2022 – Week 22 – Can You Hear the Silence?

Silence week is one of my very favorites!

Unless I am determined to shut the noise out, it can feel almost impossible. We all know where all the noise is coming from in our lives – internet, smart phone, radio, television, podcasts, streaming music, traffic sounds, city sounds, crowd noise – it all barges in and we have to make a decision to make it stop!

THE HIGHER PANTHEISM

The sun, the moon the start, the seas, the hills and the plains —
Are not these, O Soul, the Vision of Him who reigns?

Is it not the Vision He, though He be not that which He seems?
Dreams are true while they last, and do we not live in dreams?

Earth, these solid stars, this weight of body and limb,
Are the not sign and symbol of they division from Him?

Dark is the world to thee; thyself art the reason why,
For is He not all but thou, that hast power to feel “I am I”?

Glory about these, without thee; and thou fulfills thy doom,
Making Him broken gleams and a stifled splendor and gloom.

Speak to Him, thou, for He hears, and Spirit with Spirit can meet–
Closer is He than breathing, and nearer than hands and fee.

God is law, say the wise; O soul, and let us rejoice,
For if He thunder b law the thunder is yet His voice.

Law is God, say some; no God at all, says the fool,
For all we have power to see is a straight staff bent in a pool;

And the ear of man cannot hear, and the eye of man cannot see;
But if we could see and hear, this Vision–were it not He?

Alfred, Lord Tennyson

In shutting off all the outside noise, God’s voice can be heard. Make an appointment with silence, and “Speak to Him, thou, for He hears. . . ” Then listen to what He says.