Central Lutheran Church - Elk River
Central Lutheran Church - Elk River
Rhythm: Silence & Solitude with Pastor Ryan Braley
What happens when we stop shaking the jar of our lives and let everything settle? In this exploration of silence and solitude, we discover how intentional withdrawal from noise and distraction creates space for profound spiritual encounters.
The story of Elijah offers a powerful metaphor for our own journeys. After a tremendous spiritual victory, Elijah flees into the wilderness, overwhelmed by fear and despair. There in the "eremos" – the desert, the lonely place – he encounters God not through dramatic manifestations but through "the sound of sheer silence." This pattern reveals something essential about our spiritual lives: authentic connection with the divine often happens when we quiet everything else.
Our modern lives resemble jars of river water constantly being shaken. We fill every moment with stimulation, productivity, and distraction, never allowing the sediment to settle. When we do pause, we often confuse numbing with nourishing – binge-watching shows, scrolling social media, or even taking chaotic vacations that leave us more exhausted than before.
True silence and solitude confronts us with uncomfortable questions: Who am I apart from my relationships? My achievements? My distractions? As Blaise Pascal observed, "All humanity's problems stem from our inability to sit quietly in a room alone." We avoid silence because it forces us to face our inner chaos.
For those new to this practice, start small – perhaps just a few minutes daily in a quiet place without your phone. Establish a sacred space you return to consistently. Resist the urge to "do" anything during this time; the point isn't productivity but presence. Welcome the initial discomfort as a sign of how much you need this practice.
The rewards are profound: authentic rest, clarity of purpose, and most importantly, space to encounter God in ways that transform us from the inside out. This week, find your "eremos" and listen for what emerges when you stop shaking the jar of your life.
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We're engaging in our series right now, I'm going to get a couple more jars called Rhythm. And Rhythm is this idea that the things that we do shape the kind of people we are. So the great philosopher once said that the things that we do, yeah, they shape kind of who we are and what we're becoming. So you'll notice in your own life the things you do with repetition, with rhythm or with ritual or as habits. They begin to shape you. And so if you are a person who likes to complain, you do it all the time, you will, for many reasons, you'll become a complainer. And, conversely, if you have sort of more healthy rhythms, if you are a person who gives thanks to God for all the things, maybe every day, for example, and you do this repeatedly, and you thank God for all the things in your life, like large and small, you'll begin to have this heart of gratitude and you'll see and notice things differently in your life and your world. So the moral of the story is hey, be careful of the things that you repeatedly do, because they're shaping you and they shape your desires and your heart and your brain and even your body and your spirit. We're holistic beings, so be careful of the things that you do, and so, anyway. So seniors come afterwards. We have this ritual you kind of walk through. It's a way to say goodbye to your first chunk of life and be open and welcoming to the next part of your life, which is going to be an incredible time. And I'll just say now, if you have no idea what you're doing next, that's okay, you're 18 or 19. What the heck do you know? Anyway, it's okay, you're fine, you'll figure it out. I always figure out. Your 20s is just for that anyway. Trying to figure out what you want to do, who you are, what's down there, what you're good at, that takes some time, so don't worry about it, you'll figure it out. So come, hang out for that, okay. So rhythms we engaged. The first week we did just an introduction. The second week we did fasting, the rhythm of fasting, and the intention is for you to engage in like that following week to try these rhythms out. So maybe you tried fasting out. Last week, sonia preached on service. Maybe you tried out doing some service.
Speaker 1:And then this week is silence and solitude my favorite for sure. Personally, it's really the most difficult one for me too, but I love it and so I would encourage you, at some point in this sermon, write down some thoughts. I want you to try it out Now, some of you who've never tried this practice of silence and solitude. It might be just enough to start with like four minutes a day for like the next couple of days. Just try it out, see how it goes and see what comes up. For those of you, like hardcore maniacs, who've done it before, maybe this is an invitation for you to like try out a couple of days in the woods or get a little hermitage at Pachamon Terrace or something else. But maybe you're somewhere on that spectrum of like new beginner and like old time pro. But find some time this way to engage in silence and solitude. If you do it and if you have an experience I didn't say a good experience If you have any experience, let me know how it goes, even if it's terrible, because it might be terrible, it might be really unpeaceful, and that's okay too, but let me know how it goes. I want to know, if you try it, does that sound all right? Because the idea is to put these rhythms into practice. Try them out and see what they are like and see what it does for you and how it might be helpful or or not.
