Hearing vs. Listening

To be honest, one thing that really annoys me is when someone says “Hey how are you?” and I reply with “Good, how are you?” loud enough for them to hear… but they never respond, they just walk away or continue what they were doing previously. I understand that people are busy, and have a lot of things running through their minds at once but I ask this because I genuinely care how people are and want to build a relationship with them.

The definition for hearing is a process or function of receiving sound. The definition for listening is paying attention to a message in order to hear it, and responding physically or verbally. These two things are so different from each other, as we saw from the example above. If the people that I interact with respond by saying “I'm doing good, bad, alright, etc”, that's listening, and responding to a question. 

These situations remind me of how we can be as people towards God. I think sometimes we hear God say something to us and just go about our day, and do not respond or even think about what He has just spoken. We should always be listening, and responding to what God has for us, and speaks to us, because I promise that everything that he puts on your heart, and speaks to you is so important. 

“Give ear and come to me; listen, that you may live. I will make an everlasting covenant with you my faithful love promised to David.” - Isaiah 55:3

We are to listen to what God says in order to fully live life. Listening to God, and spending time with Him is one of the most important things ever. So through this blog, I hope that this is a lesson, or a reminder to always listen to what God has to say, and not just hear Him.