. At some point, we can’t stop it. But we can change our reactions. Or better, I suppose, I can change my reaction.
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Jon Andrews
Thank you for this. You put into words exactly how I felt in the gym Sunday. Sunday I needed to listen, I needed to hear.
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Jon Swanson
and Jon, it was good to hear you on Sunday.
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cjhinx
I have heard about a painting with a dove perched on a branch amidst tremendous chaos. The title of the painting is called peace. This message made me think of that painting. There is often tremendous chaos going on around us– in worship and in life– where we need to block it all out and find the place of peace, and yes listen. That is what I need to do right now.
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cjhinx
Sorry, the painting is called, “Peace in the Midst of a Storm” by Jack E. Dawson. The other correction is the dove is enclosed in a small inlet of the rock–much as we are enfolded in the arms of Christ.
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Jon Swanson
interesting. Is peace an abstraction, or is it a contextual thing? Peace, as opposed to peace in the middle of a storm. I home you find some time this weekend to listen.
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