Is Your Life Loud and God Silent?
Inviting silence into our life—and a free ebook link to my book "Soar"
In a world that is screaming at us to always do more, how do we quiet ourselves to notice the movements of God?
This post is an excerpt from my book “Soar - Noticing God While Discerning the Unfathomable”.
I’m sharing part of “Soar” this week because the ebook is currently FREE through Friday 8/23.
If you have already read “Soar” or after you get your free ebook, would you please leave an Amazon review? It’s a HUGE help for me as a writer. I’m so grateful!
In our day and age silence is a rarity.
There are few places where you can go throughout the day that hold silence or even space for it. We are constantly bombarded in our world with noise. The persistent dings of our phones let us know that we are missing out on something, and the dopamine hit we receive as we check those notifications is just one click away—is always leave us needing a little bit more.
There’re constant ads on videos, TV shoes, our phones, on the side of the road—everywhere you turn something, or someone is telling you a message. You name the place, and there’s probably an ad there to distract you and get you to think that your life isn’t good enough right now because you don’t have a certain product in your life.
Life is full and loud.
There’re children running around, meetings that go long, calendars that are filled to the brim, dating apps that let you know when you’ve been swiped on, and the list could go on.
It’s exhausting to think of the noise in our world. Yet so often, we give into it, our bodies are so used to it, and we’re trained to need it. We don’t want to pull out our phones and check TikTok when we’re reading to our kids, but our brains are so hardwired not to miss out, to check it for a second—we give in again and again. We don’t want to yell at our kids in the car, but between the school events, work emails, sports practices, baby feedings, and the list of Marco Polos you’re behind in responding to—you’re overwhelmed. You can’t think straight and there’s an undercurrent of anxiety that bubbles up.
We’re scared of the silence.
We’re scared of what will happen if we stop.
We’re scared of who we will be if we’re not always “busy” (because how do you make small talk with strangers and friends if you don’t have that to say about your life). Silence can be easily avoided in our day and age. It’s very easy to pull our your phone at the red light, send a text while you take a walk, answer that work email in the school pick up line, and respond to the invite as you wait in the drive-thru.
We can fill our lives with everything—and yet still feel like we’re empty.
Notice your body right now.
What are you feeling at this moment?
What surfaces when you think of silence in your life?
Maybe it feels lonely in your singleness.
Maybe it feels unattainable with two kids under two.
Maybe it feels deafening as you pass by the empty, silent bedroom.
Where is the place where you desire silence?
Where is the place where you add noise to life?
I’m so often amazed by the way Jesus did ministry on this earth. It baffles me that the God of the universe spoke, and the trees sprouted, the flowers bloomed, animals snorted and roared. He also breathed his own air into the lungs of humans. That same God—he sat under the same trees, smelled the flowers in springtime, stroked the animals, and felt their fur beneath his hands, and he breathed. He breathed the air of this earth—just the same as you and me. This man, Jesus, was fully God, yet also fully human.
The Bible has a lot to say about Jesus and his ministry, but one part that I consistently am drawn to is his slowness. Jesus never rushed his ministry. You never read in the Bible that Jesus “ran to the next village” or “he rushed through the many crowds of people he needed to heal.” What amazes me is that to our twenty-first century minds, Jesus could have done so much more during his three years that he worked in his ministry. He could have organized his schedule more efficiently to minister to the maximum number of people—added more speaking engagements, traveled more consistently to villages that were further away, and performed more miracles.
He could have done so much more on this earth—but he didn’t.
Jesus was never in a hurry.
Jesus lived his life slowly and very silently.
He created space in his life and ministry so he could stop and look into the eyes of those he met. He gave himself time and space to laugh with his friends.
Jesus lived presently and intentionally with those around him.
Jesus lived with an internal silence that allowed him the opportunity to experience his heavenly father and those on this earth in a beautiful way. Often in scriptures, you will find times where Jesus withdrew by himself. I wonder what Jesus noticed in himself when he needed to withdraw and spend time alone? What did he need from God in that space?
However you wake up to reality, even when you wake up before the sun, the chances of getting some “quiet time” by yourself are often few and few between. The quieting I’m referring to, is in the way I notice Jesus living—his consistent need to be by himself with God. I’m sure that didn’t always happen in the beautiful silence of the morning with the sunrise etching a beautiful scene across the sky. I’m sure it held interruptions, distractions, and weariness. However, there is a need to be silence with God. The need to be with him is so great.
But how is this even an option in our noisy, busy, never relenting twenty-first century lifestyle? Well, I have no special formula or secret to share. Grief will swallow us whole some days. The noise will be so loud that we hold our hands over our ears screaming for it to stop.
There must be relief.
There but be some way to quiet ourselves,
even when the deafening screams of our lives don’t stop.
What if we changed our posture to the question? What we we ask the question:
How can I allow the silence I’m experiencing in my relationship with my heavenly father draw me slower to him each day?
Let’s start here.
Want to read more? Get your FREE ebook copy of “Soar” today! Paperback, Hardcover, and Audiobook versions of the book are also available too!
P.S. Don’t forget to leave your Amazon review when you’re finished!
Some insightful reflections here, Brianna! Thank you for encouraging our noisy world to slow down and embrace silence. As a toddler mother who is often feeling overwhelmed, I have also been reflecting on the unhurried nature of Jesus’ ministry and drawing comfort from His example. I’m glad I listened to this piece first thing in the morning!
I was teaching my kindergartener about slugs and I asked her, “Why do you think God made slugs slimy?” And she said, “so they would go slow.” It was way too profound for a Monday morning but had me thinking about innate human limitations, how we are trying to work around them but were made to go slow. I often tell myself that the Holy Spirit is not in a hurry so I don’t have to be either. Rest well! Thanks for this encouragement.