Patience

This verse has been speaking to me a lot lately, especially as I am realizing that patience and silence are disciplines I struggle with.  The discipline to quiet my thoughts long enough to wait patiently on God and truly listen to Him is a challenge for me, but one that is worth every effort.  I find myself getting myself into a tizzy with worry and anxiety about a huge laundry list of items, wondering what I should do or what I should say, when the ONLY place I need to turn is to Him.  I don't have to figure this out on my own and furthermore, that is not what I am called to do at all.  My calling and my purpose is to seek Him and practicing this discipline of silence enables me to fine tune my ear, so I may hear from God and understand what He is saying to me.

I find myself asking what it is that keeps me from seeking the silence more and I found a very convicting answer in the writing of John Main.  He wrote how true silence is most perfected in the presence of trust.  We can all think of people in our lives with whom we are so close that sometimes words are not required, but there is peace in the silence because of the trust.  I began to ask myself about my trust in God, the One to whom all my faith and trust must belong.  Am I afraid of what God will say?  It is a question that leads me to recognize my human desire for the illusion of control, something I long to relinquish completely, but somehow seem to take it up over and over again.  And so I pray more and more for trust and for focus as I remind myself again and again that I am not required to walk this journey alone.

As the psalmist writes, God inclines to us, God turns to us, God hears us.  What a powerful truth that the Almighty, All Powerful God of the universe is also Emmanuel, God with us, in each and every moment.  What will you trust to Him today?