First Thursday of Advent

For God alone my soul watist
         in silence;
   from him comes my
         salvation.
He alone is my rock and my
         salvation,
   my fortress; I shall never
         be shaken.
            Psalm 62:1-2

Whenever I am with Teddy, I am reminded of how noise is such a normal part of our lives.  One of the ways in which he is 'typical' is his love for music  -  but it has to be beyond loud, and the bass has to be cranked up (or would it be down?) so that the doors of the car shake.  Meanwhile, he is on his cell phone, and it is constantly chirping, chiming, tuning, ringing, loud enough to be heard over the radio or CD, of course.  Noise is all around us - revving engines, computers dinging with new emails, the TV carrying on a constant monologue with us, the air brakes of the big trucks hissing outside our offices. 

It's become so noisy, that we rarely notice the noise . . .
. . . until someone turns it off.  And we discover how abnormal silence is for us. 

Yet the author of this psalm of confidence challenges us to enter this unknown territory, for it is there in the silence that we find God waiting for us, to speak to us, to be with us.  And what is our normal response to this invitation?  'right.  When should I be silent; where; how?'

Why not right now?

Wherever you are, turn off the noise  -  the electronics, the people around you, the stress.  Turn off all the questions about process; turn away from the computer or phone or pad, and simply look in the other direction; turn off that fear switch that tells you not to go down that road

   and just wait

      in silence

         tens seconds, thirty, a minute or more

      just wait

   for God.

(c) 2011  Thom M. Shuman