SPEAKER_00: One little scene in there where this little girl is just like raising her hands in worship.
SPEAKER_00: I just love that.
SPEAKER_00: It's so good for me to see our children of the next generation serving, worshiping the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, I wanna do something a little unique, a little different today in our time together rather than just take a passage and walk through it.
SPEAKER_00: Kind of let you know where we're going.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm going to take a passage.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna read all of a Psalm together.
SPEAKER_00: Just appreciate the beauty that it is.
SPEAKER_00: I am gonna go through and kind of quickly work through it, explain it, help you better understand it And then what I love to do is grab a little thread in that passage and kind of pull on that for the remainder of our time together, okay?
SPEAKER_00: The psalm we're gonna be in today is Psalm 62.
SPEAKER_00: If you have your Bible, you have your phone Bible, iPad Bible, whatever it is, it's on the screen as well.
SPEAKER_00: Love for us just to read it together, then I'll kind of go through, explain that, and we'll pull on that thread.
SPEAKER_00: So this psalm has been called, has been given the title, Trust in God Alone.
SPEAKER_00: Now, as we go through it, I just want you to ask yourself, what is it that causes this trust?
SPEAKER_00: What is it that brings this type of confidence in God alone?
SPEAKER_00: Here we go.
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 62, verse one.
SPEAKER_00: This is a Psalm of David.
SPEAKER_00: David writes, for God alone, my soul waits in silence.
SPEAKER_00: From him comes my salvation.
SPEAKER_00: He alone is my rock and my salvation, my fortress.
SPEAKER_00: I shall not be greatly shaken.
SPEAKER_00: How long will all of you attack a man to batter him like a leaning wall or a tottering fence?
SPEAKER_00: They only plan to thrust him down from his high position.
SPEAKER_00: They take pleasure in falsehood.
SPEAKER_00: They bless with their mouths, but inwardly they curse.
SPEAKER_00: Selah, which means pause, stop, contemplate what was just said.
SPEAKER_00: Verse five, for God alone, oh my soul, Wait in silence, for my hope is from him.
SPEAKER_00: He only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress.
SPEAKER_00: I shall not be shaken.
SPEAKER_00: On God rests my salvation and my glory, my mighty rock, my refuge is God.
SPEAKER_00: Trust him at all times, O people.
SPEAKER_00: Pour out your heart before him, for God is a refuge for us.
SPEAKER_00: Selah.
SPEAKER_00: Those of lowest state are but a breath Those of highest state are a delusion.
SPEAKER_00: In the balances they go up, they are together lighter than a breath.
SPEAKER_00: Some translations say they are only a breath.
SPEAKER_00: Put no trust in extortion.
SPEAKER_00: Set no vain hopes on robbery.
SPEAKER_00: If riches increase, set not your heart on them.
SPEAKER_00: Once God has spoken, twice I have heard this, that power belongs to God, and that to you, O Lord, belongs steadfast love, for you will render to a man according to his work.
SPEAKER_00: Incredible Psalm of David.
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 62 opens verse one and two as a testimony of trust.
SPEAKER_00: You see the confidence he has in the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: These statements that he's my rock and he's my refuge.
SPEAKER_00: He's my salvation and I shall not be shaken.
SPEAKER_00: It's a great confessional statement.
SPEAKER_00: Then what happens is verse three is now some enemies show up.
SPEAKER_00: And he kind of uses this plural, kind of all y'all enemies, so we're not precisely sure who specifically he's talking about.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's one group, maybe it's a couple groups, maybe it's more of a general term, the world, the flesh, and the devil, regardless.
SPEAKER_00: Some enemies are present now, and so what does he do?
SPEAKER_00: He repeats back in verse five.
SPEAKER_00: He says, oh my soul, wait in silence, but did you see the difference?
SPEAKER_00: David changed it up just a bit.
SPEAKER_00: In verse one, it's, oh, my soul waits in silence.
SPEAKER_00: But the verb here is now a command, an imperative.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, my soul, wait in silence.
