Tick/Tock

"There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven:

a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot, a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build, a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance, a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain, a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away, a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak, a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace."

~Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

Time is a strange master.

It is one of things that we as mere mortals cannot fully understand or comprehend.

There is a time for everything.

This reality has come harshly into the light for me in recent days. A week ago today, I found myself weeping as though my heart would shatter.

I had reached a point where one of the few solid things in my life had just been shaken to the core; I was falling like Alice down a strange sort of rabbit hole, and I had no idea when or where I would land.

I was, quite literally, lost.

My emotions were scattered across the map.

I was scared to death. My heart held a momentary burst of anger, which then melted into a sheer, rich sorrow.

And then loneliness.

And then...

...a strange, echoing silence.

It took me all of 24 hours to reach a strange new sort of reality.

This new existence -- however brief or momentary in the long run -- wasn't wrong. In fact, it was a long time in coming.

I'm not saying that I was suddenly okay with this sudden separation...the time had just arrived for a "severing," of sorts -- for such a resounding shaking of my so-called security in this particular aspect of my life that would leave me NO OTHER CHOICE but to run to my God.

And I did.

I promise, I do have a point to these seemingly random and disconnected ramblings.

There is a time for everything.

Sometimes, it takes a sharp severing -- an uprooting of a deep-set root -- for the beauty to have room to grow.

Sometimes, we need to just let go.

There is a time for everything. The hands of the clock are carefully moved by the unseen Hand of an Almighty God.

Time is not strange or alarming to God; it's an essential ingredient, a necessary fuel to His refining fire that burns away the impurities and leaves us grasping for Him alone.

The times, situations, and moments of our lives are not out of control.

They are not just whisperings of ideas cast about by the Fates or some unseen collection of deities with nothing better to do than meddle with the lives of mankind.

Our times are secure.

Because He is faithful...

..and He has a time for everything.

"You will keep in perfect peace him whose mind is steadfast, because he trusts in You." ~Isaiah 26:3

Silence

Silences make the real conversations between friends. Not the saying but the never needing to say is what counts. ~Margaret Lee Runbeck

There is something so velvet, so blissful about silence.

Those moments when all distractions fade away and you are completely lost in a perfect moment of soundless thought.

Some view the concept of "silence" as a sign of mental dysfunction, or an awkward moment between friends when there is nothing left to say.

For me, it's the exact opposite.

When there is silence, there is comfort.

The noise ends, the chaos is silenced. It's a glimpse into the comfort of Heaven.

His still, small voice speaks loudest when we cease our storms and just allow our souls to be bathed in soothing calm.

I think that's why God gave us the following truth about our relationships here on earth...

...when you are able to be silent with someone, without a word between you, it is not because you have nothing to say to one another or that a unspoken tedium has been reached.

Not in the least.

You have reached that point of the utmost love. When those moments of pain arrive between two friends, there is such blessed relief in a simple embrace where not a sound need be made.

You both just know.

There is a time and a place for silence. There is an unspoken need in each one of us to have someone understand us at that level.

It's in that moment of silence when you hear the words "...you're going to be okay" the most clearly.

Because that is a picture of our relationship with God.

Does this not make the silence that much more beautiful?

It should.

And behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind tore into the mountains and broke the rocks in pieces before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire; and after the fire a still small voice. ~ 1 Kings 19:11-12