"Did you Hear What I Said"

“Did you hear what I said”, was a common phase I heard a lot as I grew up. Teenagers have learned the art of "tuning out” parents. We are old, we are dumb, we are out of touch, and we are an embarrassment to them.

Therefore they feel justified to develop selective hearing. The trouble is that many times that rolls over into adulthood. Being an ADHD person, I am many times guilty of hearing everything someone says, but processing only part of the information. It drives Lynnette crazy when she asks the question, “Did you hear what I said?” My brain heard every word and I can repeat back every word. Yet I have only processed part of the words and very little of the point of the communication.

We may hear what is being said, but we are sometimes too occupied in our own world by continuing to read the newspaper or watch whatever is on television.

I think God has a great sense of humor. He created us to be drawn to someone who may have a personality that is opposite to our own. What we found cute or attractive during the dating process becomes a communication issue after marriage. A detailed person and a outgoing carefree person can raise a lot of issues throughout the relationship.

It can develop to the point that we when communicating we tune each other out. Then we see couples going to desperate measures just to get the other person’s attention. When in a conversation, I use pronouns, instead of nouns, that can mean nothing to some people but I know exactly what I am trying to say. My weird mind had processed the data and in some cases my mouth expects other people to catch up.

Strangely enough both my children follow where I am headed when talking about a subject. They just say, “I know what he is saying, it’s Dad.” But this area of communication is something that I have to work on daily in marriage and business.

How do you communicate with your friends, spouse, and others? Do the differences in personalities contribute to a conflict? How can you be a better communicator? Do you really listen to what others are saying?

In this area of my life, it is a constant conscious effort to work on being clearer in what I say, and what I mean when I speak words, while at the same time listening to what the other person says.

An old philosophy question in college was “If a tree falls in the woods and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?”  Talking to yourself can never be construed as communication. That may be why couples are so often desperate for real communication.

Men, just because your wife is around the children all day does not mean she has ample communication for the day. She needs to converse with you. As one lady put it, “I need an adult conversation.” Communication will never happen if we are the only one talking or we are never listening.

The Lord talks to us daily through people and His creation. All He wants is for you to communicate with him. Our prayer lives can reflect how well we communicate.

Do we just tell God what is our selfish agenda or do we listen for Him to show us the life he wants us to live? Did you hear what the Lord said today?

Being a Hybrid

Well it’s spring again and for many people it is time to begin planting seeds for herbs and vegetables. Our family has a strain of green bean seeds passed from generation to generation which are called, “pure” seeds. These climbing beans give a lot of fruit when they are kept away from all the other bean seeds.

During the year, we would save one healthy plant for seeds for the next year. I was told by my dad to never plant these seeds next to any hybrid seeds. I had read that hybrid seeds were seeds developed by laboratories to give high yields and are pest, drought, and mold resistant. Therefore, as a young man on his own I did not listen to my father, and planted the pure seeds next to hybrids. The first year I had great results. I saved some seeds from that crop and the next year planted them and got good results. It was not until four years later that I realized that my dad was quite a smart man.

The plants were green and large and loaded with bloom. I gloated about what the harvest was going to be that year. When the bloom feel off there were no beans. The plants remained green but there was no crop. It was my dad who reminded me of how the hybrid seeds were produced. You take seeds from pure strains and mix them to get the hybrid. While the laboratories will develop a better seed for this year, you can not keep planting those seeds every year and get crops. The hybrid runs out.

The Lord created us as “one of a kind”, but we often take that to the point of thinking we can be pure in our lives and not need the Lord. It may be a season in our life or it could be a lifestyle. Nevertheless, we think we are like the pure seeds. If we keep ourselves away from television, radio, other people, and the world, we might remain pure. But, that’s not God plan for our lives.

When the Lord comes into our hearts, we become a part of Him. We are now hybrids that were bought with the price of Jesus’ grace and love for us on the cross. The trouble is we never get our lives renewed daily to keep the hybrid link strong. Instead we try and do things on our own time and time again until our strength is gone.

Make sure that you take the time each day to read, pray and just talk to the Lord. You be amazed how strong the hybrid relationship can be and help others desire such a hybrid relationship. 

Luke 18:27 . . . "What is impossible with men is possible with God."