SPEAKER_00: So there was a confessional testimony, sure.
SPEAKER_00: But now, in the presence of enemies, in the midst of people trying to deceive me and speak falsehood and attack me and push me down like a tottering fence, now, It gets real.
SPEAKER_00: Now, can you still trust in the Lord in this moment?
SPEAKER_00: So in verse five, he's preaching to himself.
SPEAKER_00: It's not just a confessional statement when times are good.
SPEAKER_00: Now in the presence of enemies, he's saying, oh my soul, wait in silence.
SPEAKER_00: Again, he reemphasizes, repeats, reiterates, God is a rock, God is a refuge, he is our hope, saying, yes, you can trust God, not just in the good times, but in the hard times as well.
SPEAKER_00: David then tries to encourage everybody.
SPEAKER_00: Come on, all you people.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, people, believe in this God.
SPEAKER_00: Trust in him like I am, David's saying.
SPEAKER_00: He's a refuge.
SPEAKER_00: And then he talks about, hey, in the midst of this trial or enemies going on, there's a temptation to start trusting in self.
SPEAKER_00: And what he shows us is that humans, we act alone, we act without God.
SPEAKER_00: Our actions, our efforts, they're corruptible, they're flawed.
SPEAKER_00: And they're temporal.
SPEAKER_00: That's why he's saying there, there's this robbery or extortion and things like that.
SPEAKER_00: And then he ends the psalm with one more magnificent man.
SPEAKER_00: God has power and love.
SPEAKER_00: It's kind of this grace and truth, this balance of God, right?
SPEAKER_00: He is good enough.
SPEAKER_00: He has the strength and the love to even the ways of the world.
SPEAKER_00: Incredible psalm, amazing message.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you, David, so much.
SPEAKER_00: But what helps continue to emphasize the message of the psalm is not just the words and their understanding, but actually the structure of it all.
SPEAKER_00: As I was reading, maybe you noticed if you were reaching the ancient Hebrew, you would notice it come up more, but there's a word in here.
SPEAKER_00: It's alone or only.
SPEAKER_00: You can translate it either way, but it's repetitive.
SPEAKER_00: Alone, alone, alone, alone, only, only, only, only, only.
SPEAKER_00: David is using it to kind of draw your attention.
SPEAKER_00: It's one of the structures he's doing.
SPEAKER_00: An alone, only contrast between God and God.
SPEAKER_00: And between humans and their effort.
SPEAKER_00: How God acts alone in verse one, two, five, and six.
SPEAKER_00: We see for God alone my soul waits.
SPEAKER_00: He alone is my rock.
SPEAKER_00: And then the contrast is how humans act alone.
SPEAKER_00: Verse four and verse nine.
SPEAKER_00: That's why it says sometimes they are only a breath.
SPEAKER_00: And so you see the contrast David sets up.
SPEAKER_00: Not only that, he gives us another structure.
SPEAKER_00: It's a progression of trust in the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Did you see it as we went through?
SPEAKER_00: First, it's just an individual, right?
SPEAKER_00: Just saying, all right, trust in the Lord in good times when everything's all right.
SPEAKER_00: But then the presence of enemies, now he's got to double down, preach to himself, but I still trust in God, even in the midst of adversity.
SPEAKER_00: Progression, and then what we see again, now he's trying to get everybody, come on everybody, let's all trust in the Lord and ultimate trust in God.
SPEAKER_00: So we see this progression of trust in the structure as well.
SPEAKER_00: Third and finally, we see this trust in God alone in a chiastic structure, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Let's get a little nerdy for a second, talk about a chiasm, you can go impress your friends or waiter at lunch, but let's go ahead and hit them with it.
SPEAKER_00: Terry, thank you guys.
SPEAKER_00: So what we have oftentimes in scripture, sometimes in English will kind of lead people to a conclusion, a kind of climactic ending.
SPEAKER_00: Oftentimes in biblical literature, there's a chiasm.
