Meditation on Silence, by Laura B.

About ten years ago, I saw a post going around social media called ‘Blessings Jar’—write down good things that happen during the year, put those slips of paper in a container. A way to be intentional in your day to day. I started doing it because it seemed like a spiritual goal I could attain. I’ve done it for a decade now, and it always tells me something.

Every New Year’s Eve, I take the glass box down from my bookshelf and dump out all the little notes I’ve written to myself over the year. With a notebook on my lap, I jot down notes, sketching the themes I see repeating, the things which show up no matter the season. I condense it down to one word to take with me into the New Year.

In December 2019, that word was Listen. Stop talking, stop venting, stop asking other people to weigh in. Stop being so certain you know all the answers. Stop plotting your next move, stop planning what you’ll say while someone else talks.

I spelled it out in alphabet magnet letters on my fridge as a reminder -- LISTEN.

There’s a story about Elijah who only had bad news for the immoral and unjust leaders of his land. When they put him on a hit list, Elijah turned tail and ran.

Alone and miserable hiding in a cave, certain he was right, he wanted to die. For Elijah, the God of his ancestors was personal and intimate, a back and forth that was as natural as two friends communicating, and as unnatural as calling down miracles from the sky. It was that mystical communion that Elijah wanted again.

As he waited on the Word promised to him by his God, wind broke the mountainside; an earthquake took the very cave out from under his feet; there was a consuming fire. But God wasn’t there. God didn’t show himself.

Finally. Sheer, utter silence.

In the aftermath of all that power and violence, when the world could take a breath in the silence, only then did Eljah get to hear his God. As a whisper. That whisper of God named Elijah’s successor. A friend who would walk with him, commune with him, Elisha.

Out of the windstorm and fire and earth-shattering of a pandemic, we’re sent to find friends. People who will walk beside us, people who can carry our load when it gets too heavy. People who know how to be silent, how to listen.

Sometimes I run away and hide in a cave. Sometimes I call down fire with righteous indignation. But I can’t forget that God is also quiet and still. I’m grateful for the mornings when I get to sit and listen with you all to the sheer silence of God.