Taking time

THERE are many versions of the story about the military orders which had to be sent by a series of radio relays

It was in the days of crackly old headsets and not every word was accurately heard. The Field Commander had asked the first radio operator to send the message: “Enemy advancing on the right-flank…….Send reinforcements……..We’re going to advance.” By the time this request reached Command Headquarters it read: “Enemy advancing with ham-shanks……. Send three and four pence……..We’re going to a dance.”

This story may be apocryphal, but it illustrates how words are often misheard and how messages are misunderstood.

Politicians will tell you that you can’t be too careful with what you say, because there is always someone ready to make capital. The sound bite has become such an important way of communicating that the context in which things are said is seldom respected and many a career has been cut down to nothing because of something said out of turn or deliberately misconstrued. Even more serious are the times when medical consultations include conveying to the patient both a diagnosis and a prognosis. In good faith, a doctor will outline the illness and spell out the treatment, but all too often the message is misheard or misunderstood. The lesson is simple; no one should assume that what is said - is what is heard. You can’t be too careful when it comes to the business of communication.

This, of course, is not something new. At the beginning of the gospel there is the story about Herod being told of the birth of a new king, however, he makes no effort to establish what this might mean in reality; instead he immediately assumes that there is a threat to his power and orders a drastic response.

Misunderstanding followed Jesus throughout his life. At a critical point in his ministry he asked his disciples to tell him what people were saying about him and he got a range of answers: “Some say John the Baptist, some Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” Clearly, they had heard him, but had they got the message?

The only way to find out was to frame a direct question - not a question about what others were saying; instead a question that would test whether the disciples themselves had understood the message and the intent of his ministry. So Jesus asks: “Who do you say that I am?” Prone to engaging his mouth in advance of engaging his brain, Simon Peter is quick to declare that Jesus must be the “Son of the living God.” This is a pivotal moment in the gospel narrative. It is at this point that Jesus declares he will build his church on the rock and the revelation of Peter’s confession. But it also marks the moment when Peter, having got ahead of himself, is rebuked for his crass misunderstanding of what lay ahead for the Son of the living God.

Peter, like everyone else, had seen the actions and heard the words of Jesus, but somewhere between the teacher and the disciple the message had been misinterpreted and misunderstood. Jesus knew that he was on a collision course with the powers that be and he warned his disciples that they were walking headlong into an ordeal that would end with his arrest and trial and death. This wasn’t what Peter had deduced from the words of the man who had persuaded him to give up his trade as a fisherman; somehow or another Peter had only got a hold of half of the message.

We all need to take the time and the effort to check for consistency between what is said and what is heard. This simple truth applies to the way in which we hear the gospel just as much as it applies in the doctor’s surgery or in our conversations with family and friends. ¤

This article appears in the March 2020 Issue of Life and Work

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