Embracing Silence: The Power of Words and Reflection

you are made to count you and I have a drive for significance a desire to have impact on this world and on the lives of other people and that's placed in Us by God that it's really good thing one of the primary tools by which we do that is our words the encouragement or inspiration or challenge or questioning or love or Comfort or tenderness or exhortation that we put into one another's lives marks us sometimes for a very very long time what a great thing it is Imagine life if there was no such thing as word [00:19:03]

God began everything with a word it is the expression of personhood of thought and emotion and Will it's a very good thing that you have this gift but we have problems with words at least I do really I only have two problems when it comes to words and they are that I sometimes say things that I should not say and then I sometimes fail to say things that I ought to say other than that I really don't have a problem [00:61:12]

the desire inside myself to defend myself to want me to look good to want somehow to be able to avoid saying I'm sorry for something or acknowledging that there are habitual tendencies in me that are off that pattern is so close to the surface that it just takes the tiniest little incident to trigger it and then I say what I ought not say when I want to be the kind of person that could just simply graciously appropriately own I was late [02:49:92]

there actually is a practice that you can engage in we're going to try it today that enables us to not be enslaved by the patterns of speaking and not speaking that lay so close to the surface that are embedded in my body and that practice is the practice of Silence we're learning from the Masters these days this is from Henry Nan who writes wonderfully about uh the value of Silence silence is an indispensable discipline in the spiritual life he says [04:82:12]

ever since James described the tongue as a whole Wicked World in itself and silence as putting a bit into a horse's mouth that's in James chapter 3 Christians have sought to practice silence as a means to growing in following Jesus and gaining the gift the power of self-control part of why he writes this is because uh he says this is in his book The Way of the heart over the last few decades we have been inundated by a torrent of words [05:17:36]

wherever we go we're surrounded by words softly whispered loudly proclaimed angrily screamed words spoken reseted or sung words on records and books on walls of the sky or screens words in many sounds many colors many forms words to be heard read seen or glance that Words which flicker off and on move slowly dance jump or wiggle words words words they formed the walls ceilings floors of our existence it wasn't always that way [05:51:60]

there was a time not long ago without radios and television stop signs yield signs bumper stickers the ever PR presentent announc ments indicating price increases or special sales there was a time without the advertisements which Now cover whole cities with words recently I was driving through Los Angeles and I had the strange sensation of driving through a huge dictionary wherever I looked there were words trying to take my eyes from the road [06:80:39]

all this is to suggest that words my own included have lost their creative power and yet words are themselves spiritual entities that can have great power we're told that God created the heavens and the Earth by his word the expression of his mind and his intent and that when Jesus came he reflected the message of God so deeply that in the Gospel of John he is simply known as the word in the beginning was the word [07:26:28]

often followers of Jesus practice silence um simply because it is so hard to talk without sinning Proverbs I think it's 1910 says where are many words sin is Not absent and that's a good reason to practice silence sometimes just to learn I can survive without making sure everybody knows that I'm right about stuff Freedom comes through silence but now it talks about another posit more positive meaning of Silence it protects the inner [07:61:80]

fire silence guards the inner heat of religious emotion this is the inner heat of the life of the Holy Spirit within us silence is the practice by which the inner fire of God is tended and kept alive diod doas ftii offers a very concrete image he says when the door of the steam bath is left continually open the heat inside rapidly escapes through it likewise the soul in its desire to say many things dissipates its remembrance of God through the door of speech [08:91:91]

even though everything it says may be good there the intellect though lacking appropriate ideas pours out a Welter of confused thoughts to anybody it meets then it no longer has the Holy Spirit to keep its understanding free from fantasy now it talks about how sharing has become one of the great common values anytime anybody says anything we thank them for sharing it was so good of you to share this he says this shows that the door of our steam bath is open [09:29:12]

for a few moments right now be still be silent saying nothing and listening listening for the word of God to express love and guidance and care for you for a moment now be silent before him thank you God for your word and for the gift of Silence keep me today from misusing words guard my mouth help me not to say what I ought not say help me to be quick to say what needs to be said help me to guard the silence within so that the fire can burn in Jesus name amen [09:79:12]