SPEAKER_00: So it comes from the Greek letter chi, you know, X, okay?
SPEAKER_00: And so you kind of see that right there.
SPEAKER_00: And what happens is there's these kind of parallel statements that all funnel to a middle.
SPEAKER_00: And the middle piece is the chiasm.
SPEAKER_00: is the message, that's the most important piece of it all.
SPEAKER_00: So here you see the chiastic structure, the parallel trust in God at beginning and end, which is actually in the middle as well, the attributes of humans, the action of enemies, okay?
SPEAKER_00: So David puts all this in there, the structure, the words, the language for this great message, trust in God.
SPEAKER_00: Trust in God at all times and every season.
SPEAKER_00: And we love that.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much, David.
SPEAKER_00: That's incredible.
SPEAKER_00: Here's my pet peeve when reading scripture like that.
SPEAKER_00: I go, but how?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, that's great.
SPEAKER_00: Sure, I love to trust God, even when enemies are lying to me and threatening to push me down.
SPEAKER_00: But how do I do it, David?
SPEAKER_00: Give me something.
SPEAKER_00: Did he just leave us hanging?
SPEAKER_00: No, he actually worked the way to have this type of trust and this type of confidence in the text.
SPEAKER_00: There's only three commands.
SPEAKER_00: There's only three imperatives in the entire Psalm.
SPEAKER_00: Wait in silence, trust in the Lord, pour out your heart.
SPEAKER_00: And wait in silence, he uses twice.
SPEAKER_00: Is David saying, That the way to have this type of trust, this type of confidence alone, is the spiritual discipline and practice of silence, solitude, stilling your mind, quieting yourself.
SPEAKER_00: Really, it can't be that.
SPEAKER_00: Is that what you're saying to us, David?
SPEAKER_00: And so we're kind of in a series here where we're taking some psalms and kind of looking at some spiritual disciplines.
SPEAKER_00: And what are spiritual disciplines?
SPEAKER_00: What are spiritual practices, spiritual rhythms?
SPEAKER_00: It's this, someone gave it to me as a kind of an illustration.
SPEAKER_00: When we do these spiritual practices and rhythms, maybe silence and solitude, it creates an arena in your soul.
SPEAKER_00: where you are inviting the gladiator of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit to come and make war against the wild beast of your sin, flesh, devil, evil, darkness in your life.
SPEAKER_00: It's been said that spiritual disciplines and practices, that's us doing what we can do to make room for God to do what we cannot do.
SPEAKER_00: And what you cannot do is make yourself more like Christ.
SPEAKER_00: That is the work of the Holy Spirit in you, conforming you, molding you, shaping you by one degree of glory to another.
SPEAKER_00: But we can do a rhythm.
SPEAKER_00: We can create an arena.
SPEAKER_00: We can wait on the Lord to enter in and to begin to do what we cannot do.
SPEAKER_00: Is silence silence?
SPEAKER_00: really able to do that, to shape us, to make us more like Jesus, to have this type of confidence and trust in the Lord?
SPEAKER_00: Honestly, I doubted it.
SPEAKER_00: But as I started deciding on what to preach about here, I wanted to do silence and solitude in Psalm 62, just honestly, for a few reasons.
SPEAKER_00: Number one, hadn't really studied it all that much, not as deeply as I like to study things.
SPEAKER_00: So I was curious about it.
SPEAKER_00: Secondly, hadn't really practiced it At least not well, at least not rightly the way you're supposed to.
SPEAKER_00: And if we're just being honest here, number three, I thought it was kind of the dumbest discipline, if you will, kind of like low on the totem pole, like really unimportant.
SPEAKER_00: I'm more like, yeah, let's get in that Bible, you know?
SPEAKER_00: Let's read that Bible, let's meditate, let's study.
SPEAKER_00: Really just silence and solitude, we're okay, you know?
SPEAKER_00: Maybe for the lazy Christians, you know, or whatever.
