There are few things more annoying than when someone interrupts you midsentence only to miss the whole point you were trying to get across.

If only they would have listened to the whole thing, they would have gotten the whole message!

Unfortunately, this happens much more often than we would like it to.

Even more unfortunate, we are guilty of it as much as everyone else.

I believe part of it is just a byproduct of the world that we live in today.

Everything is so fast-paced and deadlines are always looming. We rush to get one task completed just so that we have enough time to squeeze one more task in. Rest becomes both a faint memory of something we used to enjoy and the hope of a distant tomorrow.

In this race against time, we abbreviate, use emojis and autofill to complete our sentences. We skim messages and emails and multitask any chance we get. Jumping to conclusions halfway through saves time and comes naturally.

The problem is that sometimes we miss the point that is being said. Saving time is great until it makes people feel like you don’t care enough to spend the time to listen.

Saving time is great until it causes mistakes to occur. Saving time is great until you miss the point of what you were supposed to do.

We do this to friends, family and co-workers, and we do it to God as well. We read a verse or a passage, feel like we learned what it was teaching and move on with our day.

Daily devotionals can be a great tool but help facilitate this kind of reading. We hear God speak but not in the full context of the larger chapter or book.

A great example for us comes from 1 Peter 1:9 where it states, “But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession.”

It is a section of Scripture that is familiar to a lot of Christians because it is so succinct and memorably worded. It is a great word from God about who we are in Christ and who he is calling us to be. It is a great thing for us to memorize it. The problem is that it is just the first part of the verse. The verse goes on to say, “so that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.”

That’s still not even the full sentence, but seeing the verse in full reveals to us something very important that we would have otherwise missed. We are those things SO THAT we may proclaim the excellencies of God. We are who we are because we have been given a purpose.

It is so important for us to slow down and take notice when the Bible says “so that” or “therefore.”

God wants us to see how things are connected and for us to understand the whole message.

We are blessed every time we study God’s Word. Take time today to soak it in and listen without interruption.

People’s EC Church is located at 216 Wagner St., Lehighton.