While I never started counting, I am sure I would have lost track of the number of times I’ve asked my kids, “Are you listening?” Like most kids, they’ve heard what I’ve said, but they have not done what they have been asked to do. They have heard, but they have not (yet) listened.

James writes, “My dear brothers and sisters, take not of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, because human anger does not produce the righteousness God desires.”

There was a time where I thought this verse was encouraging believers to care enough about the people around us to where we listen and seek to understand before letting our voice be heard. That’s not a bad principle, but I’ve come to see this passage in a different way.

First, James is concerned about anger in the passage. It’s not just about listening or speaking- but about the anger that people in the church are exhibiting. In chapter four of James, it appears that the church is fighting and quarreling with each other. Believers desire what they do not have and consider murder (!) as a way to get what they deserve (check out 4:2). In chapter one, James warns how evil desires tempt us into sin. It seems that believers have been tempted to believe that physical violence was an appropriate response to the injustices they were facing.

What is James encouraging believers to listen to? James writes, “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.” James wants the church to hear God’s Word and to put it into practice. This introduces a theme he will pick up in chapter three. For a believer, it is not enough to listen to the word, we must practice the word.

What does that look like? We should read The Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) and put these teachings into practice to avoid anger, shun adultery and lust, to love our enemies, to love our neighbors, protect the marriage covenant, turn the other cheek, and so on. These are just some of the teachings of Jesus of what a believer’s life is to look like. We are to be quick to listen (and put into practice) Jesus’ teachings.

Are you practicing the Word of God or merely just hearing it? Let us be believers who seek to practice the teachings of Jesus in our own lives.