When I’m driving through unfamiliar places, I use my GPS. It gives me step-by-step instructions. I am much better at following a map than I am in following auditory directions. I often miss my turns, because I am paying attention to something else at the exact moment that my GPS is speaking. I’m too busy talking or listening to somebody else or getting distracted by the radio, etc.
I frequently ask God for clear directions.
“Your own ears will hear him. Right behind you a voice will say, ‘This is the way you should go,’ whether to the right or to the left.” (Isaiah 30:21 NLT)
I wonder if I’m not hearing God’s step-by-step directions because I’m too busy paying attention to my own voice or other distractions. There are long periods of silence when I am supposed to just stay the course--these are the times when I’m tempted to distract myself the most. My mind is rarely still. Even my quiet times are filled with reading, writing, thinking, and praying (which mostly consists of me giving God directions--in the form of requests). Complete stillness feels unproductive. But, if I’m missing my turns and driving the wrong way, that is counterproductive too.
In order to hear God’s directions, I have to get comfortable with silence, emptiness, and total stillness.
Meditation is a learned art that takes practice. It brings you to the point you can hear clearly.
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