Listen

The other day a friend of mine called she was very upset, but wanted to thank me for my friendship. She was going through a rough time with one of her friends who honestly was not being much of a friend. This friend of hers was threatening to reveal some secrets to my friend's husband. While I don't agree with some of the things my friend has done, I could never imagine doing that. I tell her what I think and the Godly way to handle things and leave it at that. I listen to what she needs to say when she's upset and many of the times I don't try to force her to do something different as many other people would try to do.

When I think about people wanting their friends to listen and just console them by listening to them, I think of Job. He wanted his friends to listen to him, and all they did was tell him he must have sinned greatly against God and made him angry. Finally in Chapter 21 verse 2 Job tells his friends "You can console me by listening to me. Bear with me and let me speak." Job wanted his friends to just shut up and listen to his despair. Sometimes we need someone to listen to our pain. When I dealt with cancer all I wanted was someone to listen to me when I wanted to rant and rave. Our friends want the same thing. They want us to listen to them when they need an ear.

One of the greatest ways we can show the love of God is to console our friends and family by simply listening to them. Who wants someone to constantly tell them when they are doing something wrong or trying to give them advice all the time? Wouldn't you want your friends to just listen to what you need to say so shouldn't we do the same for our loved ones? Job was in such despair and his friends weren't very consoling, instead I think they just made matters worse, and made Job feel even more depressed. They never once tried to lift him up or just listen to what he had to say. God needs us to be a source of comfort for the people in our lives, and part of that is to just shut up and listen.