Today’s quote is from the book Spiritual Leadership, Principles of Excellence for Every Believer by J. Oswald Sanders. I highly recommend this book! Even if you are not a leader, it has principles that apply to all believers (as the title suggests). Here is an excerpt on listening:
To get to the root of problems, a leader must develop into a skillful listener. Too many strong personalities are compulsive talkers. “He won’t listen to me”, complains a missionary. “He gives the answer before I have had the chance to state the problem.” To many people, sympathetic listening is inefficient – merely waiting until someone else can state a point. But genuine listening seeks to understand another without prejudgment. A problem is often half solved when it is clearly stated. One missionary casualty moaned: “If only he had listened to me, I needed someone to share a problem.” Leaders who want to show sensitivity should listen often and long and talk short and seldom. Many so-called leaders are too busy to listen. True leaders know that time spent listening is time well invested. -J. Oswald Sanders
Recently a blogger friend Tim had a post on being a quiet presence in a time of need. Advice is often not helpful. Hope you’ll check it out. It is called Flying Lessons.
Thanks for the shout-out, Laura. I love that Sanders book. I must have read it 25 years or so ago, and now you’ve got me thinking it’s time for a re-read.
Tim, I read the book about 5 yrs ago and I want to re-read it also. I frequently stumble upon quotes and excerpts from this book in various places.