SPEAKER_00: I could not have been more Wrong.
SPEAKER_00: As I was reading, as I was studying, there were some quotes I ran across that blew me away.
SPEAKER_00: Listen to what some people speak about science and solitude, something I was ignorant of.
SPEAKER_00: One author would say this.
SPEAKER_00: Our greatest need.
SPEAKER_00: Think about how you would finish that statement.
SPEAKER_00: What's the greatest need in the world today?
SPEAKER_00: Our greatest need is to be silent before our great God.
SPEAKER_00: Another author would write something staggering.
SPEAKER_00: Waiting patiently in silent expectation is the foundation of a spiritual life.
SPEAKER_00: Another author would say this.
SPEAKER_00: No large growth in holiness was ever gained by someone who did not take time often to be alone with God in silence.
SPEAKER_00: No large growth ever.
SPEAKER_00: And this last one just put me on my back.
SPEAKER_00: Listen, see if you agree.
SPEAKER_00: Without silence and solitude, it is virtually impossible to live a spiritual life.
SPEAKER_00: You do not take the spiritual life seriously if you do not set aside time to be silent before God.
SPEAKER_00: And listen to him.
SPEAKER_00: I read that and I was like, I must be so wrong.
SPEAKER_00: Missing it.
SPEAKER_00: What is it to this practice, to this discipline of silence and solitude that would lead people to say things like this?
SPEAKER_00: That would give David this type of trust and confidence in the Lord in all seasons.
SPEAKER_00: So I started looking at this practice of silence and solitude.
SPEAKER_00: It's not just found there in Psalm 62.
SPEAKER_00: It's all throughout the Psalms.
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 4.4, be angry, do not sin.
SPEAKER_00: Ponder in your own hearts, on your beds, and be silent.
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 37.7, be still before the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Now, it doesn't mean like, be frozen before the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: That's what I was talking about.
SPEAKER_00: It's a stilling of mind.
SPEAKER_00: It's a quieting of the mind.
SPEAKER_00: It's practicing the spiritual discipline of silence.
SPEAKER_00: Be silent before the Lord and wait patiently for him.
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 39.9, I am mute.
SPEAKER_00: I do not open my mouth, for it is you who have done it.
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 46.10, Austin, just open with this.
SPEAKER_00: Be still, be silent, and know that that I am God.
SPEAKER_00: Is that how we are to come to know that he is God?
SPEAKER_00: Through silence?
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 131, I have calmed, quieted my soul like a weaned child with its mother.
SPEAKER_00: Like a weaned child, my soul is within me.
SPEAKER_00: Not only is this practice of silence all over the Psalms, it's all over scripture.
SPEAKER_00: Some verses you're very familiar.
SPEAKER_00: Let me read them to you again.
SPEAKER_00: Exodus 14, 4.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord will fight for you.
SPEAKER_00: You have only to be silent.
SPEAKER_00: Habakkuk 2, 20.
SPEAKER_00: But the Lord is in his holy temple.
SPEAKER_00: Let all the earth keep silence before him.
SPEAKER_00: Zephaniah 1, 7.
SPEAKER_00: Be silent before the sovereign Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And in 1 Kings 19, this episode with Elijah in the cave, you kind of remember that story, the earthquake, the fire.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what it says in verse 12.
SPEAKER_00: And after the earthquake, a fire.
SPEAKER_00: But the Lord was not in the fire.
SPEAKER_00: And after the fire, many translations say a still, soft voice, a quiet whisper.
SPEAKER_00: You know that?
SPEAKER_00: Look at how this one translation says it.
SPEAKER_00: And after the fire, the sound of sheer silence.
SPEAKER_00: And was this not a regular practice of our Savior?
SPEAKER_00: Jesus who would come and go, who would retreat into the silence, into the stillness, into the solitude.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe there's more to this than I first assumed.
SPEAKER_00: What is the spiritual practice of silence and solitude?
SPEAKER_00: You could define it in this way, it's just intentional time alone in the quiet, to be with ourselves and with God.
