Shout for joy to God our defender;
sing praise to the God of Jacob!
Start the music and beat the tambourines;
play pleasant music on the harps and the lyres.
Blow the trumpet for the festival,
when the moon is new and when the moon is full.
This is the law in Israel,
an order from the God of Jacob.
He gave it to the people of Israel
when he attacked the land of Egypt.
I hear an unknown voice saying,
“I took the burdens off your backs;
I let you put down your loads of bricks.
When you were in trouble, you called to me, and I saved you.
From my hiding place in the storm, I answered you.
I put you to the test at the springs of Meribah.
Listen, my people, to my warning;
Israel, how I wish you would listen to me!
You must never worship another god.
I am the Lord your God,
who brought you out of Egypt.
Open your mouth, and I will feed you.
“But my people would not listen to me;
Israel would not obey me.
So I let them go their stubborn ways
and do whatever they wanted.
How I wish my people would listen to me;
how I wish they would obey me!
I would quickly defeat their enemies
and conquer all their foes.
Those who hate me would bow in fear before me;
their punishment would last forever.
But I would feed you with the finest wheat
and satisfy you with wild honey.” (Good News Translation)
I have a wife and three daughters. They talk – a lot! When my girls were small, it was hard to get their attention long enough for them to hear anything I was saying. So I oftentimes cupped my hands to their little faces so they couldn’t look around and get distracted. Then, I would speak, with them looking me straight in the eye.
It’s hard to listen. And listening seems to be a lost art and a skill we no longer care to develop. Maybe that’s because we’re obsessed with hearing ourselves talk. There’s so much chatter about so many things that we rarely even remember much of what we said; and a lot of those words get uttered before we even think.
What’s more, when other people talk, most of it seems like a bunch of gibberish, due to our lack of focused attention. Perhaps we need an adult version of the hand-cupping we do with kids.
We really need the wisdom to know when to speak and when to be quiet. Whenever being quiet is required, it’s for the purpose of listening. And whenever words and noise are needed, it’s to praise God with our mouths and our musical instruments.
In this day and age, folks get so worked up to express their opinions, and say what they want to say, that the virtue of listening is not at all valued. However, God puts a premium on taking the stance of listening.
The more you talk, the more likely you are to sin. If you are wise, you will keep quiet. (Proverbs 10:19, GNT)
Another reason listening is not well-practiced is that we esteem being busy and constant activity, to such a degree, that taking the time for silence long enough to listen is not of value to us. But if God’s people are going to hear the voice of the Lord, we must be still and silent, long enough to listen to what’s being said to us.
And yet another reason we eschew listening is that we are uncomfortable with silence, and seek to fill any quiet space with noise so as to not have to deal with what is really going on inside of us. Since God often speaks within the stillness and quietness of things, we’ll never hear, because our inner dialogue is drowning the words we need to listen to. (1 Kings 19:11-12)
I have a friend (I’ll call him Elmer) who spent eighteen hours in complete silence, without any talking whatsoever, in order to listen to God. You might think that Elmer is a monkish sort of introvert who likes that sort of thing. However, he’s actually an extrovert who lives in the inner city and comes from a large family.
Elmer simply came to the point of understanding that he was so busy moving from one thing to another, and constantly talking, to the point that he was drowning-out the voice of the Lord. Here’s what Elmer said about his time of silence:
“Those eighteen hours of silence were the loudest hours I have ever experienced. My mind was so noisy and so filled with stuff that it nearly drove me nuts. But after many hours passed, as the noise started to fade away, I could begin to hear the still small voice of God.”
Elmer discovered that he was a person who kept pushing and projecting his agenda onto God. His lack of listening led to an inability to obey. After Elmer’s experience, he determined to start including times of solitude and silence into his everyday life, even if for only ten minutes, so he could listen to what God wants rather than tell God what to do.
The Lord came and stood there, and called as he had before, “Samuel! Samuel!” Samuel answered, “Speak; your servant is listening.” (1 Samuel 3:10, GNT)
Any fool can babble on about their gripes and opinions. In Holy Scripture, however, human speech is generally viewed as being overrated. Instead, silence and solitude, listening and learning, are the virtues practiced by Jesus; the kingdom of God cannot operate without them.
Therefore, we must take up the shield of faith with which to extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one who wants to keep us trapped in either a cycle of constant chatter without listening, or continual silence without acting upon what we hear from God.
We must be quiet for the purpose of listening to God. Then, when we hear the Lord speak, we must act in faith to say and do what we are called to.
God of silence and of all sound, help me to listen! Enable me to be patient and wait for your still small voice calling me. Give me attentive ears that can separate the noise from the sounds that are you. Today help me to hear you anew so that I may obey with wisdom and obedience. Amen.
Rev. Tim Ehrhardt 