I spent this past week in the mountains of Colorado. I was there as a participant in an institute on spiritual formation. While I was there to learn and share, more than anything I wanted the week to be one in which God and I had some time together. I have been feeling stretched of late, like there has been too little of me to spread over too much of everything else. I was tired. I get that way sometimes. I went hoping, planning, praying that God would meet me there.

Let me tell you. I discovered something fairly quickly. There is nothing quite like soaking in the beauty of God’s wonderful creation as you suck wind at almost 9,000 feet. I found that I had to move more slowly, that I couldn’t help but see what was around me. After all, I could hardly move. What was I supposed to do while I gasped for breath other than look at what was around me. As the week progressed and my body adjusted, I kept my rhythm of living the same. I kept moving slowly. I took more time to walk from one place to another, refusing to hurry. I spent more time savoring aspects of life, the food I ate, the people I moved among, even the work I had to do. I was looking for God, wondering when He would show up. What I never imagined was that He was there all along.

One night a group of us were meditating upon 1 Kings 19. Maybe you know the story there. It is the story of Elijah on Mount Sinai. Elijah had run to the mountain. He too was feeling stretched a bit thin. He too wanted to see God. What transpired was pretty amazing. Lighting. Thunder. Earthquakes. It was a incredibly raucous scene, but God was not in any of that. No, it was when things got quiet and still that God showed up and began to speak. God showed up in a still and small voice. As I thought about that passage I realized that God is always present. He just is there as a still small voice, a voice that can be drowned out by the raucous noise that fills our lives. Realizing that, I wondered what would happen if I kept stilling my own life. Would I be able to hear that voice? I decided to spend the rest of the week trying, trying to be quiet so that I might hear God’s quiet voice. I spent the remainder of the week moving slowly and quietly. I sought to see everything as a gift, something meant to be enjoyed and cherished, not hurried through. I sat with sunrises, with scripture, with people. I stilled my life. As I stilled my life I began to hear God’s voice. What surprised me was how full of love and grace, how playful and life-giving that voice was. Most of all, I was surprised at how constant it spoke.

Now I am back and I don’t have altitude or setting that facilitates a quiet life. I have a life filled with email, bills, and preschoolers. Life is anything but quiet. I was afraid that life would get so noisy that it would once more drown out God’s quiet voice. Today, I have in the noise sought to maintain my pace, sitting with scripture, with people, with life. What is surprising even now is that I can in this way still hear God speak.

A fellow traveler,

Blake
Spiritual Formation Pastor