Silence

The irony of writing a post on silence today lies in the fact that the current group of middle schoolers is very loud and I have spent much of my day yelling to be heard.  Not mad yelling, just loud so they would actually hear me over their own cacophony and stop talking long enough to hear the instructions.  This group is a lot of fun--no troublemakers per se, just plenty of kids who want to do their own thing and aren't afraid to say it.  For the record though, most of them play most of the games with good attitudes, and listen and participate in the lessons.  It'll be interesting to watch the kids become more themselves and stop worrying about impressions and testing boundaries as the week goes on, and learn where they're at on personal levels.  Let me just reiterate how much I freaking love the Midkids.  Middle schoolers are the best and I am SO glad I get to work with them all summer!  I can't remember if I've talked about this already but they are just such an interesting age because they're in a time of transition between kid and young adult, and there are definitely aspects of both age groups which makes for a very unique amalgamation.  There is also a huge range of maturity levels, even though it only spans ages 11-13 (with the occasional 10 or 14 year old).  All that to say, middle schoolers are great.  They're (usually) young enough to be fun, but also old enough to understand deeper things that elementary kids don't quite get.  We as staff get great enjoyment from the kids' "I'm too cool for games/camp songs/dancing/being as ridiculous as the leaders" attitudes that sometimes surface, and the presence of deadly cooties that are spread when two people touch each other in any way (quelle horreur!).  At the beginning of the summer I was kind of hoping to get Midkids because it's an age group that I hadn't worked with before, and I had heard how fun and rewarding it was to work with middle schoolers.  Well folks, it's true!  They're great.

Now to the topic at hand: the value of silence.  This is a lesson God taught me the past semester of school and I've been waiting to write about it until a time when I had nothing else huge to post about.  If you've read my older posts, you may remember that I was sick a lot last semester and the body part that suffered the most was my poor vocal cords.  I was on vocal rest a lot, which meant that I would go eat with my friends in the dining commons and just sit silently while everyone else talked.  As annoying as that was sometimes, God really taught me how incredibly important silence can be, and how much a relationship can benefit when one person shuts up and lets the other person talk.  Here's a quote from my journal from Feb 28: "Being silent has allowed me to observe and listen and realize how trivial my opinion is.  It's been a good lesson that I never expected to learn."  I normally talk a lot, and I like to share with other the things that I notice.  Being the talkative and observant person that I am, that means that I am often blurting out random things that I want others to see or enjoy, which too often meant interrupting someone (example: having a conversation in the car and spotting something extremely fascinating out the window and butt in while the person is talking to insert my comment of aforementioned fascinating thing).  God helped me to realize that while my opinion is important, there are so many times where the other person isn't going to miss out on anything huge if I don't tell them, but they will greatly benefit from me giving them my undivided attention and just listening, without blurting unrelated things, enjoyable though they may be.

All semester I was praying for God to give me humility and help me be a reflection of Him in my relationships, and this silence thing fit right in.  The whole premise of loving someone as Jesus did is loving them first, before me.  That means when they want to talk, I listen, and when I want to talk, I make sure the other person doesn't want to talk first.  I don't hesitate to assert myself when I want to say something or make my opinion known, and while this is not a bad thing it is also really important for me to remember to give others the chance to be heard.  The journal entry in the previous paragraph was written on a day of vocal rest that I had had dinner with one of my friends.  We're really good friends and we talk about all kinds of things, but that night I realized how much more he had to say when given the chance.  Both of us were surprised at the things he shared because I was quiet and just let him talk, and it was a really sweet conversation.  That meal was what made the value of silence click in my head.  And relationships with people are not the only thing that benefit from selfless listening and silence--when we are quiet in God's presence, He is there, whether he speaks or not.  Psalm 46 says "Be still, and know that I am God."  Psalm 37 says "Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him."  Stillness, silence and solitude.  Those things are hard to put into effect, especially when life presents a million things to do and worry about and plan and memorize and study--which, let's be honest, is most of the time.  But when silence becomes a priority, relationships will change.  People will be encouraged.  It's not always easy to make time and especially find a place to be silent before God, but it is absolutely invaluable.  I need to do it more--a lot more.

In Exodus 14, Pharaoh has already let the Israelites go and he is already regretting his decision.  He sends his men out in chariots to find his freed slaves, and meanwhile the Israelites (such whiners!) are terrified and complaining to Moses about dying in the desert and thinking they would have been better off as slaves again.  If I were Moses, I would be pretty annoyed and just want to roll my eyes and say "Forget it, I'm going to the Promised Land without you and you can just make your own town right here--Whinerville."  I don't know what his attitude was but his response was simple and poignant:

"Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will work for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall never see again.

The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to be silent."