I still remember the door shutting behind our two kids as they walked out the door for the first day of their senior and sophomore years of high school. With the new-found freedom of being able to drive themselves, it was the first time I didn’t have to accompany them.
The sudden silence overwhelmed me.
Rather than feeling my own freedom, I felt empty. Tempted to fill the space with activity, instead, I felt compelled to sit and acknowledge it for a moment. I turned it over, questioning where it came from and why. What did it say about my soul?
It wasn’t a comfortable moment.
It was another tug at my soul from God, a whisper from a place of quietness I have always been loath to enter. Productivity, input, engagement-this is where I feel at home.
God Calling Me to Silence
Since then, through various means, including books like You Are What You Love and Liturgy of the Ordinary, God keeps calling me to order my life so that the lonely places are not something to avoid, but something to practice. God keeps calling me to order my life so that the lonely places are not something to avoid, but something to practice. Click To Tweet
I have the best intentions. I believe what people say about the importance of silence, making space for my soul to speak, and space for the Spirit to respond.
So I began carving out that space: ten minutes of silence to start my time with God in the morning. Then fifteen. Even sometimes twenty. Turning off the radio during a drive. Choosing not to pull up a podcast on a long walk with my dog.
I love what I find there, I do.
Creating space for silence lets my soul breathe. All the anxiety that hides in corners of my soul, weighing it down, comes crawling out into the open. There’s relief in offering it to Someone far more capable than I. Thoughts crystallize. I become conscious of what holds my heart. My soul gets quiet enough to listen to God.
My Struggle with Silence
But just as quickly, I let the noise creep back in. It’s easier. I fill a boring moment with a new TV show episode, and suddenly I’m hooked. Someone mentions a new podcast and I pick it up. It’s more fun to cook with something occupying my mind. Soon enough, distractions take over once again.
It’s tempting to be discouraged, to give up.
Perhaps I am simply too hard-wired for activity, I think.
It helps to remember that there is a war for my soul, and the enemy loves using noise and distraction in the fight. This isn’t merely a matter of discipline, but of the kingdom, for which I am ill-equipped to fight on my own. I need God’s help.
So I keep listening for His whispers, calling me back. I know He holds no contempt for me when I finally turn down the sounds of my life and get quiet again. He is patient. He is waiting.
Making Peace with Silence
Places of solitude and silence can overwhelm. But maybe they’re supposed to. In those places, we touch our humanity. We feel how small and helpless we really are to control our space. But we also touch His divinity. We’re invited into His presence.
Sometimes, the silence feels like nothing. My thoughts are scrambled, and it hardly feels worth it. But I believe it is. I trust that something is settling in me-a deeper capacity to be conscious of His presence in a way that seeps into every moment of my life. Hopefully, it’s creating a solid place in me where my false self gets stripped away and I am just His. I have faith that it is.
So I will keep struggling to make peace with silence. As uncomfortable as it may be, as much as I don’t enjoy the flood of thoughts that come knocking when I get quiet, I know there is life there.
And I know that God is on our side in this. He longs to meet us in what feels like empty space, so He can fill us with Himself.
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