Being Present

What could be easier than to be exactly where we are? It seems so elementary, and yet I am finding this to be an incredible challenge! I am discovering how rarely I am truly present in the now, in the moment.

I tend to spend so much of my time in the past or the future. I am generally a post-worrier. I don't worry much about the future, but I can spend a lot of time replaying things and worrying about the past. On the other hand, I can also spend a lot of time thinking about the future, trying to predict what will happen if... Or trying to control the outcome of things that haven't even happened yet.

This morning, I took some time to just sit and be present. I wanted to be present to the Lord, but the starting point was just to be present to myself. I had to sit still and just notice the things that I was feeling, the thoughts racing through my head, the motivations of my heart. I had to quiet myself and then present these things to Him in the quietness of that moment.

I wrote down the things that were troubling me. I wrote down my worries and my fears. I wrote down the things I was dreaming about and the future I was striving to create for myself. Then, I sat in silence.

A few minutes later the real dialogue began as a felt His response welling up with in me. I wrote down the words that I attached to these impressions: "Relax. Enter in. I am here. Stay in the now. It's okay. Come away with me. Take it one step at a time. Don't try to predict or control the future, that's my job."

As I sat, I compared the two lists, and suddenly the things that had seemed so overwhelming didn't overwhelm quite as much. I still was facing the same things, but the facts were emptied of the fear that had made them so fearsome. Instead, I felt peaceful. I recognized that I would still need to do something, but I knew, experientially knew, that my Father was in them with me. His presence made all the difference.

Olympic Training for Listening?

The Bible is such an interesting book. No matter how many times I read it, there will always be something new waiting to jump off the page. The Spirit draws my attention, or I suddenly feel the distance between my mindset and what I am reading.

This happened to me the other day as I was reading Hebrews chapter five. At the end of the chapter we find a description of those who are mature and immature. The recipients of the letter are mildly rebuked for being immature and not being able to understand. It seems a bit harsh to reprimand them in this way. Why would God rebuke someone for failing to understand?

In the final verse of the chapter, we find the reason for the rebuke. We read that the mature have become so through practicing. They have learned to discern by exercising their senses. The word used for exercise is an active word. It carries the sense of training for the Olympic Games.
 
They are rebuked not because they don't understand but because they had failed to train themselves. Their lack of discernment, their immaturity was a result of their choice. They chose not to train like an athlete preparing for the Olympics, and therefore lacked discernment. They had not learned to listen.

More times than I care to remember, I have griped about the silence of God. Why doesn't God tell me this or that? I wonder how many times I have not discerned God's voice because I have not seriously trained. Like athletes with various levels of natural skill, discernment may come easier for some, but we can all grow in it through intentional training.

I do not mean to say that God will always answer. There are times of silence, even in the most intimate relationships. But, I wonder if we don't often mistake our inability to listen with His unwillingness to speak.

Awakening to an Invitation

I woke up early this morning.  As I lay there in bed trying to get back to sleep, I felt something.  At first it was just a sort of vague curiosity.  A sort of wondering feeling.  It was so subtle that I only became aware of it as it begin to coalesce into a longing, a longing still quite vague.  There was no distinct object of my longing, my desire.  Then it morphed again from a longing to an invitation.  That was when I began to awake to the source of the longing and the invitation.  God was at it again.

I got up and headed downstairs with my journal and Bible in hand.  I knew that I was hungry for God, that the hunger was from God.  I knew that I wanted to meet with Him.  As I opened my journal I saw that it had been many days since my last entry.  I silently repented of my neglect of this, my most important relationship.  It's not that I had not been praying, or even experiencing God in worship, contemplation, nature, or His children, but it had been weeks since I had taken the time to sit quietly with Him. 

In that moment I realized that I was in danger of talking more about God than with Him.  I was subtly sliding into a life about God but not with God.  As I sat on the couch I was desperate for His presence.  I sat quietly for a time and then began to write and pray.  I wrote about my heart and shared with Him my thoughts and invited His input.  I didn't feel anything except alone.  The quietness of the sleeping house broken only by the ticking of the clock. 

Gradually I began to be filled with memories and with gratitude.  I remembered how far He had carried me.  A growing wonder dawned on me as I realized anew the miracle of knowing Him.  I tried to remember why the sins of my youth had seemed like a good idea.  I praised Him for rescuing me and for healing the pain in my soul.  I needlessly apologized yet again for spending so many years fleeing from Him, the Lover of my Soul. 

Then I was filled by a desire to love.  I felt a deep desire to be an agent of His love, for others to be healed, for others to experience the fullness of joy, the abundance of life, that I have found.  I prayed for and wondered about those in my life.  How could I love them better?  How could I help them to find the blissful surrender to the Lover whose unrequited love for them never diminishes or fades.  Then I was moved again to wonder and to praise at the fact of His presence in my life and the love that He has lavished on me.

As I closed my journal and reached for my Bible, I wondered where to read.  I did not want to study the scriptures, I wanted to meet with my lover, the one who speaks through them.  As the Book fell open on my lap my eyes fell upon Isaiah 35.  From the first verse I knew that this too was a gift from my Lover, my Father, my Brother.  He spoke to me through the passage about redemption and healing. 

He met with me.  He loves me still.  He speaks to me still in the silence and in the scriptures.  He awakens me.  He woos me.  He draws me to Him again and again.

Silence

Last night I watched a movie with my wife, "A River Runs Through It".  Afterwards, she was tired and went to bed while I sat on the couch reflecting on the themes of the movie.  After a while, she called down and asked me what I was doing.  I responded, "Nothing.  Just sitting here."  It struck me as a little odd.  I wasn't really doing "nothing".  I was reflecting.  I was thinking.

Another piece to the story is that after the movie was over, and before my wife called down, I turned off the DVD player and the TV popped back to regular programming.  A movie was on that I didn't recognize.  Even though I was enjoying the silence and wanted to continue to reflect I was immediately drawn in.  My curiosity was piqued.  It was a few minutes before I realized that I was losing the thoughts, the reflections, and the rest, that I had been entering into just moments before.  It was a real struggle to choose silence with interesting noise so readily available. 

I am so addicted to noise and activity!  I feel strange sitting still.  I know that it is in stillness and silence that I get in tune with my soul and with my God.  So, why do I feel almost guilty when I am doing nothing?  I am nearly always doing something, many times attempting to do multiple things simultaneously.  Busy-ness is familiar and comfortable.  If I find myself between tasks I feel somewhat uneasy and I start to immediately search for the next thing to do; the next activity to engage in, the next media to consume, the next problem to solve.  The problem is that noise is constantly available and even intrudes on our lives unbidden.  The hard part is to choose silence.  Silence seems unnatural.  It is hard to find or create silence, but it is necessary. It is worth pursuing.