Speaker 1:Okay, so we just heard Richard read this text from the book of 1 Kings about Elijah. Here's the background quickly. You got to read the whole story on your own, but the background is that just prior to this, elijah has this incredible victory. He's sort of warring with the prophets of Baal there's this false god. He's a foreign god called Baal. The king of Israel, ahab and his wife Jezebel. They worshiped this foreign god called Baal, which was really not okay to do in the land of Israel. They were to be devoted to God, but they worshiped Baal. And so the prophet Elijah is furious. So he has this. He's like hey, we're gonna have a contest on this mountain called Mount Carmel. You'll call on your God, the God of Baal, I'll call on my God, the God of Yahweh, and we'll see who wins. Well, when the prophets of Baal call on Baal, nothing happens.
Speaker 1:And Elijah's talking about trash. He's like where's your God at now? Is he sleeping? But trash talk is in the Bible, so it's okay to talk trash. And then he says where's your God now? Is he in the bathroom? Is he defecating? In the Hebrew he says is he defecating Meaning. Is he going number? That's true, look it up. And then he's like let me call my God. And he calls on Yahweh, and fire falls from heaven and burns up all the animal parts on this altar and he's victorious, proving his God is the real God. People fall on their face and they worship God and God alone.
Speaker 1:Right after this, though, this incredible victory, this achievement, this accomplishment, right after this, jezebel comes to Elijah. He's like hey, hey, dude, that wasn't cool. You, you showed me up, you showed my god up. I'm gonna kill you. So I don't know if you've been there where, like you have this incredible moment, like a victory at work, or like with your kids, or like you have this momentous or monumental experience like this is great, I finally am winning in life.
Speaker 1:And the very next day it like something happens. And just right back down in the valley, and Elijah suddenly becomes overwhelmed with despair and fear. He's afraid for his life, and he should be. Jezebel's going to kill him, and so he's overwhelmed with fear and maybe depression and anxiety, and he runs for his life because he's so afraid, so he goes. Then the text tells us that Elijah goes out into the wilderness because he's so afraid. So he goes. Then the text tells us that Elijah goes out into the wilderness because he's so terrified of what Jezebel might do to him. So he runs, yeah, into the wilderness, into the desert place.
Speaker 1:By the way, in the original Hebrew there's a word for wilderness and desert place, and then, years later, scholars translate the Hebrew Bible into Greek and they use of course it's a different language, they use different words, but when they translate the word wilderness into Greek, it's the Greek word eramos. Everyone say eramos, now eramos in the Greek it's the same word that's used when Jesus goes out into the eramos after he's baptized. The spirit leads him out into the eramos. Eremos is a place of desert land. It's dry and hot. Eremos is a place of desert land. It's dry and hot. It's a wild place where there are wild beasts out there. In fact, eremos could be translated or rendered as the lonely place. So, elijah, after this great victory, he defeated the prophets of Baal and the god of Baal and then, immediately after that, his life is threatened. He runs out into the wilderness by himself, he leaves his servant and he goes out into the lonely place called the Eremos. It's the same place Jesus goes when he's led by the Spirit.
Speaker 1:Now, deserts, or the Eremos in the Greek, in the Bible are often places of solitude and silence. There's not much else out there. Jesus, when he goes out there these wild beasts show up in Mark's gospel, but most often they're places of solitude and they're places of quiet. There's nothing out in the desert. You've been out in the desert. There's not much out there. Even the animals are kind of quiet, except at night maybe. And they're hot. They're hot and dry. There's not much to sustain you out on the desert place. There's no frills, there's no Four Seasons Hotel, there's no plumbing, it's bleak, and at night it gets pretty dark and actually really cold in the desert. You can die just from the temperature fluctuations in the desert. They're tough places and in fact in the Bible the desert places the Eremos.
