Day 20 – Issue 16

Be Still Know

Psalm 62:1a NLT 

‘I wait quietly before God.’

Having moved house, I find it difficult to locate things. I know where they would have been in my previous house, yet now I’m not sure if they are buried in a box or have been unpacked and carefully put away somewhere I can’t remember. It’s frustrating and I need to keep searching for some essential item. The search for God is similar. There are so many places we can locate God, yet perhaps not all of them are truly the God we’re invited to seek.

Silence might appear a somewhat unusual place to focus our search. Yet it is in the silence that God will reveal himself. It’s not the silence of the lonely forest or the empty seashore. This is an interior silence. Here we choose to avoid pursuing the distractions of our constant mind chatter and quietly wait for God’s visitation. While we wait our minds are so easily pulled in a variety of directions by the thoughts that race through our head. Any one of these might appear a worthy vehicle to carry us into the throne room of grace – a favourite chorus, the Lord’s Prayer or a series of intercessions. Yet each may well be to look for God, to wait for God’s appearing in the wrong place.

In Malaysia with a friend and fellow birdwatcher we went to a normal residential area in search of the endemic Malaysian Whistling Thrush. It had been sighted there over a series of mornings. My friend and I adopted different positions and then waited, in the silence. I was rewarded with a sighting; he sadly returned home with one less tick on his bird list.

We choose to position ourselves where we believe God will show up. We have the witness of countless saints before us of God’s sightings. However, there are no guarantees, for God’s revelation is always within God’s gift. Yet God is often concealed within the cloud.

QUESTION: Where do you look for God?

PRAYER: Lord God, would you open my eyes to see and ears to hear? Would you reveal yourself again to me today?