Sunrise Silence

I don’t know what dragged me out of a deep sleep, but I do know what finally pulled me out of my warm bed before 6 a.m. on a Sunday.

The noise… in my head.

The thrum of thoughts fast and unfinished drove my heart rate up and my eyes open. I had no choice but to move. When I’m worried or anxious, I move to the coffee maker and Psalms. But, when my mind is just racing to nowhere for no reason, I move outside. 

Bundled against the 16° morning, I reached up for a bird feeder and saw that sky!

No clouds. Just a perfect ombre of peony pink to an almost shimmering twilight blue.  As if the color of the sky were not enough beauty for one morning, Venus also sparkled joyfully in the southeastern sky.

I don’t know how long I stood there open-mouthed in awe, but after a while I realized the world stood in silence with me. No trucks shifting gears out of town. No cars hissing through the morning a mile away on 1st Road. No grain bins drying their store. No trains announcing their arrival at crossings seven miles away.  No coyote packs yipping through the creek bed. No dogs barking, cattle lowing, birds alerting one another to the arrival of breakfast. The furnace didn’t kick in. The horses didn’t crunch across the snowy pasture to snuffle a hello. There wasn’t even a breeze to rustle the winter zebra grass.

In the crescendo of that silence, I was able to hear God’s voice soft and clear: Be still, and know that I am God (Psalm 46:10). 

The world around me in that moment obeyed.

In the sacred silence, I was awed. I felt utterly known and loved and… still.

In grateful wonder of such a gift, I pray that you, too, get to enjoy a moment of His stillness in the noise of your today.