Standing on the Promises: Wisdom's Child has a Listening Heart

This week's readings:  1 Kings 3:4-28. Psalm 119:126-136, Matthew 6: 9-10

What would you ask for if God asked you, as God asked Solomon, “What do you want?  Ask me anything and I will give it to you”.

What would you say?

Solomon asks for wisdom - our translation says a “discerning mind.”  The Hebrew is literally a “listening heart.”

Solomon asked for  wisdom, not so he will have the prestige of being known as a wise man, but so he can govern his people with justice. He asks for the wisdom to have the heart of God, to love those that God loves.

Solomon asked for a listening heart. A heart that listens to God's own heart.

It's my prayer too.  God, please give me a listening heart.

A listening heart....

A listening heart so I can listen to all sides of an argument

• To hear those places where we are in agreement,
• That sometimes our goals are the same, but the way we go about reaching those goals are different,
• and coming to compromise.

A listening heart enables us to come to comprise

A listening heart to hear beyond those who are unwilling to compromise, unable to let go of their hate,

• to hear the fear hidden underneath,
• Or to hear the alignment with the gods of greed and power and one’s own good laying underneath the hate.

A listening heart to stand up for justice when it's being denied.

A listening heart to hear beyond my own experience

• to hear the experiences of others who do not experience events the same way I do,
• to recognize that they often experience my blessing as oppression,
• and to come to the knowledge that all too often, instead seeing myself blessed to be a blessing, I fight to keep those blessings to myself.

 A listening heart to align with the marginalized and vulnerable, the ones that God loves so dearly.

A listening heart that can hear

• those times that the things I want are in line with what God wants,
• and those times when I want things that are not in line with God’s will,

A listening heart that re-aligns my heart with the heart of God, instead of spinning the truth to make my wants seem like what God wants.

God, please give me a listening heart.  Amen.

Solomon, out of all the gifts he could have asked of God, asked for wisdom. 

What would you ask of God?