Praying for our students through the year - day 12 (L) Listening

Let us pray for listening ears today. We have 2 ears and one mouth for a reason...mine just tends to be a loud mouth sometimes! Do we listen twice as much as we speak? James wrote to us in the New Testament we should be quick to hear and slow to speak, but in a me first world this can be a difficult thing to teach our children. Sadly many of us are quick to do right the opposite of what James teaches--we are quick to speak and slow to hear. We stop listening so that we can start thinking about what we are going to say next to win the argument or just to keep the conversation going. When our babies are born we treat them as if the whole universe revolves around them and they are the absolute center of our attention; later only to have to teach them it doesn't. We need to pray our children learn to listen to God's Word 1st and foremost. We need to pray they learn to listen respectfully to others as a way to show Christ-like love. We need to pray they learn to listen to their teachers and others in authority over them. God hears our prayers...HE listens to us...if God does that for us, we should do the same for others. (See 1 Peter 3:12) A sympathetic ear may be just what a brother or sister, friend, neighbor, or even stranger is needing and we may be in that conversation for such a time as this. "Hearing" is not always listening...I have been guilty of saying yes or no to my kids when they were little when I was distracted with chores later to think 'what did they just ask me?', 'what did I just give an answer to?'. Have you ever left being with someone and tried to remember what the conversation was about, or when multiple people are waiting to talk to you and you can't remember all the questions you answered?...if not, maybe that's just me and my distracted listening skills...The point is we can HEAR and not really LISTEN! Our kids are the same way. We need to pray for them to develop good listening skills. Depending on the situation, taking notes helps tremendously with my listening skills and keeps me from being distracted by my surroundings. If we never stop talking an learn to be a good listener we may miss the most important Still Small Voice one day. 1 Kings 19:11-13

Here are some tips to improve listening - pray for your children (or you, or me!) to improve in these areas:

1. Pray for the ability to truly listen instead of using the time the other person is speaking to form your next thoughts.
2. Pray for the ability to not interrupt the other person, learn to let others finish their sentences. 
3. Help your children learn good visual listening cues that shows they are active listeners (ie. nodding their heads yes or no).

"The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but a wise man listens to advice." Proverbs 12:15

"Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak" James 1:19a