Silence.
written by Julie R. Neidlinger 8 comments link this post-- Frederick Buechner
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One evening, as the last days in Nicaragua wound down for me, when all but a few of us had gone to bed, I admitted I only heard silence.
Silence is rare in Nicaragua. It seems to me that there is sound everywhere, somewhere in each moment. Roosters crow to a verge of insanity, and dogs bark in competition. The wind picks up dust and throws it about with a rattle against the concrete and tin. People chatter, cars honk, church bells ring, Latin music beats a rhythm, and women selling watermelon and fried bananas holler.
"If I were to tell you my testimony," I said to the small group sitting in chairs and hammocks that night in the courtyard, "it would be one of silence."
I do not hear God calling me to do anything beyond His word. I hear many people telling me what they think God surely must be calling me to do, but that is not the same thing. I hear many people listing my skills and attributes and giving me suggestions on how, surely, I could further the Gospel, but that is not the same thing.
I hear nothing.
In college, I prayed to God to help me believe despite my uneasiness over the answers I did not have. I did not want a belief based in answers because that was no belief at all. It took almost ten years, getting the answer to that prayer. I am grateful for that answer, as uneasy as it seems in moments, even though the "yes" happened in silence.
"I hate it when we sit around in a group and each have to share," I said. I always feel that God must be a yammering pest, the way everyone describes how He's talking to them, how He's directing them, how He's called them, how He's working in their lives, how He's given them purpose.
I hear nothing.
"I'm a big fake. I don't hear God telling me to come to Nicaragua," I went on. "I don't hear God telling me to do anything. I hear silence and I end up just doing what I know to be right."
It all seems to be a crapshoot, a leaping into the dark and hoping that the tiny faith, the tiny belief, the tiny trust that I have will be enough to land me firmly on the ground I should be at.
I don't blame God or anyone else. Maybe I've just not learned to listen, or am still thinking that God is in the whirlwind when He's not. Maybe I've just not learned to wait long enough. I wonder at the flippant way Christians talk with great amounts of assurance that they, indeed, can answer the question of what God is doing in their life and what direction He is leading and why they do what they do and are where they are. I can't see that at all.
"Silence," I said.
I will continue to dread sitting around in a circle and being asked to share what God is doing in my life, because I don't know. I don't hear anything but my own thoughts, screaming against silence, readying myself for another blind leap.
But that doesn't mean I don't believe. I will take Him at His Word.
Copyright (c) Julie R. Neidlinger 3/08/2007 08:04:00 PM
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8 Comments:
Julie you're just going to think I'm blowing smoke especially given your comment at my place... but something's gotten into you and whatever it is, it's good.
This is, and I mean every word of this, one of the finest meditations on silence I have ever read. And I've read some of the best. I've also written a few that I thought were pretty good, until now.
I'm glad you wrote it, but even more so that you lived it. May God bring forth the fruit in your life and others, and get the glory too.
By 
Jim, at
8/3/07 21:17
God of all creation, I am jarred and confused by the contradictions of this world. I pray that I may sense your presence in the silence of my soul, and gain a renewal of spirit and life that will spread across all that I live and see.
I believe in God even when he is silent. These words were found scrawled on a cellar wall where Jews had hidden in World War II in Cologne, Germany.
That took real faith. Staying steady when God is Silent was hard even for David in Psalm 4.
You could have written that Psalm.
You just did.
By 
Gene Redlin, at
8/3/07 22:41
Thank you for this; thank you for giving "voice" to those of us who rarely, if ever, actually hear anything that could be construed as the voice of God outside his Word.
On a completely different note, I remember when I was the pastor of First UMC in Tamaqua, PA being confronted by a former pastor (who had converted to Christianity after seeing a vision of a hundred foot Jesus in Oklahoma) with the words, "God has told me that he wants me to preach here at First Church in December."
I replied that December was a very busy month and that I was already going to be out of the pulpit for two Sundays, so I didn't think that it would be wise to take off a third Sunday so he could preach. He accepted this news, but I could tell by the look on his face that he thought I was "quenching the Spirit," so to speak.
When I told my wife (now ex) what this pastor had said, she told me that what I should have said was this, "Well, I appreciate what you're saying pastor, but since God spoke to you, he has gotten in touch with me, and he told me to tell you that he has changed his mind."
People who hear from God like this can be very scary. After all, who can argue with the Word of God from on high? Who would dare deny what God has supposedlty said to someone else?
The most authentic and spiritual Christians I have met have wrestled with the silence of God in their lives. They have struggled with not knowing, and have meditated on this for years.
One great Christian I knew in a former church once told me, "I have only asked God for two things in my life. The first was that my first child would be born healthy. He wasn't and has spent all of his life institutionalized. The second thing I asked from God was that my youngest boy would return home from Vietnam alive. He came home in a body bag. Where was God? Was I not faithful enough? Was he trying to teach me something? Why didn't he hear me? Why couldn't he have answered these simple prayers? I don't know," he said, "I just don't know."
And while this man sounds as though he might be the kind of person to turn his back on God, even on the idea of God, he is one of the most committed and faithful Christians I have ever known.
Well, I have said too much, I'm afraid. Forgive my wordiness in the face of Divine Silence. Thanks again for your meditation
By Will, at
8/3/07 23:12
Very well said Julie !!
Jerry
By , at
9/3/07 15:17
Very well said, Julie. I find it more reassuring to think that God has said what He has to say, and we have it in black-and-white, than to believe that I have to imagine that God is directing me by means of hunches and inclinations, and that I have to discern His authoritative direction for my life from these hunches and inklings or else I will waste my life.
By MichaelBates, at
10/3/07 00:46
You put it into words perfectly, Julie. I was reminded of a Sara Groves' song called "Hello Lord" . . .
I don't doubt Your sovereignty
I doubt my own ability
to hear what You're saying
and to do the right thing . . .
I know that You tore the veil
so I could sit with You in person
and hear what You're saying
But right now
I just can't hear You . . .
See you soon.
n.
By , at
12/3/07 09:26
I'm a "lurker" but I've read two posts of yours today that are wonderful and just had to pop in and say thanks. :o) I, too, am a Christian who has never heard God "speak" to her. I've always felt very left out, if you know what I mean- why can't I hear God? Other people hear God, know what their life purpose is.... why not me? Am I not praying enough? Am I not listening hard enough? What's going on?
I'm glad I'm not alone in hearing silence -and yet still Believing strongly, with all my heart. :o)
Cheers,
Jen
By Jen, at
16/3/07 18:12
Faith is an action, not a feeling. I think that is important to remember. Mother Teresa had a few powerful experiences where she felt/"heard" God speak to her, but only a few. The rest of the time, she struggled, serving the poorest of the poor with the utmost humility. For her, God was silent for DECADES. Yet she persevered.
Silence is normal. People who constantly think they know what God is saying, in my opinion, are not discerning properly what is their own desire and what is the will of God.
By jsignal, at
1/4/08 19:03