SPEAKER_00: Now, when I say quiet, when I say silent, there's two different types we're talking about.
SPEAKER_00: Number one is an external silence, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Where you get away from kids and cars and noise and beeps and all this kind of stuff.
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes you'll go, you'll kind of get in that spot.
SPEAKER_00: You got some external silence and you'll have a Bible open or a commentary or a devotional.
SPEAKER_00: You'll be reading and ingesting.
SPEAKER_00: Great, wonderful, awesome, praise God.
SPEAKER_00: but not necessarily the spiritual discipline of science we're talking about here.
SPEAKER_00: This is an internal silence.
SPEAKER_00: A way you can define internal silence is this, free of all inputs.
SPEAKER_00: It's yes, externally silent as well, but then also just saying, I'm not gonna have any inputs.
SPEAKER_00: It's just gonna, the two people who have access to your mind at all times are you and the God of the universe.
SPEAKER_00: and saying nothing else, not that reading Bible or devotional comment, any of that's wrong.
SPEAKER_00: It's just, this is a different muscle and you're trying to get a different person.
SPEAKER_00: It's you and the Lord God there in the quiet.
SPEAKER_00: That's what it is.
SPEAKER_00: What it's not, it's not an introvert's paradise, okay?
SPEAKER_00: You're like, I'm gonna take that one, please, you know?
SPEAKER_00: It's not an excuse to not help get breakfast ready for the kids in the morning.
SPEAKER_00: It's not, R and R, it's not decompression space, it's not me time.
SPEAKER_00: There's a big difference between being silent and being silent before the Lord, as the Bible said.
SPEAKER_00: We're not talking about silence.
SPEAKER_00: That's good, that's fine, you go do that.
SPEAKER_00: That's not spiritual discipline practice.
SPEAKER_00: This is silent before the Lord to create that arena, to invite him in, to be shaped and molded to become more like Jesus is the purpose.
SPEAKER_00: One author would write this.
SPEAKER_00: The spiritual practice of silence, it's not your private therapeutic place.
SPEAKER_00: It's a place of encounter where the old self dies and the new self is born.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that the purpose of every discipline?
SPEAKER_00: So that the old self would die and then we'd be made more and more like our Lord, our Savior, Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: One said this, that silence and solitude It's an invitation to commune with God who waits just outside the noise and the busyness of your life.
SPEAKER_00: Parents in the room, you'll get this.
SPEAKER_00: So we've got nine, seven, four at the house right now.
SPEAKER_00: Every day about six o'clock, it's just a circus.
SPEAKER_00: It's just what it is.
SPEAKER_00: One's talking, one's over the other.
SPEAKER_00: One's biting, one's stealing.
SPEAKER_00: It's all mom, mom, mom, which is fine with me.
SPEAKER_00: But anyways, it's just, it's a lot going on in the house, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Just a lot of noise.
SPEAKER_00: And so there's sometimes as a father that I wanna give some instruction.
SPEAKER_00: I wanna give some correction.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe I even wanna provide some, But when all that's going on, sometimes I'll just sit and wait.
SPEAKER_00: And when it all calms down and gets still and quiet, then I can take my daughter's face and say, I love you.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you haven't heard from the Lord in a long, long time.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe one reason is, is we've got so much circus and noise and crazy and inputs going on.
SPEAKER_00: And God's just not gonna intrude in there.
SPEAKER_00: He's simply waiting just outside the noise and the busyness of your life to maybe speak some instruction, correction, maybe even affection into your life.
SPEAKER_00: And if we would put this into practice, Who knows what he would say?
SPEAKER_00: They said it's a place of encounter.
SPEAKER_00: Some people will push back and say, well, if I just had a little more time, I mean, I had three kids, job, whatever, I get it.
SPEAKER_00: I love what one author did, really just kind of took that excuse away from us all.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what they said.
SPEAKER_00: It's a fallacy to think we just need a little more time.
