Stealing Quiet . . . Finding a Center . . . Seeing Him Alone

Here's a song from 40 Days that I really enjoy. The song is "Quiet" by Mark Warren and Joel Warren. Here are the lyrics:

Walk into a crowded room, into a faceless sea
I feel right at home
Remember not to look too close so they won't see through me
They can never know that there's a voice inside my head
Inside my mind
If I could find that secret place
A place to hide

Chorus:
It would be alright if I could stay there for awhile
It would be alright if I could steal the quiet
Deep down I have a need that I cannot deny
It would be alright

I sense you there across the room
A blinding light stills me where I stand
I didn't think you'd come this soon
If I may, if I might find out where I stand
I didn't plan to leave you out for all this time
I took for granted you were here
But if you don't mind

Chorus:
It would be alright if I could stay there for awhile
It would be alright if I could steal the quiet
Deep down I have a need that I cannot deny
It would be alright

I don't know why this song speaks so strongly to me. I think it is the whole idea of stealing quiet.

Finding a center . . . Hunkering down for a moment of peace in a world of white noise.

Brother Lawrence said, "To be with God there is no need to be continually in church. Of our heart we may make an oratory, wherein to retire from time to time and with Him hold meek, humble loving converse." (The Practice of the Presence of God)

Sometimes we need to retire, to separate ourselves into a sort of solitude just to be in the presence of the One who really matters. Thomas Kelly in A Testament of Devotion calls this the process of centering on God. It is the discipline of finding a place to be, a place to just sit with Abba and simply to breathe.

If we make time for this practice, for this centering, for this laser like focus on what really matters, we may well find that God often appears in those times in ways we may not have expected. As Evelyn Underhill notes in Practical Mysticism.

"Because mystery is horrible to us, we have agreed for the most part to live in a world of labels; to make of them the current coin of experience, and ignore their merely symbolic character, the infinite gradation of values which they misrepresent. We simply do not attempt to unite with Reality. But now and then that symbolic character is suddenly brought home to us. Some great emotion, some devastating visitation of beauty, love or pain, lifts us to another level of consciousness; and we are aware for a moment of the difference between the neat collection of discrete objects and experiences which we call the world and the height, the depth, the breadth of the living, growing, changing Fact, of which thought, life, and energy are parts and in which we 'live and move and have our being.'"

I think that sums up the second verse of the song--sometimes we are just jolted out of our activity, out of our busy-ness, out of our mundane existence, and then we have a clarity we have not experienced and maybe cannot adequately express. We see.

We see HIM.

We get IT.

Like the disciples on the mount of transfiguration (Matthew 17:1-8) we sometimes find ourselves in terrifying times, yet in those times we need a fresh vision of Jesus--the One who removes our fear and gives life meaning and direction. Matthew 17:7-8 says "Jesus came up, touched them and said, 'Get up; don't be afraid.' When they looked up they saw no one except Jesus alone." When they faced something they feared, after they fell on their faces terrified, at that point Jesus came and touched them and spoke comfort to them. When they saw "Jesus alone" they were no longer terrified  . . . they were home  . . .  they were comforted. His touch and his voice can have that effect. When the world goes crazy and things seem to spin out of control, that's when we really need to see "no one except Jesus alone." 

So, I need the quiet. I need to get it. I need to crawl into my Father's lap and be shocked into an awareness of how interconnected my world is to His, how his grace overflows in every aspect of my existence, how completely all-encompassing is this One called God. I need Jesus and I need him alone. His touch, his voice, his gracious presence . . . in my worries, my fears, and my anxiety . . .  JESUS ALONE is my need. 

So today, do it! Steal the quiet.

Take the risk and get into God's presence. Get alone with the One who Loves. Get alone with Jesus. 

Let the Mystery and Meaning of life jolt you into the reality of this great grace which sustains us all. Look for opportunities today to raise yourself above the mundane/temporary/overwhelming to that which will never fade. Set your mind to pursue it, and wait for the sheer shock of God's interruption.

