“Be still and know that I am God.”
How often do we, as believers in Christ, take the time to simply stop and be still? Sometimes? Every once in a while? Ever? The world around us is in constant motion. We move from one activity to the next, one job to the next, one relationship to the next. Every ounce of time within our day is constantly calling for attention from someone or something. But do we ever set aside the time to simply be with God?
When I say this I do not only mean studying scripture, praying and fasting, or communing with fellow believers. All of these are spiritual disciplines, which must hold our attention often or daily if we are to understand our Father’s heart, but even more important is the act of simply being with Him.
The past ten days here in Guatemala have been a time to rest and listen to the voice of the Father. Hours of silence have brought rest and refreshment that was much needed. However, sitting and being still is also one of the most difficult of all disciplines. Being silent requires you to deal with deeper issues of the heart otherwise unnoticed amongst the noise and chaos of a busy life. We fill our lives with so much commotion that we no longer hear the voice of the Father trying to speak.
As I am beginning to learn, one of the greatest traps is that of a life filled with not only worldly bustle, but spiritual activity as well. Without recognizing it, we can become to so focused and busy with what we believe God would have us be doing that we drown out His voice in the process. If we are to ever know our Father’s heart we must rid ourselves of this plague of business and learn to be still and listen. As Dick Dungan, one of my closest mentors and a man of wisdom and godly character seldom seen, has often asked me, “If we cannot first hear the voice of the Father in the quiet, how will we ever be able to recognize it in the business of life?”
For many of us, cultivating this lifestyle will require a breaking of identity, identity in what we do and how much we can accomplish over who we are in Christ. Taking the time to stop and be still before the Lord, setting aside everything else in life, will be one the most difficult actions we will ever carry out. It goes against everything the world is screaming for us to do and calls us to simply be, to listen, and hear the voice of our Creator who desperately wishes to talk with us.
It requires discipline, overcoming the fear of what we might hear, and the destruction of an identity with just doing. If we as the body of Christ truly desire to know him we must first be still.
Journal Entry: November 17th 2013
