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Quotations I love: A primary task of listening

Lynne Baab • Saturday May 22 2021

“One of the primary tasks of the listener is to stay out of the other’s way so the listener can discover how the speaker views his situation.” —Robert Bolton, “Listening Is More Than Hearing” [1]

Can you think of a conversation where you started talking about a topic, and after you talked about it for a while, your perspective changed? Certainly our perspective can change from hearing another person’s opinion, but sometimes, in one of those rare and beautiful conversations with a good listener, we find that our views on something change as we talk through it.

You’re probably familiar with the concept of...

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Quotations I love: Try softer

Lynne Baab • Wednesday May 12 2021

“If trying harder doesn't work, try softer.” —Lily Tomlin

“Trying softer isn't about knowing or doing the right thing; it's about being gentle with ourselves in the face of pain that is keeping us stuck. Because no matter how hard we try, we can't hate or shame ourselves into change. Only love can move us toward true growth. This is the love given to us by a gentle, kind, compassionate, good God — and the love we are invited to give ourselves too.” —Aundi Kolber, Try Softer

Our son Mike, a journalist, has done quite a bit of research and writing on the impact of stigma...

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Quotations I love: John Stott on pruning

Lynne Baab • Tuesday May 4 2021

The setting is the Urbana Missionary Conference, and John Stott is speaking daily about the Upper Room Discourse, John 13 to 17. I am a university student who travelled from the Pacific Northwest to Illinois during my Christmas vacation. I sit in that huge arena on the campus at Urbana, captivated by John Stott’s teaching. His exposition of the material in John 14 and 16 about the Holy Spirit completely changes my perspective on the Holy Spirit. Now I understand that the Holy Spirit is not some esoteric, mysterious force, but instead a person who I already know. The Holy Spirit...

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Quotations I love: Make it beautiful

Lynne Baab • Wednesday April 28 2021

“If it can’t be happy, make it beautiful. . . . I hope that, in the midst of your sorrow and the bleakness of what you’re facing, you can yet find a way to make it beautiful. . . . The pandemic has been an experience of powerlessness and sadness for most of us. It hasn’t been happy. But we can still make it beautiful.” —Samuel Wells, vicar of St. Martin-in-the Fields, next to Trafalgar Square and the National Gallery in London

I love Samuel Wells’s distinction between happiness and beauty. I find it easy to conflate the two. I have seen so...

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