We need to steal the quiet. We need to stay there for a while. We need Him. We need Jesus alone.

Thanks for reading!

 

Sounds of Silence--A Repeat

Nine years ago I was in the middle of trying to write and to establish a new program of study at Liberty University, and I found myself a bit overwhelmed.  You might even say that I was drowning in busy-ness and work.  Today I often find myself right back in that same ocean . . . swamped by a sense of "things to do" and "work, work work".

I think we all have been there.  The waves of life crash around us, and we sense we are sinking in the foam of life and finding ourselves stuck in the mire of everyday expectations.  The thunder and bluster of life's storms cause fear, and we lose focus on what really matters.  We succumb to the slumber brought about by drowning in activities--e-mail to answer, calls to be made, classes to prepare, friends to meet, people to impress, notes/articles to write, family expectations or obligations, to do lists full of things that just HAVE to be done today, etc.  The raging waves lull us to sleep as we are rocked steadily into a coma of concern.  The cacophony of our activities becomes the lullaby to our souls, and we yield to the siren's call, surrendering to what we think is really important.  We forget that we sometimes need a pause, a moment of Selah, a time to come apart before we fall apart.

In the middle of such a situation nine years ago, I wrote the following words.  They spoke to me then, and they convict me now.  How often I forget to sit silently in the presence of the Father who genuinely cares!  I come into his presence with my own agenda, dropping my "to do" lists in his lap as though they were a heavenly call that cannot be avoided.  Anyway, today I want to remind myself to sit with God, to just be silent in his awesome and awful presence with no agenda except to be with him.  I need some "quiet time", how about you?

Silence, cold eerie silence.

In this post-modern day and age, we rarely find ourselves in a place that is so utterly silent as to be practically without sound. We are surrounded by noise—the chattering of talk radio, the booming of the latest music craze, even in the shopping centers and elevators of life we encounter the ever-present reminder of Muzak to keep us company. At work we are assaulted with myriads of sounds, from the boss handing out assignments to the response of the assistant or the ringing of the phone. Even the internet is now wired for sound so that you can search for the latest piece of news or information with surround sound convenience. We return home from work only to turn on our cable TV to act as a kind of “white noise” in the background of our family lives. Some of us even go to sleep with the latest tunes playing on the radio to soothe our tired souls and “give us rest.” Today a human can actually go from womb to grave completely surrounded by the music of their own chosen personal soundtrack. Surely we are rarely without noise in our lives!

In this post-modern life we seem to have grown afraid of silence. We avoid it. We try to fill it with something that will give “meaning” to the emptiness. Why do we do that? Why do we fill our lives with sound?

Could it be that we are afraid of what we may actually hear if we are silent?

Could we be afraid that we may hear nothing? That we may be drowning in silence?

I believe we have grown accustomed to sound as a substitute for genuine communication with the transcendent. We have blocked out the very voice of the cosmos with our sound track so that we do not have to give our souls pause and just listen.

When was the last time you listened, really listened, to nature around you? I heard a mockingbird this morning, the bark of my dog, the jingling of my cat’s tags as he walked up the walk. It was so quiet I swear I could hear the sun groaning as it rose from its sleep!

I sat there, in silence. I listened. After a few seconds I grew jittery, even panicky. I really should be doing something, listening to something, “accomplishing” something worthwhile with my time.

I heard a voice, quiet and still—“Hush, be quiet. Be still and know . . . .” I listened, and in that silence I found a reverence for life that I hope only grows throughout the day. The quiet voice didn’t offer any startling revelations, but my basking in silence lent a kind of sacred feel to my morning. God was there. We had coffee. We sat quietly like two old friends for whom words would be a waste of effort. We silently toasted the beginning of a new day, and I felt as though the Almighty smiled at me. That stillness of that moment had created an almost “holy” space for the two of us to share. I know he was there. I long for a few more quiet moments with my Father and Friend.

Shhh . . .

Listen. . .

Was that the whisper of his voice?

Thanks for reading!