This guy walks into a fancy restaurant in downtown Chicago to meet an old classmate and when he gets to the door he’s stopped by the doorman and told, “SORRY, SIR, BUT YOU CANNOT ENTER THIS RESTAURANT UNLESS YOU’RE WEARING A NECKTIE.” The guy kind of panics, knowing this old friend is probably in there waiting for him. He runs out to his car and checks the back seat and then the trunk, hoping maybe there’s an old necktie he can use. There is nothing in the trunk but a set of jumper cables. He decides maybe that’ll work and fashions a necktie out of his jumper cable. He returns to the restaurant and the doorman looks him over and says, “I GUESS YOU CAN GO IN, BUT DON’T START ANYTHING!”

Where’s a rim shot when you need one? Ba dum bum. Can you think of anything you have tried to start lately? Maybe a rock band or a basketball team, or a neighborhood program to feed the hungry. Or have you decided, “Now that I’m retired or, because of my busy schedule, I’m happy to join teams and causes, but I really don’t want to get involved starting anything.” Fair enough. But those excuses only goes so far, don’t they? That fact is, it’s never too late to start something. Need some examples? How about these gifted people who spent their 30s in the completely wrong profession. Julia Child worked for the federal government as a spy in her 30s. Andrea Bocelli was a lawyer, and Martha Stewart was a stockbroker in her 30s.

And how about a couple of famous late starters. Laura Ingalls Wilder didn’t write her first book until she was 64! And the most famous example: Grandma Moses didn’t start painting until age 76, and then only because her arthritis was so crippling she could no longer hold an embroidery needle. Over the next 25 years she created over a thousand paintings, dying at age 101. But let’s not ignore a couple of significant late starters used by God. Abraham was 75 years old when God first approached him about having a baby, which would lead to being the father of a new nation. And things didn’t move quickly after the announcement. Sarah made arrangements with 4 different OBGYNs before finally getting pregnant and giving birth to Isaac some two decades later.

The key here is, Abraham kept listening to God. And then there was Moses. 80 years old when God told him he would become the leader of the Hebrew people. It took some convincing, but once Moses believed and trusted, he was able to stick it out for 40 years of wandering in the wilderness. And let me tell you. This was some first class wandering. One of the many things that strike you when you visit the holy land, is that this sojourn of Moses and the Israelites from Egypt to the promised land of Israel, they could have covered the trip in 6 months. But God led them in a zig zag pattern, to say the least, for 40 years. God started something with Moses, and for all those years Moses kept trusting and listening to the voice of God.

Isn’t that really what faith is? God speaks and we listen? That’s easier said than done, isn’t it. Because most of us tend to talk too much – talk talk talk. Women lead the way when it comes to talking on the phone. When Dawn is on the phone with our daughter or one of her sisters, at the hour mark they’re usually just getting warmed up. But men can monopolize a conversation pretty well, too, especially when we think we’re more knowledgeable on the subject than the other guy. And even when we’re not talking, we’re not listening. Instead, we are trying to think of what we’re going to say when the other person slows up enough for us to break in.

What a contrast to our Lord, who in all history had more right to speak with authority than anyone. Yet, how often do we find the Gospel accounts recording examples of Him listening! He listened to Nicodemus, that powerful and proud member of the Pharisees. Jesus knew what the problem was right from the beginning, but He listened. He heard him out. He listened to Peter, patiently, even when Peter was making a fool of himself or digging himself deeper. He listened to the woman at the well without rushing to judgment.

Jesus was the consummate listener, and even now He listens to our heartfelt prayers, our sometimes selfish requests, our demands and our tearful pleadings and He hears every word because He’s truly listening. What frustrated our Lord during His ministry and still today is the difficulty He has in getting some reciprocity in the listening department. How does Jesus get US to listen to HIM?

Remember those tearful words of Jesus as He looked out over the city of Jerusalem from his perch on the Mount of Olives? “HOW I LONGED TO GATHER YOU TOGETHER,” Jesus said “AS A HEN GATHERS HER CHICKS UNDER HER WINGS, BUT YOU WERE NOT WILLING; I WANTED TO CLAIM YOU AS MY OWN FOR ALL ETERNITY, AND YOU WERE NOT LISTENING.”

Consider this case history that appears in Dr. Paul Tournier’s book. THE STRONG AND THE WEAK. It is the case of a family in which there were father and mother and several children. The father had a problem with one of his daughters, a little girl who was immensely shy and unable to express herself outwardly. The father and his other daughters were all very outgoing, so that her behavior just didn’t make any sense to him, even though he tried to understand. On one occasion he gave his quiet little daughter a present. It was a beautiful little glass elephant on a gold necklace. He put it down on the table in front of her and told her, THIS IS FOR YOU. The daughter was overwhelmed, which naturally left her speechless. Her mouth dropped open and she stared at this beautiful thing which, as Dr. Tournier editorialized, “shone more beautifully than any star of Bethlehem because it symbolized her father’s love for her.” She sat there just staring at this gift and not speaking. She finally got up to go and try to tell her mother what had happened. When she came back she was stunned to see the shining elephant dangling from her sister’s neck. The father said, in an offhanded way, “YOU DIDN’T SEEM TO WANT IT SO I GAVE IT TO YOUR SISTER.”  Didn’t want it?! “He wasn’t listening! She thought to herself. He wasn’t listening to the joy of her silence.”   And now years later she was in therapy trying with her analyst Dr, Tournier, to trace back to the tragic feeling she had that no one was listening all of those years.

The lament of Jesus over Jerusalem is heartbreaking:  “I wanted to gather you like a mother hen. I wanted you to know me, to listen to my Word and receive the power of faithful living. I wanted that for you, but you wouldn’t listen.” And the parable of the prodigal son, too, reminds us the God allows us to ignore Him. That wayward son insists his father give him his share of the inheritance because he has decided to go his own way……and the father lets him. It breaks his heart, but the father lets him. When we turn from the will of God, turn a deaf ear to the call of God, He lets us. Would that it were not so, but God lets us. Because without the gift of choice we could never know true love or faithfulness or authentic worship and praise.

Even though we may stop listening, though, God doesn’t stop calling. The One who wants to gather us all under His wing never stops calling us, hoping that our eyes and ears will be reopened to Jesus, the light of the world.

May we all be determined to start something, and to do so by talking less and listening more. Listen more closely to our children, to that special person we see last before bed and first when we wake up. Listen to our loved ones, and especially, listen to our Lord. AMEN.