“In the beginning was the Word”— and in each of our beginnings was a Word to us. Each of our lives is therefore relational and aural at core. All we are is a hearing and a response. We are responsible because we are response-able. Between the first word of God’s creation and the last word of his judgment our ways of life are our response to God’s Word to us. There is no God but God. There is no word but God’s Word. There is no way of life but God’s way of life. But for the time being our response is up to us; we are not forced to say yes. Indeed, as Kierkegaard insists, “All the shrewdness of ‘man’ seeks one thing: to be able to live without responsibility.”