Speaker 1:They're times of testing. When you go out there, you find out what you're made of, even today. If you go out there, you find out what you're made of Even today. If you go to the desert, you'll find out what you're made of, unless you have bear grills with you. You're going to struggle a little bit and so what's on the inside of you begins to come out, because there are times of testing. So what's down in there, in times of desert or dryness or the eramos, loneliness, that stuff will start to come out and it'll start to surface.
Speaker 1:So Elijah runs out into the wilderness. He runs for his life. He's full of fear and anxiety and he's probably a bit depressed. And when he gets out there he collapses underneath a broom tree. Yeah, they have broom trees sort of scattered throughout the land of Israel in the desert. I said, hey, chat, gpt, make a picture of a broom tree, make it look realistic and make it look hot. Does that look hot? Oh, yeah, I can feel the heat coming off the screen. And he collapses under this tree and he's exhausted and he's spent and he's lonely and he's afraid and he's reached the end of himself and he says to God please just take my life. What, just a moment ago he was victorious. He had like shown up the prophets of Baal. What, just a moment ago he was victorious. He had like shown up the prophets of Baal, defeated the god Baal and God Yahweh, like put his own power on display through fire. And now, because Jezebel threatens his life, he runs to the wilderness, the lonely place, and he collapses and asks God to take away his own life.
Speaker 1:Now, broom trees are these modest shrubs. They don't give a lot of shade, but if you found one of these in the desert it might sustain you for a little while. In fact you could sit underneath and it would provide enough shelter, enough shade that you wouldn't die. So I guess it turns out in the Eremos, in the lonely places of our lives, or in the world, in the deserts, there are pockets of shade and sustenance and grace that seem to be out there, sufficient enough to survive, because in the desert again, we're stripped of all the things that we use to protect ourselves, or all the noise and distractions we use to kind of keep ourselves numb, and we come face to face with. It looks like the sustaining presence of God, the shade or little oasises in the desert, and they sustain us. So in that way, maybe deserts, as they reveal what's deep inside, can also be places of rest.
Speaker 1:Elijah collapses under the tree in the shade and falls asleep. Jesus too finds rest and is ministered to by angels. It says so, elijah, jesus, what about us? I imagine that some of you today might hear the invitation, either from God or just from me hear it from me too, to wander out into the Eremos this week, into the desert, into the lonely, the dry places of our lives, and to sit under a tree and find some rest. Because the willingness to walk into the empty places of our own lives and to sit with whatever comes up the existential despair, the loneliness, the questions, the doubt, the sorrow, the pain, the loss and to sit with it, is actually a precursor to encountering God. So this silence and this solitude in the Eremos is actually a gift. So I invite you to sit in the wilderness of your own questions and your own doubts and your own sorrows, your own fears, Because you're, after all, in good company with the likes of Elijah and Jesus and others in this room. See, god meets Elijah in this place.
Speaker 1:It's in the Eremos, in the desert, the loneliness, that Elijah finds and discovers God In his weakest moment. He finds God there. This angel comes like hey, wake up and you've got to eat something. So Elijah wakes up out of this fog and he's tired and he's under this broom tree and he gives him some food and he eats and goes back to sleep and all the sleepers in the room said amen. And then he wakes up a second time hey, wake up. So he wakes up a second time and gives him some more food and he falls back to sleep. Now look, I'm not saying that all the problems of the world can be solved by a good meal and a nap. I'm just saying that no problem in the world can be made worse by a good nap and some food. Amen. By the way, high school seniors who are graduating just know that if you're ever crabby or cranky at the end of your rope, just try having a good meal and a nap and just see what it does. It might be just you're needed.
Speaker 1:So he wakes back up and then the angels are like hey, I'm going to prepare you for this journey. And he goes on a journey for 40 days and 40 nights and takes him to this cave to meet with god. And all these wild things happen. Of all, there's this incredible wind that passes by the cave and Elijah thinks that's God. So he goes to the cave and he looks out and it's not God, it's just crazy wind. Then there's an earthquake and he's like oh, that must be God in the earthquake. But he goes to the cave mouth and there's no, it's not God, it's just an earthquake. Then fire falls from heaven again, like it happened before. Oh, this is definitely God. These are all ancient symbols of God and they're called theophanies. So you're like, oh yeah, that's definitely God and it's not God in the fire either.
