Active Listening

So lately I've been wondering how in the world to get people to listen. Not an easy thing to do. Marketing people try a whole host of strategies. Humor, Sex, Volume, Trickery, Bait and Switch, Lavish Promises, etc. Then there is the media who try to sensationalize things and drum up juicy stories that are sure to whet our appetite for more, more, more.

But in reality, I think it all becomes such a great cacophony of noise, that in reality nobody is listening anymore.

So now that all of these idiots have gone and made so much noise about useless products and non-newsworthy sensationalized stories, what is the church to do? When we actually have a message worth hearing, how do we get people to listen?

Not only that, how do we communicate within the body? How do we get the attention of the Church and direct them to the very real problems in the world? How do we get people to care when their ears have gone deaf from the noise?

Here are some suggestions, but I'd like some feedback in order to flesh this out further.

1. Limit your exposure. Determine how you are going to get fair, balanced, accurate, and comprehensive news coverage and leave all other options untouched.

2. Create a focus area(s). Find a very small set of issues that matter to you and/or you can/want to do something about and read everything you can about them.

3. Get involved in the areas that matter to you. In the end this is what matters. After all, no news story can ever portray the truth you can find by getting involved.

4. Talk with others about the things that interest you. Word of mouth is still the most powerful way to spread a message.

5. Keep it all in perspective. We are ever and always on Kingdom business. Our involvement in the world is Christ's work in us. We need to be fired up with His passion and His perspective. We need to spend lots more time in Prayer and in the Word than we spend elsewhere.