SPEAKER_00: If we had it, we would simply fill it up the same way we do with the time we already have.
SPEAKER_00: It's not a matter of more time.
SPEAKER_00: It's a matter of a prioritization of our time.
SPEAKER_00: And if we prioritize it, if we go into the silence, like they said, it is a place of encounter.
SPEAKER_00: Let's talk about what you will encounter and why sometimes we have a resistance to that.
SPEAKER_00: Number one, what you'll encounter in silence and solitude, you will encounter God.
SPEAKER_00: The holy one, the righteous one, your creator who knit you together in your mother's womb, the all-knowing one, the all-powerful one, the righteous judge of all creation.
SPEAKER_00: Amazing, you get to commune with him right here in that moment.
SPEAKER_00: Now, that may, if we're honest, be a reason some of us don't practice silence and solitude.
SPEAKER_00: We really, if we're honest, don't wanna hear what God has to say to us, about us.
SPEAKER_00: You ever called to the principal's office, like in middle school?
SPEAKER_00: You're like, I don't know that I wanna go, I don't wanna hear what he has to say, right?
SPEAKER_00: It can kinda be that same thing.
SPEAKER_00: Another reason we have a resistance, maybe, to coming before the Lord, one author puts it this way, really insightful.
SPEAKER_00: Each time we work a deliverance of our own, we find it more and more difficult to trust in God alone.
SPEAKER_00: Till at last we give way entirely to our natural fallen reason and unbelief prevails.
SPEAKER_00: So when it's time to trust, we've got an option, ourselves or in the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: I think many of us here, we start with the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Do we not?
SPEAKER_00: Go to God, okay, God, I got this situation, I got this thing, enemy, whatever, I need to trust you.
SPEAKER_00: All right, whatever, fine, I got it.
SPEAKER_00: I can handle it.
SPEAKER_00: I'll take this.
SPEAKER_00: I can do it.
SPEAKER_00: I know what to do here, right?
SPEAKER_00: And so we continue to reemphasize.
SPEAKER_00: It becomes secular, right?
SPEAKER_00: We're like, I'm putting my trust in myself and less in the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And David's already told us what trust in ourselves is.
SPEAKER_00: It's corruptible.
SPEAKER_00: It's fallen.
SPEAKER_00: And it's temporal, only a breath.
SPEAKER_00: Another encounter that we have, not only with God, we will have an encounter with ourselves, right?
SPEAKER_00: It's a terrible illustration, please forgive me.
SPEAKER_00: It's super corny and cheesy, but it's just stuck in my head.
SPEAKER_00: I can't get it out.
SPEAKER_00: Kind of like one of those jingles in a commercial or something like that.
SPEAKER_00: Super cheesy, but it's been said that our souls are like turtles.
SPEAKER_00: And until everything is still and calm, quiet and safe, only then does the turtle come out.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe the same is true of our souls.
SPEAKER_00: Until everything is still and calm, It's calm, it's quiet.
SPEAKER_00: Then our true self really comes out.
SPEAKER_00: What a more tougher manly example.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, maybe it's like a hunting or something like that.
SPEAKER_00: What do you do when you're trying to spot a wild animal?
SPEAKER_00: You go out into the woods and what do you do?
SPEAKER_00: You get still.
SPEAKER_00: You get quiet.
SPEAKER_00: And you just wait to see what comes out.
SPEAKER_00: So when you do this practice, when everything is stripped away, the real you is revealed, and who you really are deep down inside comes out.
SPEAKER_00: When you do this practice, you find out what's really going on in your mind, what really consumes your thoughts, what you really desire, what you actually worship.
SPEAKER_00: It's an encounter with ourselves, and one of the reasons We may not practice the discipline of silence and solitude, as we don't like what comes out.
SPEAKER_00: Deep down, one author, so grateful and thankful that they were vulnerable enough to even write this, here's what he says.
SPEAKER_00: In solitude and silence, I get rid of my scaffolding.
