Site
Contents
 |
General Information about the Area Office
North Indiana Conference Office
South Indiana Conference Office
Prayer Guides
(Courtesy of the NIC Prayer Team)
Area United Methodist
Foundation
For resources to assist your congregation in welcoming guests,
click here
Seashore District Volunteer Center VIM project -- Completed
Hoosier United Methodist News Archives
| Hoosier United Methodist News |
April 2002 |
Pay Attention
Pay attention! It is an admonition recalled from my childhood. Parents, adult family members and even teachers would admonish me continually to pay attention. Prone to daydreaming, my mind would wander in the classroom or living room. I especially remember those times when I was receiving instruction on some particularly unwelcomed task. My father would often say, "You're half-listening!"
Pay attention! Half-listening! Both suggest a less than full measure of one's presence -- physical, emotional, mental and spiritual. It is to miss the moment! Or the times! Or perhaps not fully engaged in either.
Sometimes it is obvious and other times it's subtle. Frequently it's deceptive. The body is present but the mind elsewhere. Or the heart.
One of the characteristics of this phenomenon is that one can be "absent" and others believe he or she is really present. It gives the impression that you are "here" when you're "there!"
The greatest failing, of course, is that one misses, or is not aware or involved in what is taking place -- what is happening, what is being said or done. Awareness is absent, fully or partial.
Some have heard the words, "You're not here!" And knew indeed they were not. Whatever was taking place all around them, the sounds, the sights had no existential impact on them because they were "elsewhere." They were both present and absent simultaneously. Half-listening or not listening at all -- called back sometimes with the words "Pay attention!"
At times, not paying attention has insignificant consequences. In most instances, the cost is high. So much so, that new jargon has come into our vocabulary. The term "listening skills" suggests that the way one pays attention impacts competence and effectiveness. And relevancy.
One simply must pay attention! It is one of the life skills. Survival itself may depend on paying attention.
Interestingly, The Book of Discipline when describing the skills needed by a Bishop indicates, "Reading the signs of the times … " In other words, pay attention!
Maybe Easter is God's way of saying to the world, "Pay attention." It may well be that God determined that the human family still didn't get it. So many ways God's love and caring for us was manifested yet not fully appreciated. Perhaps this event, the resurrection event, would get the world's attention as no other. God may have tired of our "half-listening," or appearing to listen when were not at all!
|
One simply must pay attention! It is one of the life skills. Survival itself may depend on paying attention. |
And so once again, God decided to God!
To put hope back into hope and eternal life into life! Dramatic and conspicuous, unmistakable would be this Pay Attention.
And when we heard, and saw, we said our own Pay Attention with the shout of, Christ the Lord is risen today, Alleluia!
World Pay Attention!
Church Pay Attention!
Saints Pay Attention!
Sinners Pay Attention!
Christ the Lord is risen today, Alleluia!
Pay Attention!
Last updated on 01/14/2004