The Cinderella of the Spiritual Disciplines

“And if Paul and I listened carefully, all our lives, we might hear those words.” -Paul Mclean, A River Runs Through It

If spiritual disciplines were a fairy tale, silence would be Cinderella. What do I mean by this? Cinderella was the girl up in the attic that everybody forgot about until she became royalty. Everybody was so focused on everything else that she was easily dismissed. That is, until her true value was revealed. Silence is like that. As Christians, we focus so much on prayer and Bible reading (and by no means do those have little value), we forget about a discipline like silence until we take the time to practice it and find out how truly valuable it is. In fact, if we take the time, we will find that silence is an integral part of our walk with Christ. Often, we use the two-legged analogy of a conversation to describe prayer and Bible reading. The Bible is how God speaks to us and prayer how we speak to God. But why does it all have to be about talking? What about listening? Could it be that in silence, we listen for what God is really trying to tell us?

In the life of Elijah, there is an amazing moment where Elijah is confronted with the presence of God, but in a place where he least expected it. Elijah, standing at the mouth of a cave nestled in the mountains, witnesses the power of a mighty wind tearing though the mountains, an earthquake, and a great fire. But God was not in either of those. In fact, God was in the low whisper that followed those more powerful phenomenons. And when Elijah heard that low whisper, he knew he was in the presence of God. In our lives, we too often get caught up in the noise of life. We mistake busyness for godliness, as if by doing more were become more spiritual, more in tune with Christ. Perhaps if we stopped doing more we could take time to dwell in the presence of God and listen to what He is trying to tell us. Perhaps if we stopped looking for God in the mighty wind, and the earthquake, and the fire, we would find him in the low whisper. But we have to be listening.

There is a beautiful scene near the beginning of A River Runs Through It in which it is told that Reverend Mcclean would take his sons, Norman and Paul, for walks along the Big Blackfoot River to unwind between Sunday sermons. As they walk along the banks of the river, he explains to the boys that the river and the rocks were created long ago, but that long before that, even beneath the rocks, were the words of God. The reverend pauses a moment and then says one word, “Listen.” And in the typical fashion of young children, the Mclean boys lean forward expectantly, waiting to hear God speak to them. Maybe if we took time, even a small bit, to sit in silence, all the while leaning forward expectantly, listening for the words of God, we would find them. “For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence, for my hope is from him” (Psalm 62:5 ESV).