Speaker 1:And then it says Elijah hears the sound of sheer silence and he gets up and he goes to the mouth of the cave and he meets with God. He hears the sound of sheer silence. I said hey, chat, gpt, would you generate for me a picture of the sound of sheer silence? Yeah, that's what it did. That's good. Yeah, what does sheer silence sound like? How does he hear the sound of sheer silence? You know, today audio technicians, if they want to get like a movie, if they want to get some like a few minutes of silence, they have to go into the woods and they have to record for hours, because it's really really difficult to find anywhere where there's of silence. They have to go into the woods and they have to record for hours, because it's really really difficult to find anywhere where there's any silence. What does sheer silence sound like?
Speaker 1:Rumi the great poet wants that silence is the language of God. Everything else is just a bad interpretation. Silence is the language of God and Elijah hears the sound of the sheer silence and he meets with God. Because God seems to be found in the sheer silence of the Eremos, in this place in Israel, and maybe in our lives as well. So it's no wonder for thousands of years and this has been a practice of Christians and other people of faith to wander out into desert places geographical, also metaphorical to search for God and to listen for God in the sound of the sheer silence what might God say to us? And to strip away all of our dependencies and all of our frills and all of our you know distractions, and just to get down to the quiet and listen for God to somehow restore our humanity.
Speaker 1:Because for many of us, if we're honest, our lives are like this jar of river water, which ideally I'd wanted some clean water, but this is not. But either way, we're like jars of river water that just get shaken up all the time and gets even muddier. And this is our life right here just shaken up. We're so busy, full of distractions and things and schedules and chores and task lists and emails and people we got to get back to, and our lives are like this. We don't have any room for the sheer silence, let alone God, or God speaking to us or talking to us, or anything like that, and then we wonder why we don't feel God. Our lives are kind of like these giant jars of river water that just get stirred up and shaken up, and that's our life. And what if we didn't do that? What if we took some moments to sit in the sheer silence?
Speaker 1:Here's a definition, by the way, of the silence and solitude practice, just so you know what we're talking about. So the Christian practice of silence and solitude is the intentional withdrawal from noise and from people and from distractions. I'm already having like palpitations, like no, I love people and I love noises and I love talking, so this one's hard for me. In order, though, to be fully present with God If you want to meet with God, I'm just telling you you might have to wander out into the Eremos and turn the noises down and be alone and see what you encounter Opening oneself up to his voice, to his presence, and it's transforming love in our lives. Here are some quick things too, by the way what silence and solitude is and what it's not. So silence and solitude is silence and it's also solitude. You're welcome. By that I mean this.
Speaker 1:There's a couple of ways to experience silence. One is internally. You have this, probably running monologue in your head. We call this the monkey mind. It's just always going, worrying, thinking, planning, plotting, comparing, trying to earn things. You probably hear it going all the time. Am I to this? Am I not enough of that? Am I always going so to quiet that down? That takes a long time to quiet down, by the way, just so you know. And the first time you try this you might be like I couldn't even turn it off. That's okay, you're in good company there.
Speaker 1:But it's an internal silence of all that running monologue in your head, the monkey brain. It's also an external silence. You've got to get away from the noise. Get away, get into a quiet room, go out into the woods, go out into the lake, get somewhere where there's not a lot of noise going on. It's an external disconnection from things and noises and the phone. Put the phone away, for God's sake. Put the phone away for just a few minutes. It's also a time of solitude, like actual literal disconnection from people Getting alone and all the introverts in the room said amen, let's go. And like it's an intentional separation, to be alone and to be quiet and to see what comes up.
