Shut Up & Listen: Living Quietly with God in a World of Noise
Yet we urge you, brothers and sisters, to [love each other] more and more, and to make it your ambition to lead a quiet life: You should mind your own business and work with your hands, just as we told you, so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody.
In the 2007 film Into the Wild (based on a book that I didn’t read, go ahead, judge me), Christopher McCandless is a irritated twenty-something Gen X’er who, despite having the world at the palm of his hands with a great GPA at a prestigious university and with his mother and father bankrolling his social, cultural, and financial ascent into American hierarchy, turns his back on it all as he begins a soul-searching trek through the American countryside en route to the primary Mecca of his journey; Alaska. Many who cross his path along the way inquire as to why he would turn his back on so much promise and potential to pursue such a bizarre and specific goal. One such interaction leads him to state plainly why he rejected pedagogy and pedigree of academic acclaim by quoting the famous writer Henry David Thoreau.
“Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth.”
A powerful quote that is probably deserving of an entirely different blog. And yet, in a certain sense, McCandless’s dream as expressed by Thoreau has become true in America (see what I did there?)
Underneath the dark underbelly of the American ideal of love (a certain, Hallmark kind of love), money, and fame, has dawned a rise in the importance of truth.
But what truth, you ask?
Your truth.
More and more society has focused on discovering one’s truth. However, from my perspective, it seems like there are two dominant strands of ‘truth-seeking’ that have gained the most traction. If you are on the left politically, this is often expressed in free sexual expression, open and abundant consumption of hallucinogens/substances, and a rejection of the Western, primarily white-dominant notion of being a “born again” Christian (so many blog ideas, so little time). Yet if you are on the right, it is often expressed in blind patriotism & subservience to “traditional American” values (even when they lead to open and rampant sinfulness, again, another blog, another time), claiming your right to weapons with the capacity to kill without a semblance of moderation, and a fierce desire to claim some kind of non-assimilated culture which leads to a certain kind of superiority complex.
Before I go further, one whopper of a disclaimer; these are huge caricatures. I myself lean liberal, so I probably gave them more of the benefit of the doubt, but I still stand by the thrust of these generalizations. I think they both miss the mark.
Rather than honestly, genuinely, and recklessly push forward to the truth, we end up taking a road more traveled, leaning passionately or meekly into one of the two roads mentioned above, finding comfort and solace in having company along the way, even if both of the paths do not lead us to actual clarity, let alone happiness or meaning or purpose. It’s a mad, mad world, as the Tears for Fears song goes.
The one thing these two polarizing opposites have in common? Where do they both fail? What do they both lack?
Tangible connection to God. Intentional movement toward the “Other.” The idea that, just maybe, we can’t find the truth on our own. That the truth, well, abides within a being.
In the 1953 sci-fi classic Fahrenheit 451 (this one I have read, dozens of times), the primary character Montag lives in a post-literary dystopian world wherein all books are incinerated. At first thrilled to live in the exhilaration of the pyromaniac’s dream, Montag is, quite literally, stopped in his tracks by a young girl named Clarisse early in the narrative. As their budding friendship begins to blossom, something new arises in Montag by the ethereal, other worldly, qualities of Clarisse. After one of their first conversations, Montag muses about it:
“What incredible power of identification the girl had; she was like the eager watcher of a marionette show, anticipating each flicker of an eyelid, each gesture of his hand, each flick of a finger, the moment before it began. How long had they walked together? Three minutes? Five? Yet how large that time seemed now. How immense a figure she was on the stage before him; what a shadow she threw on the wall with her slender body! He felt that if his eye itched, she might blink. And if the muscles of his jaws stretched imperceptibly, she would yawn long before he would.
Why, he thought, now that I think of it, she almost seemed to be waiting for me there, in the street, so damned late at night…”
For Montag, Clarisse was so unlike all others in his life, even his own wife. Without even hinting at something adulterous, Ray Bradbury intensifies the connected feeling Montag has with this young girl, who could easily be his own niece, as a wise counselor, an outside voice to a monotone, uninteresting world filled with fires & disengaged faces. Later, in a more tender moment, Montag investigates about her keen insight about him and his life:
‘“Why is it,” he said, one time, at the subway entrance, “I feel like I’ve known you so many years?”
“Because I like you,” she said, “and I don’t want anything from you. And because we know each other.”’
Clarisse, with only a few interactions and a sweet, genuine disposition, makes Montag feel known in a manner he does not experience with any other character in the book (till later on, y’all gotta read it, thanks to Junior year of high school English teacher, Mrs. Rubus).
Her power comes not from “her truth,” or her agenda, or her desire to convince Montag to throw out and burn his fire uniform before burning down the rest of his life. Her power comes from being a true presence, an honest kindness, a person who invests wholeheartedly in Montag for Montag’s sake and just because she likes him.
I think God feels the same way that Clarisse feels about Montag toward us. Let me explain.
Before Jesus began his ministry in the gospel of Matthew, before He did any cool, Son of God, super hero-y healings or miracles, He was just a simple construction worker. He came from a boring little town named Nazareth. And He wasn’t a handsome fellow like a Ryan Gosling or a Brad Pitt (always had a man crush for my boy Joaquin Phoenix). He was an average Israelite. Nothing special, nothing unique. Just another guy.
