The challenge of silence is to listen with our heart and soul. However sometimes it can possibly seem easier to live without any silence. That can mean that we can perhaps sometimes try to live in such a way that we try to fill every moment with noise. Yet the very profound aspect of silence in there is a whole sense of being to be found within it. That reality of embracing the silence and asking God to speak to us in that process means encountering ourselves as we really are, not hiding from our strengths, weaknesses, hopes and sorrows. It is also at that very moment that we open ourselves to all sort s of unexpected ways in which the Spirit of God can speak to us.
In listening to the silence, we find our common dignity as human beings created by God. We encounter the complete love of God who has created us. It also enables to find the moment of God’s grace. God’s grace that is on offer to us freely and completely but the Spirit forces nothing upon us, we must choose freely to listen, engage and follow and sometimes waiting in hope. That process of waiting is sometimes the hardest thing. St Paul speaks of faith as the assurance of something we hope for, conviction of things unseen. As human beings we possibly struggle most with the unseen part of it. Everything about how we know things to be, is that seeing is believing. As with Thomas in the Upper Room, we struggle with the reality that it is not always about plain but spiritual sight.
The challenge is to have faith when everything seems to be going in the opposite direction and nothing seems to make sense and there are more questions than answers. Trust in God is not something that is glibly mentioned or easily explained, its a lifelong pilgrimage of learning and formation. In the Gospels Jesus speaks of that point at which we set out on a journey in search of the things of God and indicates that as we seek we shall find but that we have to make the decision to start that journey. The journey begins with one small step and many small steps and in many times, quite a bit of struggle and effort. Pilgrimage is a journey of hope and challenges and is individual to each of us. As we revisit the Gospel accounts of Jesus journey through Lent and Easter through to Ascension-tide and Pentecost, we are reminded that that Jesus walked that road completely to bring us to resurrection hope.
In these challenging times when we are dealing with an unprecedented reality in current living memory, there are no easy answers but we can rest on Jesus assurance that as we knock, the door shall indeed be opened. The next thing after that take a step over the threshold into abundant life in following him daily in the here and now, and for the future, and we can know that that even if we sometimes struggle in faith to do that, he is there every moment to help us and is present with us in each step no matter how large or small.
Matthew 7:7-8
Hebrews 11:1-2
John 20:24-29
1 Kings 3:1-15