Speaker 1:It's also space in your calendar. I'm telling you, nobody sort of accidentally has times of silence and solitude Because our calendars get filled and we all brag about how busy we are and we get it, we're all busy. So you've got to create some space in your calendar for the eramos, for the sheer silence. You've got to do it. It's a discipline, it's a rhythm. You've got to make space for it in your calendar. It's a discipline, it's a rhythm. You've got to make space for it in your calendar. It's also a place Many of you might already have one. I heard from a woman this morning. She's got a chair in her room off of her kitchen that she goes to to sort of be with God and her dog comes in there, and it's a place you might have a chair. It might be a cabin, it might be a spot in the woods, it might be in your backyard in a hammock, a place you go to like with rhythm. You go to the same place. That's your holy, sacred place, because your intention is different when you're there. So find a place, make one up. It doesn't have to be anything sacred, I mean you can make it sacred.
Speaker 1:Silence and solitude is also a place of the. It's a state of the mind and heart, not just a geographical place, but it's also a state of being. For example, you could be in traffic and experience silence and solitude. You turn the radio off and kind of zone in and open your heart to God and your mind and your experiences with God. It doesn't have to always be a literal place, it can be, but it can also be just a state of the heart and the mind and it can also be just a time of settling. Yeah, like what happens when you let all the sediment in your life go to the bottom Up close. This looks really cool, maybe far away, you can't really tell. But what happens when you let it settle? Well, silence and solitude is a time of just settling, letting all the mind stuff run out and let it until it's nothing left and the inner turmoil kind of just ought to be present. But let it all, it all settle.
Speaker 1:Now here's what it's not just so you're clear too silence until it's not just being alone, it's being alone with god and listening for god. It's also not just a productivity hack. Some of you are like, oh, if I could be alone for an hour, I could get a lot done the next day. Well, no, it's not okay. It's not just that. It's to be alone and to be in the silence for the sake of being alone and being in the silence, to hear God, to be with God, to be with yourself, knowing that you're enough. It's not just so you can be more productive the next day. It's also not escapism. Now listen, elijah kind of falls into this bucket, but it's not you running from everything and escaping and trying to. I got it. I got it.
Speaker 1:But that can actually lead you to silence and solitude. It can. It led Elijah there. He goes there because he's afraid and depressed at the end of his rope, but ideally, it's an intention of your heart and your mind and your being that you want to go out there and engage in silence and solitude. So it's also not easy and it isn't always peaceful. It's not just for monks and pastors and the spiritual gurus of the world.
Speaker 1:Because it's not easy, I was telling my friend Dave this morning I go, because he's like, hey, I'm going to try it, but I think it's going to be really hard. I go. It probably will be hard, that's okay, try it anyway. It might take you a few times of trying it to let your spirit settle Because, after all, we're like jars of river water that's shaking up and it takes some time to let that thing settle down. So it may not be easy, it might be tough those first few times you try it. So I want you to try it anyway. Now it's difficult, like I said, because of all the stuff shaking up in our lives. But silence and solitude is choosing to do nothing, to give up accomplishing anything and to cease all of our attachments.
Speaker 1:Now, the first time I tried this was years ago. I went on a retreat to Enders Island, connecticut, and we were with other people out there and we had to spend a whole day alone in the silence and the solitude. I was like, oh my gosh, how am I going to do this? So I got my Bible, I got some reflection things to read. I got like you know they had the Stations of the Cross at this place. I'm like I'll go for a walk. So I got down in there, I started reading my Bible and I went to like reading some reflections and I went to do the around the area and I looked at my watch it had been seven minutes.
Speaker 1:I was like, oh no, I'm in trouble and it's hard, but it's become one of the most formative experiences of my life. I'm telling you this because I need it, and people like me need it, because my life is often like a jar of river water that's just been shaken up. And even to this day I've been doing it for over a dozen years and I still have this push-pull with it and it takes me a while to settle in and let the sediment go to the bottom because I'm like it's hard. But for me it's out in that space and the silence and the solitude, out in the woods alone, I can sort of experience God in unique and different ways and I can hear the sound of the sheer silence and perhaps even also the voice of God.
Speaker 1:The great Blaise Pascal says this. He says look, all of the unhappiness of humans arises from the single fact, one single fact that they cannot stay quietly in their own room. We love having our lives shaken up like this. I mean in the Eremos. We're stripped of all of the things that we're used to, and being alone in the silence and the solitude is terrifying for us, because it confronts us with this question.
