Today's Lenten Meditation : Listening is a Door

You listen,

as the forest listens to the wind,

as the ocean hears the river.

You listen to someone, not just their speaking

but their being.

Your listening is a door,

through which they enter you.

The more fully, openly, spaciously you listen,

the more of them comes in,

what they're saying and not saying,

and can't say, what they may not even know

until they hear it being heard.

The door that is your listening becomes

the whole space, a house, a temple.

It holds the world.

In this temple, beneath the words,

beneath the cries and silences,

you hear the voice of God—

without words, a wind. A music,

enveloping all, the full sound.

In someone's story, even their pain,

is the world's vast joy and agony.

In your listening the whole sanctuary

resounds with the glory of God.

~Steve Garnaas-Holmes