“Be still and know that I am God.” Psalm 46:10

“Do you hear it – do you hear it?” – with an extreme emphasis on the letter “t”. While watching my grandson about eleven years ago, he would look up in the sky and ask me this question over and over – until I realized – his mom was flying for a business trip and he could hear a plane overhead miles away and wanted me to know that his mom was on that plane. I just smiled.

If I would have asked myself this question thirty years ago or more, I would say no, I don’t hear it. Oh, how I wished I would have been still and listened. I kept saying to God, “Why don’t You take a chair – I’ve got this”. God would say, “No – you take a chair – I’ve got this”—I never listened. Why is that? Why is it so hard in times of distress, worry, or conflict, we think we don’t need God – nor do we listen or go to him – are we afraid he can’t help us – or he doesn’t care?

When Psalm 46 was written, the Israelites could possibly have been in war or the writer in conflict himself. God could be saying in either situation to stop fighting – your conflict is with me. “Let me be God. Don’t try and do my job for me. Be patient, be still, and let me go to work for you. I’ve got this!”

It’s too bad for us that Lent only lasts forty days. The forty days represent the time Jesus was in the wilderness preparing for his own last days. I wouldn’t want those forty days of Jesus being in the wilderness to last any longer than it did though. We, as Christians, are to take this time to renew our personal relationship with God – whether it be through fasting, giving ourselves to community efforts or strengthening our own spiritual discipline – stop the conflicts in our lives.

Prayer: Dear God, My prayer this day is that all who read this can learn to sit – “be still – and know that I am God” – and if we sit still long enough, we will feel Your hand on our shoulders and hear You whisper in our ears that life will be OK. I pray that we will take Your hand and sit with You awhile, not just during these forty days, but every day, until that day we join You and all our brothers and sisters in Christ in heaven. Amen.