Something sacred in the silence

The other night, I was reading Little Women and had come to the chapter when Jo realizes that Beth is dying. The funny part about that chapter is that Jo realizes the state of things without Beth having to tell her, and, for awhile, they don’t talk about it. But they both know and Louisa May Alcott described that time by saying there was something sacred in the silence.

I was reading in bed and momentarily searched my nightstand for a pencil so I could underline that phrase. Sometimes you read something—in the Bible, a novel, on a blog, in the lyrics of a song—that resounds with you so deeply that can’t forget it, and that’s what happened to me in that moment.

Because I know that sacred silence. It stretched between me and a friend who stopped in my office yesterday morning to tell me about the peace that passes understanding he’d felt in the middle of the tumult of emotions that rocked his family this week when his youngest child got sick and was ultimately diagnosed with diabetes. It surrounded me on a dark August night several years ago when a friend sat with me in the darkness on the patio at a local coffee shop and cried with me even though she’d never known the grandmother I knew was dying. I felt it in my heart the moment I first held my nephew, the day I was baptized, during those dark moments during Good Friday services right after the last candle was extinguished, and when I stood on an overlook in New Mexico and surveyed the beauty that no picture does justice.

As much as I love words, sometimes they’re unnecessary. Sometimes, you don’t need to say anything. Sometimes, you just need to listen, to stop talking, so that you can feel that peace, the sacredness in the silence that’s balm to your soul.

I left work early yesterday because I was in a bad mood and had worked through lunch the day before. I was in a bad mood because I felt invisible, like no one really understood me. I was tired in the very marrow of my bones and couldn’t remember the last time I felt well-rested. I was sad and I felt guilty, stupid, and selfish for being sad. Somewhere during the drive home, though, I started praying—not out loud, but silently pouring out all the hurts and sorrows even if I thought they were petty and selfish or that I was being melodramatic. And somewhere in there, the sacred silence happened. I had exhausted my list; I had no more words and all the stuff was out in the open. And I had the sense that while it all hurt and it might hurt for a long time more, I was going to be OK. And that it was OK to admit you weren’t OK all the time. And that more than anything, I was held in the arms of a God who loves me so much that He gave up all that He had to save me.  And in that moment after I’d told Him I was scared and weary and that I needed to know that somebody loved and wanted me, I felt His answer in the silence.

I am deeply loved and my hurts matter to Him, even when I think they’re silly, petty, or selfish even as I tell Him about them. I am loved by a God who never stops pursuing and wants nothing less than my honesty, even when it seems selfish. And as one who is dearly loved, I am hid in Him.

I may not always be happy, but I will be obedient. And I will be OK.