Review: The Listening Life

The Listening Life: Embracing Attentiveness in a World of Distraction

by Adam S. McHugh

Ken Lehman, (from Ministerial Meeting, 12 June 2019)


Adam McHugh’s Background

At the time of the writing of this book (2015), Adam McHugh was an ordained Presbyterian minister and spiritual director. He has served at two Presbyterian churches, as a hospice chaplain and as a campus staff with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship.

Adam McHugh’s Thesis

Based on James 1:19, “Be quick to listen, slow to speak,” Adam McHugh’s asks the question: “How would our relationships change, and how would we change, if we approached every situation with the intention of listening first? With God? With others? With creation?” His thesis is that “listening ought to be at the heart of our spirituality, our relationships, our mission as the body of Christ, our relationship to culture and the world.” (14)

Why I Chose This Book

I chose this book due to it being assigned as the third book in the Spiritual Direction course that I am taking with the Gaultieres. I am grateful that it is part of the course because I find myself now being more intentional to listen to those that God brings into my life daily, as well as listening to Him and what is going on in me.

Best Quotes

  • “Listening makes us into disciples – those who learn, who follow and who submit to the Lord. And listening also makes us into servants”…”servants are obedient listeners.” (21)
  • “Listening is who God is. Jesus abdicated his heavenly throne, emptying himself of power and privilege, in order to become a servant. That is why listening is so central to the gospel; it is the indispensable attribute of a servant.” (37)
  • “I believe a key difference between God’s voice and the sinister voices we sometimes encounter is how they ask questions. The tempter asks questions to divide and provoke, but God asks questions to elicit dialogue, a true give-and-take, and he is genuinely, even astonishingly, interested in our responses.” (43)
  • “What do you want me to do for you? (Mark 10:51). Has the world ever known a more beautiful question? This is the question of a servant. It is the question that Jesus puts to all who long for healing, and he listens for our response.” (45)
  • “I listen to the Bible, not solely read it. I listen into the Bible and meet the God who is already there.” (97)
  • “Creation may first present itself to us as art for the eyes, and we are grateful that the Artist chose a palette dripping with colour and light and wonder, but slowly we can come to understand that creation is also a feast for our spiritual ears as we make ourselves available to the messages God whispers through it.” (112)
  • “All the best listening happens when you sit with others.”(135)
  • “Good listening starts with the scandalous premise that this conversation is not about you.” (143)
  • “The truth is that your listening style reveals your lifestyle.” (150)
  • “In listening to people in pain, it is not your job to pull them out of the storm. It’s your job to get soaked with them.” (161)
  • “Good listening is slow; anxiety moves fast.” (166)
  • “Listeners weep and then heal.” (174)
  • “Discernment is a testing, a sifting through of internal experiences – not only the purely “spiritual” but also the emotional, rational and physical – for the sake of embracing the good and turning your back on the bad.” (176)
  • “How you listen to yourself will determine how you listen to others.”(178)
  • “AHEN: Anger comes from a Hurt, which comes from an Expectation, which comes from a Need.”(189)
  • “What if, instead of coming to church to be preached to, people came to be heard? What if the body of believers was known less as a preaching community and more as a listening community? What if the church was a group of people where the power dynamics of speaking and listening were inverted?” (203)

Personal Application

My journey of becoming a good listener as a follower of Christ has been lengthy, yet so fulfilling. Reading this book has so fuelled me to live the rest of my life known as a good listener whose priority is to communicate an understanding of others by how I listen to them. The final paragraph that McHugh ends his book sums up my going forward in listening.

“Listening is a gift. It is a gift from God to us that speaks intimacy; that helps us grow into servants and disciples; that promises constant learning and self-discovery; that helps us never lose the childlike gift of being surprised; and that assures us of guidance and the awareness of God’s presence. It is a gift that God offers – in the staggering discovery that we offer others, an open invitation to receive whatever they choose to share with us.” (214)

I will embrace the gift of listening!