In keeping with our Lifesprings International annual tradition, all of our leaders and members will be celebrating a month of sabbath rest from all regularly scheduled meetings, we call “Breather Month” during August. We invite all of our readers to join us in setting aside intentionally planned times of rest, restoration, and renewal, with God during August. Our reflection for this week will be centered on the theme of encouraging rest from noise/activity to practicing silence and solitude.
Listen:
“With the crowd dispersed, he climbed the mountain so he could be by himself and pray. He stayed there alone, late into the night.” (Matthew 14:23, MSG)
Reflect:
Jesus looked for a place to be alone, but people quickly discovered where he was. Before long he was surrounded by more than 5,000 people. He spent the day talking with them and curing the sick. By evening, he was multiplying loaves of bread and fish to feed everyone. By nightfall, Jesus was exhausted. He really needed time away from crowds, noise, activity, and the demands and pressures on his life. He needed a time of silence and solitude to connect with his Father. He climbed the mountain and stayed there late into the night praying.
As Jesus’ hands and feet in the world today, we too need times of silence and solitude away from the busyness of life to be alone with our Heavenly Father.
Listen to the words of Ruth Haley Barton:
“To enter into solitude and silence is to take the spiritual life seriously. To take seriously our need to quiet the noise of our lives, to cease the constant striving of human effort, to pull away from our absorption in human relationships for a time in order to give God our undivided attention. It is in silence that we release our own agendas and our need to control and become more will and able to give ourselves to God’s loving initiative. In silence we create space for God’s activity rather than fulling every minute of our own.
Silence and solitude are a ‘means through which we regularly make ourselves available to God for the intimacy of relationship and for the work of transformation that only God can accomplish.'”
Jan Johnson tells us the practice of silence and solitude will look different for each of us. Some of us might climb a mountain. Others can take a whole day once a week. Most can only take an hour a day—or an hour a week. Do what works for you.
I confess that I struggle with the spiritual discipline of Silence and Solitude, which is ironic because I am an inveterate introvert who relishes quiet time alone. I can find many ways to fill my alone time with unimportant things, but don’t often intentionally carve out times of silence and solitude with the express purpose of connecting with my Heavenly Father. Reflecting on this verse has encouraged me to take the time. My heart, body, soul, spirit, and mind need it. And God delights in it: “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you” (James 4:8).
Prayer of Response:
Heavenly Father, I know it is in you that I live and move and have my being. Please help me follow Jesus’ example of taking time away from the busyness of life to give you my undivided attention to listen to you, find comfort in you, and draw strength from you to face whatever challenges lie ahead.
Questions to Ponder:
- Have you carved out space in your busy schedule to spend time alone with God?
- What is on your “to-do” list that you could set aside to give God some moments of your undivided attention?
—Submitted by Dona Diehl
Dona lives in a suburb of Chicago with her husband Howard. They have two grown married children and 4 grandchildren. They currently minister in a local Cambodian church. Dona and Howard lived in Grenoble, France from 2006-2016 where they ministered in two English-speaking churches. Dona has been with Lifesprings almost since its beginning in Grenoble in 2006. She serves on the Executive Team and on the LSM Facilitator Training Team. She is passionate about seeing women fully realize that they are God’s masterpiece, created in Christ Jesus to do the good works He has prepared beforehand for them to do.