Happy Soul Tending Tuesday.
Two weeks ago we dipped our toes into the spiritual practice of stillness with the short video of the stream in Ireland. Want to know what I found interesting? How many people texted or emailed after reading the post saying, “Oh that looks so good and I need it so much, I will watch it this weekend!”
Tuesday, as you know, is near the beginning of the week. And I understand how full and crazy life can be. I’ll tell you the truth—as I was planning and designing our rhythms for Global Trellis, I first had Soul Tending at the end of the week and Skill Building on Tuesdays.
The end of the week feels more “spiritual” with the weekend and the Sabbath coming. But then I caught myself. If I, if we, do not weave regular ways for God to be with us, we function too much in spiritual feast or famine mode. While feasting is wonderful and there are to be seasons of fasting, fasting is different than famine.
So, if you are reading this and your kids are about to need to be fed, or you are on a crowded bus, or a team meeting will start in five minutes, I get it! You did not plan to need to “do” anything. But please, don’t wait until the weekend to spend a few minutes with God in silence.
Escaping noise is virtually impossible without intention. Traffic, music, sports, entertainment, children, construction, even household appliances add to the cacophony. Gordon Hempton is an acoustic ecologist and collects sound all over the world. He says that quiet is a “think tank of the soul.”
Enter the practice of silence. In The Sacred Enneagram, Chris
No surprise, silence is hard for me because it has the potential to be so boring. But when I see the connection between silence and learning to listen better to God (and others), I see that I need a bit of rewiring.
For us to spend a few minutes in silence today, I found a video that is ten minutes of ocean sounds. If ten minutes is too much, start with three minutes.
I know some of you live in very noisy places, so the chance of you having true “silence” is slim, thus the video. (If you don’t see it, here is the video.)
Psalm 62:5 says: “For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence, for my hope is from him.”
Yes, Lord, we wait for you.
I’ll share in the comments how this time of silence went, and I would love to hear from you. It’s nice to know that others are tending to their souls too, isn’t it.
Photo by Olivia Snow on Unsplash
This was the “worst” time ever for this post to go live :)!! I did not have time this morning to sit in silence as a ministry I am on the board for had a HUGE awareness and fundraising annual breakfast. Also, other reasons this week has already felt delightfully hijacked. But then I read my own dang words. So, I sat with a cup of tea in a slice of time that did exist (it was my own internal racing that was getting in the way, not the reality) and watched the video. Again, I’ll be honest, I felt antsy and like this was a waste of time when i could be doing something more productive!!!!!~!!!! (can you tell how I felt?). About four minutes in I began to internally slow down. And God met me in profound was I did not expect. I actually want to organize my thoughts better before I say more. You might be the same and need space to process– or this might have felt like a colossal waste :)! It’s okay to say that :)!
How was silence for you?
Thank you for this! I have been avoiding silence I think lately as I am scared God will not meet me I guess. I will try this tomorrow morning.
Listened this morning and it reminded me that I want to get to a place of spiritual indifference or freedom which means I want whatever will help me to glorify God most, even though I have some strong opinions about what I want right now, ultimately I want to glorify God and enjoy Him forever. Thank you for this challenge and encouragement which led me to pursue an Ignation Prayer adventure. Are you familiar with Ignatian spirituality at all? Thanks again!