Deep listening opens the way for discernment

The “spirit of discernment,” as the Rev. Daniel Heath heard it growing up, was not available to everyone.

“There was this notion that some people had it and others didn’t,” said the associate chaplain and director of the Davidson Forum at Davidson College in North Carolina. Heath also serves as the chaplain for Major League Soccer's Charlotte FC.

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How he reframed that notion was the topic of a recent Leading Theologically discussion with the Rev. Zoë Garry, associate director of Theological Education Funds Development for the Presbyterian Foundation. Garry and Heath were also classmates and friends at Princeton Theological Seminary.

Watch the most recent edition of Leading Theologically here.

An invitation to listen

Discernment took on new meaning when Heath got married 18 years ago, as another person would be deeply affected by his choices.

“It hit me that I have a strong invitation to listen,” he said.

When he was invited to apply for a position at the large, white, affluent Covenant Presbyterian Church in Charlotte, North Carolina, for example, he paused to consider it carefully. To begin with, it was a very different faith community from the small storefront Pentecostal church of his youth

“I asked the pastor, ‘Is your church ready for a Black person in leadership?’” Heath recalled. “However I was treated or however I experienced the congregation, I would bring it home.” With his wife’s support, he served as Covenant’s contemporary worship and arts director for eight years.

Discernment became, on a personal and theological level, a “sacred, deep listening that everyone has access to,” he said.

‘Who told you that?’

As a college chaplain, Heath invites students into curiosity and possibility. He asks them when, where and how they’ve experienced God at work in the world. “I’m not here to give you answers, but to explore with you, to walk alongside and maybe notice something along the path that you’re not noticing,” he told Garry.

Another frequent question he poses, especially as students process academic major and career choices, is “Who told you that?”

“I create space for people to consider what hopes, dreams and fears are theirs and which are someone else’s,” he said.

As a liberal arts college, Davidson is a welcoming space for such exploration, according to Heath. “You don’t have to choose one thing,” he said.

One path and God’s economy

Heath, who also holds degrees in music and law, said he used to be ashamed of not having chosen one thing.

“I felt that folks would judge me as not being sure — trying this, trying that. In growing my faith and surrounding myself with folks who helped me reframe this, I consider that it’s one path,” he said. “It has various and maybe unexpected stops along the way, but it’s one path.”

“Has it helped with my personal discernment and helping others to discern? Yes,” he said, quoting from former Princeton Theological Seminary President M. Craig Barnes: “Nothing is lost in God’s economy.”

Planning with an open hand

Another tool Heath finds useful for discernment is planning. “I like to have a five-year plan, and I mean, I have details. Basically, I do this plan and give it to God to co-sign,” he said with a smile. The job at Covenant Presbyterian, attending Princeton and his current position were not things he necessarily would have chosen on his own, he said.

“This open hand approach is helpful. I’m not holding these plans with a clenched fist,” Heath said. “If they blow away and something else lands, that’s OK.”

When he left Covenant, the metaphor extended to a gift from a fellow staff member: an open mannequin hand.

“Oh, my gosh. I was like, ‘I think I get it, but I’ve got to put this in a drawer!’” Heath recalled as he and Garry laughed.

Watch previous Leading Theologically conversations here.