This coming Sunday we will conclude our three-part series of adult forums on Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Life Together with a discussion of his chapter on “service.” My hope is that this session will lead us into a deeper conversation about what “service” looks like at Holy Trinity. And by “service” in this context, I mean all the concentric circles of serving one another—service in our individual relationships, service to our church, service to our community, and service to the wider world.
In having this conversation, I hope we can model what Bonhoeffer names as “the first service” Christians owe one another—and that is the service of listening. I find what Bonhoeffer says about the ministry of listening to be both profound and underappreciated. I invite you to take a listen:
“The first service that one owes to others in community consists in listening. Just as love to God begins with listening to His Word, so the beginning of love for brothers and sisters is learning to listen to them. It is God’s love for us that He not only gives us His Word but also lends us His ear.
So it is His work that we do for our brother or sister when we learn to listen to him or her. Christians, especially ministers, so often think they must always contribute something when they are in the company of others, that this is the one service they have to render. They forget that listening can be a greater service than speaking.
Many people are looking for an ear that will listen. They do not find it among Christians, because these Christians are talking where they should be listening. But he who can no longer listen to his brother or sister will soon be no longer listening to God either; he will be doing nothing but prattle in the presence of God too.
This is the beginning of the death of the spiritual life, and in the end there is nothing left but spiritual chatter and clerical condescension arrayed in pious words. One who cannot listen long and patiently will presently be talking beside the point and be never really speaking to others, albeit he or she may not be conscious of it. Anyone who thinks that his time is too valuable to spend keeping quiet will eventually have no time for God and his neighbor, but only for himself and for his own follies.” (Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together, chapter 4).
I hope to see you on Sunday!