It might sound like a strange question, but are you? I think that maybe, just maybe, you just might be. Afraid of the quiet, that is or at least uncomfortable with it. We know that as we continue to engage these strange times in which we live that one of the strange, uncomfortable aspects of it is not being able to hear the noise of the nonexistent crowds at our sporting events. And if you’re not afraid of, or at least uncomfortable with the quiet, well then you are quite rare, and I am quite confident that so many of your human colleagues are. Oh, they might try to deny it, but how often do they let themselves truly become still and quiet? How often, do we let ourselves truly become quiet? Don’t we pretty much always want to have some background noise blaring ie. music, the TV, the radio, etc., etc.? Or maybe we are always occupied by our cell phones and social media; so our minds and hearts are certainly not still, even if they are not making a lot of noise. Isn’t it difficult to truly allow ourselves to become completely still? Why? Wouldn’t all the noise get to us at least once in a while? But it does not seem like that is the case. Silence really can be much more frightening than thunder, can’t it? Why? Because when we actually are able to hear ourselves think, we have to deal with issues from which we’d rather stay away. Elijah, went to the mountain of the Lord, in search of the Lord’s voice but he discovered that the voice of the Lord was not in the noise but in the quiet. In order to hear the Lord, in order to get to know the Lord, in order to be in a real relationship with Him we must bring ourselves to stillness and quiet on a very regular basis. And that is much easier said than done in a world of so much noise. Couple that with the fact that the quiet makes us uncomfortable and we truly have a challenge on our hands. Our best hope is that we know that we will never truly be at peace until we are able to hear that still small voice that is the Lord. A very prudent prayer for us is that our fear of the quiet is not more powerful than our longing to hear the Lord. If that is the case, we should rejoice and be glad, because we will hear His voice.