Solitude and the H.S.

"If our souls are anxious and distracted, our life connection with God will suffer. The more we are led into quietness, the more attuned we become of God" -Bruce Demarest

We can't follow God's will, unless we know what it is. To know what it is we need to listen to him, but God is in the stillness. God has a still small voice, a whisper that can barely be heard over the loudness of our lives. In the moments that we need to hear God the most, we forget the most to stop and listen. We pray yes, but prayer is verbal. Prayer is not stillness. Its important, yes, absolutely. But if we seek to hear God's voice, to hear his call, our will for our lives then we must also stop. I don't know why, but for so many of us, the thought of sitting in absolute silence is scary. It might even make us go to sleep. That is because we forget that we have the Holy Spirit, the counselor living within us, that needs to lead the way. Stopping isn't about sitting in a quiet room while your mind goes over you"to do list". Its about stopping and focusing on God. Contemplating on Him. Affirming your faith in Him, your love for him. It isn't about saying your prayer request in your head. Its about recognizing God's presence in your life. We forget he is there, oh we know he is omniscient but we forget that means he is there. His presence, there. His spirit in you. Stopping helps you recognize that. It helps you realize that you cannot do his will with out him.

Moreover, listening to God also has an element of solitude. When we study Jesus we find that Jesus spend a lot of time on his own. There are many verses that describe that he fled from the multitudes. There is something about being alone that draws us closer to God. Maybe its the reduction in distractions. I don't know. But so many of us fear being alone, or think there is something wrong with it. Yet, I have found that in the solitude my soul is drawn closer to God, in the solitude I can hear God clearer.