My day for the most part begins like everyone else.  A very loud alarm clock screaming in my ear that it is time to get up awakens me.  Then once I am up and moving around I get into my truck and head to the gym.  On my way to the gym I listen to the radio to see what the days weather looks like.  Then I hop on a treadmill trying to make myself feel better about eating that big bowl of ice cream I had the night before and I catch myself humming to the song that they have playing over the speakers at the gym.  Then it’s back into my truck with the radio on heading back to my house to take a shower and grab some breakfast.  While I am eating my breakfast I can hear in the background my son’s cartoons playing on the living room’s TV.  Then I’m once again in my truck this time listening to a podcast as I make my way to the office.  Where I am bombarded with emails and phone calls throughout the day. 

 

I take a break at lunch to clear my head sometimes I eat with a friend and just chat about the weekend or I’ll pick something up at Subway and head back to my office where I shut the door and listen to another podcast.  Then believe it or not I hope back into my truck, to go home for the day, listening to the radio while talking to my wife on the phone. 

 

Once I’m home I watch a little bit of TV talk to my wife and kids and then go to bed, ready to do it all over again the next morning.  But something seems very odd as I lay there in my bed, I don’t hear any noise and it kind of bothers me at times.  I have grown use to hear some type of noise all the time. 

 

One night last week in particular it hit me, I had not had one moment of silence all day in who knows how long.  As I lay there in bed I was convinced that I was addicted to noise.  That I had to have something on all the time, white noise if you will to drown out the silence in my life.  The silence that I should be giving to God, for the opportunities to hear from Him. 

 

Would Jesus, if He lived in today’s culture, be listing to his iPod all the time, checking his emails on His “crackberry” every few minutes?  Would He have left His phone on while He preformed miracles, to catch needless phone calls?  If I were truthful with myself I’d have to say “No, He would not.”  Jesus made time for silence in His life, so much so that He would stop preaching and healing the multitudes to seek the silence.       

 

The silence was a place for Jesus to seek out from God what was His true purpose here on earth.  If you think about it, we have it all backwards. We try to cram as much as possible into a day as we can.  Thinking that it will make us more productive in the end, but in reality we produce very little when it is all said and done.  While Jesus, on the other hand, spent a considerable amount of time being silent before the Father to receive from Him, I’m sure he had accomplished more in His three years of ministry than what we can do in a life time. 

 

The Bible talks quite a bit on waiting in silence for the Lord like:

•    1 Kings 19:11-13 (hearing from God)
•    Lamentations 3:25-28 (waiting patiently)
•    Habakkuk 2:20 (worshiping God)
•    Psalm 46:10 (knowing God)
•    Luke 5:16 (praying effectively)

 

Since God convicted me of all the noise in my life I am going to try starting this week to have at least one full day of meaningful silence.  Now I know that I can’t stop talking to my wife, kids, or boss, but I can turn off the radio, put down the iPod, and turn off the TV to be silent before the Lord. 

 

It is my prayer for those that are reading this that are guilty of being addicted to noise that you join with me in one day a week of silence before the Lord so that you might hear from Him as well.