Day 24 – Issue 18

Be Still Know

Psalm 62:5 NLT

‘Let all that I am wait quietly before God, for my hope is in him.’

Arriving on that week of silence and stillness, I was not prepared. I came from a busy life and assumed somewhat naively I could stop and engage easily. I was initially overwhelmed by the long days that lay ahead.

I was so accustomed to ‘doing’ that I was at a loss and wondered what to ‘do’ to be silent and still! Even as I read the scripture and completed Compline that first night alone in my room, my mind pursued 1,000 strands of thought concerning the week ahead and the many situations I’d left behind. I turned to sleep confused and a little inwardly disturbed. Yet the water at the pool of Siloam needed to be disturbed if it was to offer healing to those who eagerly waited in anticipation upon its sides, and so disturbance may itself be a sign of God at work.

The first part of that week was challenging. I moved from quiet space to quiet space at frequent intervals. I seized my opportunity of speech with my appointed spiritual director who listened and said little since I spoke most. Yet, by day two the questions I thought I carried in my heart had been replaced with a more pressing sense of what I needed clarification upon. The question was accompanied with an increased sense of focus and a deepening desire for silence within which to ponder it.

I was persevering, sensing the challenge while entering deeper into the silence and the stillness. I increasingly became absorbed within the confines of my surroundings and time passed. The silence I’d initially approached with a mixture of suspicion and dread actually was becoming my friend. I didn’t want to talk. The silent meals were tremendous. I sat in the friary library and gazed at the river while choosing one of their books that spoke of the prayer of silence. I was engaged and hunger awoke within.

QUESTION: When you pause and give God time and space, do you feel an inner disturbance?

PRAYER: Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.