Speaker 1:When you're alone, in the quiet, it raises the question who am I? Who am I really? Who am I apart from other people, my relationships, even your closest ones, your kids, your spouse, your closest friend? Who am I apart from them? Who am I separate from my achievements? My accomplishments I'm so good. Here's my resume. But who am I apart from that? Who am I apart from all my accomplishments, things I've done and my attachments? Who am I apart from these things I use to sort of numb myself out, whether it's shopping online or drinking too much or whatever your things are?
Speaker 1:A while ago, I had to sort of reevaluate my own relationship with alcohol, because I know that there are some folks that can drink, and drink one or two, and it's no problem. But what I've always wondered is what is the relationship like with that thing? And is there any part of you that's using that thing to kind of check out or numb out as an attachment? And if you're like, maybe, then examine that what's going on in this relationship? Because who are you apart from these attachments, these things that we go to that we're so used to just sort of checking out or numbing out? Who are you? Who are you, apart from all your distractions, when you put the phone down or the computer down or the video games away, the sports away? Who are you? And the masks that you wear? That don't work out in the Eremos, because nobody out there cares. The wolf or the bear or the birds care about your mask. They don't care, by the way. These are all what we call the false self, these constructs that we present to the world about what we are and who we are. They're not really you. They're a part of you, but they're not really you. So who are you In the Eremos? You're confronted with all these things, and these are hard questions to ask and answer.
Speaker 1:So what we love to do is just fill our lives with all kinds of diversions, to not think about it, blaze past councils Like hey, it'd be easier to not think about it. So we fill our lives with noise and crowds and stimulation and movement and vacations and people and going out to and fro, busyness avoidance. Like we turn up the radio in the car when that engine is making that clunking noise. I don't want to hear it. Just turn up the radio and it goes away. So we shake up that jar, so we don't have to be confronted with ourself and who am I really? And the existential fear and questions that live down below. We don't want to ask them.
Speaker 1:The problem, though, is we often confuse numbing with nourishing, and we think I'm nourishing my soul, but I'm actually just numbing out, and they're not the same thing. So we go on vacations and it sounds like fun, but then we get home and we're exhausted, like I need to rest from my vacation. Or we go home from a long day at work and we sit down and we're like I want to relax. We binge watch 12 episodes of Severance Just me, okay. Or we just put on headphones I love having headphones on, but, man, I can check out with headphones on for a long time and I'm wondering if I'm trying to nourish my soul or if I'm numbing out and we try to rest through excitement.
Speaker 1:It doesn't work that way, and it's more than just that we're distracted and busy. It's more than that. It's actually impacting our inner lives and it's affecting our souls in deep ways. The great Ronald well, actually Nowen says this. He says we're so afraid of being alone because we're afraid of confronting our inner chaos. Yeah, I think Ronald Rollheiser says this. Yeah, he says that we're distracting ourselves into spiritual oblivion, because we're not just busy and distracted with that, but it's also impacting our souls.
Speaker 1:The things we do with rhythm shape the kind of people that we are, and peace is not more of this. It's not. Peace is letting that bad boy settle In our modern world. It runs on hurry and busy and distraction. It just does. And these things shape us and how we think about the world and our role in it, what we should be doing and what does it mean to be a valuable person. And if we aren't careful we'll get sucked down the river right along with everybody else. Because these things shape us, they're rhythms and you'll know it.
Speaker 1:Because when you stop and you try to do it and you engage in maybe a moment of the eramos or silence and solitude, you might begin to panic and you might for a moment feel worthless because you're not doing anything, you're not being productive, or it might remind you of death itself, like the final stopping and loneliness. That's how you know. You probably need more of it, because many of us, we don't know ourselves. We don't know who we are, or it could of us. Just we don't know ourselves. We don't know who we are. Or it could be that many of us don't like ourselves. We don't want to be alone with ourselves. So what does it mean to be alone with God and the Eremos and with ourselves, knowing that whatever we are, whatever we bring, it's enough and God will meet us there? What if we tried it? I want to encourage you to try it. I got a few tips for you Before I do.
