SILENCE

God is assumed to listen to our prayers, and answer them. Jesus says in his most famous sermon ( found in Matthew 5 ) that “ we should ask, and it will be given ( added ) to us. I believe that we are comfortable in asking God for many and all things. We sometimes, I think, treat God like at ATM machine. We punch in the numbers , and we pick up our money. We ask, and God answers.

We know that this is not quite true. I asked God to heal my mom, and my Mom died. I have asked God to bring peace to Israel and Palestine, and it has not happened. I have asked God to lessen the violence in Turkey, so that I might visit there again. Did I actually write such a selfish prayer in that last sentence ?I want peace to come to a country, so that I might visit there safely. I have prayed that .God did not and should not answer that one, ever. I would hope that God would bring peace to Turkey, but not so I can visit there again.

How do we listen to God ? We like to speak our prayers out loud. Or , we might like to say them silently, still thinking God can hear them. I believe God hears everything. When, we sit or lie down, and try to listen to God, our minds usually continue to race. So, how do we slow our own mind down to listen to the thought or words of God.

The other night I had a “Samuel experience”. In the Old Testament, there is the story that Samuel is woken three straight nights by a voice. After the third night, he figures it out that the voice is God. It happened to me twice in one night. I am sure there was a voice calling “Fred” outside our bedroom. I got up. Nothing. I may have been dreaming, but I do not think so. I have waited for a third time in the night, but nothing. Silence, but what is God saying in the silence. if God was there at all.

I have an interesting journey with silence and God. Early in my years of ministry I was quieter, and but not really engaged with silence. Then in about 1998, I was introduced to silence at Loyola House in Guelph. It is a Jesuit/Catholic retreat Center. In the early part of 2016, I had a difficult time with silence at an eight-day retreat there. I have not been able to go back there. Am I afraid to meet God in silence, anymore ? Is God going to speak with me in a different way now ?

God might not speak into the silence. I need to know what God wants me to be, and do. No words needed. Jesus went away to pray sometimes, and he talked much to his disciples. Maybe he didn’t need silence . When he came from being alone, he seemed to know what to be about.

God might speak to me through you !! I am a little confused right now about how to listen to and for God. Where do you meet God ?

Fred Redekop