Spend enough time on social media, the blogosphere, and the daily, in person, interactions between human beings and you’ll find that our culture has become something quite scary. We live in a time where headlines prevail. It’s likely that 90% of the reason you clicked on the link to this article is because your curiosity was sparked by the headline. 10% may be because you know me and desire to read something I wrote.
We live in the information age, a time where we are confronted with articles, videos, commercials, and music that is just begging for our attention. In response, we have learned how to protect ourselves from information that isn’t interesting. News stations, news websites, and the like have discovered that what sells and grabs attention are things like: scandal, confrontation, tragedy, gossip, and simply flamboyant behavior.
It’s for this reason, to briefly dip our toes in politics, that a businessman whose campaign is focused on one simple message – people in Washington DC are stupid – has been leading in preliminary polls.
What gets our attention is not reasonable debate, but heated, emotional argumentation. And not only does it get our attention, but it also characterizes our behavior.
People have a really hard time in relating with and discussing with people who do not agree with them. There are great divides along the lines of politics, religion, race, gender, and insert whatever else ______. Instead of taking time to try and understand where another person is coming from, we exhibit knee-jerk reactions to points of opposition and turn what could have been a healthy debate into an emotionally charged argument that only furthers the divides.
A Practice That Our Knee-Jerk Society Absolutely Needs (And it should be automatic for Christians)
How often have you witnessed someone making a sweeping statement about a group of people? How often have you found yourself doing that very same thing about a group of people?
The culture in which we live, and unfortunately this has crept into the Church (Christians who make up the global Church), is so quick to let the world know what is on its mind, what is right, what others should think, that everyone has their mouths wide open with words spewing and no one has their mouths shut and their ears open.
This has caused the vast majority of people to refuse to listen and attempt to understand others. We are so stuck in getting our points and opinions across that we fail to listen to the ones we are trying to share our points and opinions with.
The only way we will see divides lessen is by us opening our ears before we open our mouths. [shareable]The only way we will see divides lessen is by us opening our ears before we open our mouths.[/shareable]
What I’ve learned From a Day and a Half of World Religions Study
Just yesterday (at the time of this being written) I began another semester of graduate school (Seminary). The class I am taking this week is on the World Religions. If we, as disciples of Jesus, are to expect to go into all the world and make disciples (Matthew 28:19-20), then we have to be able to understand where others from different faiths are coming from.
A principle or practice that our professor has shared with us is one that I believe would be beneficial to all people, especially Christians who desire to spread the Gospel of Jesus is this:
[callout][Epoche] – to suspend judgment until you understand what the other believes.[/callout]
Results of [Epoche]
If we strived to understand the other person or persons on the other side of the divide then we will be much better equipped in bridging the divide.
If I understand why a Muslim believes what he believes and why he practices Islam, I will be much better at introducing him Jesus. If I understand why a Buddhist believes what he believes, the same will be true.
This practice would benefit us all in every situation of life.
Instead of blowing up on social media because of something that happened, you may be more apt to try harder in understanding the person you desire to blow up at.
If anything, this will reduce the noise and allow for clarity to set into our discourse with others.
If you want to continue to have your knee pop out of its socket, then keep opening your mouth at every chance you get. But if you want to better understand another, then begin to practice [epoche].