Yet when He is baptized, something happens to Him that sets the tone for the rest of the narrative. This is where we ought to point to when we think about how Jesus was able to transform everything like He did. After being baptized by John the baptist, this is what Jesus heard from above (as did everyone else present).
"‘And a voice from heaven said, ‘this is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.’”
This is an exclamation point we like to rush past that is, I’d argue, as important as His ministry, His teachings, His death, His resurrection. Actually, since we have focused so much on everything else, we have since forgotten how He was able to do everything else.
After hearing this, the following chapter describes how Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted and tested. We learned about this passage quite a bit in Sunday school, but were never taught about the pragmatics of why Jesus was able to overcome.
By going away, into the wilderness. away from the crowds and the noise and the Instagram and the Facebook and the Youtube, Jesus was able to receive power, love, and truth from His Father.
It was the going away, it was going into the silence in solitude, that empowered Him to be Jesus.
Yet how often do we consider the importance of ‘going away?’ Of retreating from the distractions? Of shutting up and listening to what God has to say to us, about us, for us? So that we might say things to others, about others, and for others?
Henri Nouwen in his book The Way of the Heart describes solitude as “the furnace of transformation.” Without external stimuli, we finally have room to be present to God in a way that we can’t at a Sunday gathering, at a weekly community group, or with our dearest loved ones. In the “quiet place,” there is nothing around us, save ourselves and God. Finally, removed from everything that screams for our attention, love, and energy, we can fully give our attention, love, and energy to God.
And, we can finally receive God’s attention, love, and energy for us. After all, again quoting Nouwen, “the goal of our life is not people. [The goal of our life] is God.”
Yet, truth be told, getting rid of even some of our daily distractions is daunting pragmatically and daunting emotionally. The pragmatics are simple; we all are scheduling ourselves to death. In his book The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry, John Mark Comer points out that the most common response folks have to the simple how are you question is ‘good, but busy.’ Funny, isn’t it, that rather than saying good, YET busy, we instinctively say good, BUT busy. Getting rid of the busyness seems like a direct hurdle to continuing the ongoing rat race of our tech savvy, always plugged in context. And yet, I’d argue it is the only way to bring God into our emotional landscape.
Yet further, herein is where we find why we distract ourselves to begin with. As attention spans get shorter, our capacity to lean into pain also gets shorter. The more we binge the more likely we are avoiding something that is hurting us. Inviting God in gets more and more harrowing as our yearning to suppress our wounds gets deeper and deeper. We think God isn’t speaking but it’s actually we who won’t listen.
A closer examination into the stories of Jesus’ physical healing reveal more than solely physical healings. The subtext of many of these narratives are regarding people that in ancient near east society were consistently at the bottom of the totem pole. The whores, the tax collectors, the lepers, the poor in spirit… these were the ones who caught the eye of the simple carpenter from Nazareth.
Yet we avoid encounters with Jesus by distracting ourselves from the pain where He might heal. Rather than invite Him into the dark emotions and deep wounds, we ask Him to give us pleasant emotions in a feeble attempt to gain the kingdom of God without a connection to the King.
But this will not do. This is not why Jesus came and gave us Himself and His kingdom.
Brennan Manning in his book Ruthless Trust describes, blatantly, the point of his sequel to The Ragamuffin Gospel (which I highly recommend):
“The underlying premise of this book: the splendor of a human heart which trusts that it is loved gives God more pleasure than Westminster Cathedral, the Sistine Chapel, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Van Gogh’s Sunflowers, the sight of ten thousand butterflies in flight, thousands of followers on Instagram, millions of subscribers on Youtube, or the scent of a million orchids in bloom (italics mine).
Trust is our gift back to God, and he finds it so enchanting that Jesus died for love of it.”
By checking out on the checklists, by unhurrying from our frenetic hurried pace, by stopping and resting in the delight and care and tenderness and love of God, we finally taste and see that the Lord is, indeed, good. We have something to offer others who are in duress.
We don’t talk the gospel, we live the gospel.
In the final, tragic moments of Into the Wild, as Christopher McCandless begins to reflect on his life and his journey to Alaska, he mourns and mourns. Along the path, he remembers all the love he received and gave on the road, all the conversations and hugs and tears and laughter that gave him life. In one of the final frames of the film, we see him write this cryptic but beautiful line into his journal.
“Happiness is real only when shared.”
I happen to agree with him, and it gives me tears every time I see it. However, I would amend his thought with one important addition.
Happiness is real only when shared with God.
Further, to conclude, I am going to write something I thought would remain solely in my journal but which I now wish to share:
Nothing in life was intended to be experienced apart from the love of God. We are not wired to endure loss without love, pain without comfort, death without life. God acts in many ways and through many people, and He always yearns to show Himself to us if we are ready to see Him.
He is not an austere, emotionally drab watchmaker nor a tyrannical, petty monstrous dictator.
He is Papa. He is Daddy. He is Abba.
He is the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and end, and He has never existed without being the greatest lover the universe will ever know.