Has God ever spoken to you? Do you wonder why God
doesn’t speak to you more? Has God ever spoken to me? Yes; many times,
but not in audible words. Often through the Scriptures, sometimes in
prayer when something just comes to my mind, or I become aware of
something and often through other people, through something they will
say, even though they will be unaware of it.
God is speaking to us all the time. A lot of the
time we are not aware of it because we are not listening and there is
so much noise. Everywhere we go there is noise, music playing, tv or
radio on, texts on our phones. It is very hard to find silence and we
need silence if we are to listen.
If God spoke to you, what would He want to say to
you? If we really believe God created us and that we are being drawn
closer and closer to him, then God must have plenty to say to us, but
probably not in the way we would expect. Presuming that you love your
children, or nieces/nephews, you want to teach them, guide them and
encourage them. You want to help them make sense of their lives and
point them in the direction where they will hopefully be most
fulfilled. Even if you don’t have your own children, there are
always people we come across that we want to help in some way,
through encouragement, or a bit of wisdom that we have learnt from
experience. I am sure that that is also how God speaks to us. Since
He created us, He wants to teach us, show us the path that will lead
to our greatest fulfillment. He wants to help us make sense of
things. Do you ever wonder what exactly Jesus was saying to the
people he taught when he walked the earth? I’m sure it is the same
as what he teaches us now.
‘But I am so busy!’ There is always time when we
are alone and we can turn off the radio or tv and the phone! Think of
all the time you spend driving places. Turn off the radio. Get off
the phone and listen! Talk to God from your heart and just be with
him.
St. Benedict of Norcia lived around the year 500 and he wrote a rule for his monks, which is just known as The Rule of St. Benedict, and it is still used by monks today, 1500 years later. It is basically a guideline of how they are to live from day to day. The very first word of the rule is the word ‘listen’. The second word is ‘carefully’. Listen carefully to my teaching.
We also talk about being ‘obedient’ to God. The
word ‘obedient’ comes from two Latin words ob audire,
which means ‘to listen intently.’ God is saying to us: ‘Listen
carefully, because I have something to say to you.’
Last November at one of the papal audiences, Pope
Francis said this:
When we go to mass,
maybe we arrive five minutes early and we start to chat with those in
front of us. But it is not a moment to chat. It is a moment of
silence, to prepare ourselves for dialogue with God. It is a time for
the heart to collect itself, in order to prepare for the encounter
with Jesus. Silence is so important. Remember what I said last week:
we do not go to a show; we go to meet the Lord and silence prepares
us and accompanies us [for this].
(Nov 15, 2017, St.
Peter’s Basilica)
Did you know that people come here up to an hour before the mass
begins, in order to pray? They understand that
it is an encounter with Jesus and they are preparing for it.
All of us are different. All of us pray differently
and that’s normal. But all of us need silence in some shape or form
to be alone with God; to listen to God, sot that the one who created
us can speak to us.
One of the most beautiful ways that God speaks to us is through the Scriptures. The Bible is a collection of letters and stories that God has written to us. Everything in the Bible addresses everything in our world today. Everything! Do you have a bible? If not, why not? Don’t you want to know what God is saying to you, because God is speaking to you. Take out your bible, or buy one and read one chapter of one book on a regular basis. It takes about 5 minutes.
God has a lot to say to us, but we must listen.
‘Speak Lord, your servant is listening.’
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