Speaker 1:I know there's someone in the room who's going to say to me Ryan, I just don't have enough time, if only I had more time. You know who you are, and I would say this To those of you that think that if only I had more time, I would say that's a fallacy, because if you had more time, you would just fill it with more of the same distractions you already have. How do I know that? Well, a long time ago we invented cars, thinking they would save us time. But now, guess what? We just drive farther distances and sit in traffic for hours, and most of us now live 45 minutes from everything we like, including our own sanity. You know what I mean. Or how about this one? We invented the microwave, thinking it would save us more time to have time with family over dinner. But now we just expect everything to be this fast and we're impatient. It's like me, like 90 seconds for a pizza. Come on, what is this? The Oregon Trail Hurry up, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:Or email, ugh, the bane of my existence. Remember a hundred years ago you'd write a letter with a piece of paper and pen. We're like let's save time, we'll make it electronic. That was a great idea. Who ever thought of that? Because now we write hundreds of these a day and if you're like me, you spend three hours a day clearing out the clutter of all these candle emporiums that you never bought anything out in the first place. Like, what is this On the phone? It's supposed to save us a bunch of time, but it doesn't. It just distracts us. So you don't need more time, you need to make better use of the time that you have. So we're going to practice it together. Fair enough, because here's what it can do for us and I'll get out of your way.
Speaker 1:Silence and solitude, intentional times of quiet aloneness, turning things off even for a few minutes a day, can allow the waters of your life to settle. And then, when it does be present, with whatever you find down there. You may not like it at first, but don't run and numb yourself out. I'm going to go and do something I feel comfortable with. Don't do that, just be with it, be present with it. Silence and solitude can also help in this way. It can provide real, authentic and true rest, not pseudo-rest, but real rest, not binge-watching 12 episodes rest or vacation of five days of chaos. Rest, real rest, nourishment for your soul. It can also help break the rhythms of the molds Paul wrote in Romans be not conformed to the image of the world. Don't let the ways of the world, the present age, the eon of the age, or the age, this present age, don't let them shape you. They're going to try to mold you and shape you. Don't let them break out of those rhythms and establish your own rhythms. That's what we're trying to do here. Okay, a couple of tips and I'll get out of your way.
Speaker 1:Number one start small. So if you're like a brand new to this, a beginner, start small. Don't begin with like a five-day silent retreat. You know, in the desert of Arizona you may not come back. So start small, a couple of minutes in the morning. But find a place that's quiet, alone in a room. Find your sacred chair or whatever blanket, but be alone. Don't bring your phone in there, don't have a computer and do nothing in there and start small Again. If you're a longtime maniacal participant in this kind of an activity, then you can go longer, that's fine, but you have your own ideas, I'm sure, then Also.
Speaker 1:Secondly, find a sacred space. Go to the same one. I would encourage you to try it for a couple of days in a row and go to that same room or that same tree or that same hammock in the backyard. Just don't fall asleep. That's not really the same thing, although you actually might, because sometimes our bodies are so tired because we run ourselves ragged. You might need to take a nap and have a good meal, and that's okay too. Okay.
Speaker 1:Number three uh, don't do, don't do anything. All my type a folks just went. Listen, we are more than what we do. You guys are all brilliant. Look at you, look at yourselves. I'm so proud of all you, all the things you've done. You guys are great. Good for you for all the things you've done.
Speaker 1:The Ramos is not a place to do anything. It's to meet with God. If you're going to do anything, just listen for God and be with God, but don't bring your task list or your to-do list or your book or a journal or a Bible even Don't bring anything in there. Just sit there and do nothing. And then, lastly, welcome the discomfort.
Speaker 1:It's going to be hard and painful. Maybe some things will arise that you don't like. That's okay. Talk to your friend or your close loved one, or talk to me or Sonia or whomever, and, or your close loved one, or talk to me or Sonia or whomever, and we can walk you through it. So, central Lutheran Church, may you know that the language of God is silence. The God is found in the sound of the sheer silence, and when we let our lives settle just a little bit, all kinds of interesting things might happen. There are messages down there for us and healing to be had and an encounter with the divine. So today and in the days ahead, may you find God in the silence and in the solitude. Amen.