SPEAKER_00: No friends to talk to, no telephone calls to make, no meetings to attend, and no music to entertain, no books to distract.
SPEAKER_00: Just me, naked, vulnerable, weak, sinful, deprived, and broken.
SPEAKER_00: This nothingness that I have to face in my solitude, it's so dreadful.
SPEAKER_00: That everything in me wants to run to my friends and run to my work or any distraction so I can make myself believe I'm something better than I actually am.
SPEAKER_00: But friends, if you're actually willing to go there and let who you really are come out, that's when the gospel takes root.
SPEAKER_00: When you see the darkness and depravity and brokenness and fallenness and corruption of your own soul, and don't hide it, don't distract from it, don't be diverted from it, but just own it.
SPEAKER_00: That's where the gospel takes root.
SPEAKER_00: Because Jesus shows up in that moment and says, finally, thank you.
SPEAKER_00: I already knew that about you.
SPEAKER_00: I'm glad you're finally willing to own it and admit it and see it.
SPEAKER_00: And you know what I need to tell you?
SPEAKER_00: I love you.
SPEAKER_00: I came for you.
SPEAKER_00: Die for you, I wanna cleanse you from all unrighteousness, give you a new heart, make you more like me.
SPEAKER_00: That's what happens in that moment if we will get there.
SPEAKER_00: It's when the gospel really sinks down deep into our bones.
SPEAKER_00: Another reason we may not practice the discipline of silence, of solitude, is that we are addicted to achievement and accomplishment.
SPEAKER_00: Who am I if I just sit and do nothing?
SPEAKER_00: This one's been really hard for me.
SPEAKER_00: As I've been practicing more and more silence and solitude, just sitting there, even for 10 minutes, I almost feel guilty.
SPEAKER_00: Who are you if you can't perform, if you don't achieve?
SPEAKER_00: Where's your identity worth and value really coming from if you can't just sit there alone with God in the silence?
SPEAKER_00: Friend of mine here at the church, he texted me before he went on a vacation.
SPEAKER_00: I love his honesty here.
SPEAKER_00: So raw, so vulnerable.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what he writes.
SPEAKER_00: He said, Destin, I get to where I really don't trust in the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: I get anxious going on vacation because I feel like my competitors are getting an edge.
SPEAKER_00: I'm so thankful for that.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, he's kind of feeling, man, I got this thing coming up.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I feel like I'm addicted to achieving accomplishment, but praise God, He's feeling it, he's naming it, praise God, he's texting his pastor to pray for him so he can go on vacation and have some Sabbath with his wife and with his Lord and Creator.
SPEAKER_00: But this is the environment we live in.
SPEAKER_00: If I'm not performing, if I'm not doing, who am I?
SPEAKER_00: So maybe we resist.
SPEAKER_00: Another reason we resist, I get paid to speak for a living, that's great, is you and I often have a natural aversion to pain and silence.
SPEAKER_00: We encounter our pain.
SPEAKER_00: We encounter despair and weakness, exhaustion, fear, sadness, shame, broken dreams and unmet expectations and anger.
SPEAKER_00: And we will try to distract ourselves from pain with a variety of different things.
SPEAKER_00: Adults use smartphones the way toddlers use pacifiers.
SPEAKER_00: as an emotional crutch to distract them from their painful feelings.
SPEAKER_00: That slaps.
SPEAKER_00: So there's one study done, University of Virginia.
SPEAKER_00: They invited people to come just sit in a room free of input.
SPEAKER_00: Just you in a room for 15 minutes.
SPEAKER_00: Just you alone with your thoughts, with your conscious.
SPEAKER_00: And they said, hey, you can do that.
SPEAKER_00: They split the study up into guys and girls.
SPEAKER_00: And they said, if that's too much for you, if you can't handle just 15 minutes alone by yourself, free of input, we've got a little something over here.
SPEAKER_00: It's a button on the wall.
SPEAKER_00: You can push it and receive an electrical shock.
SPEAKER_00: Ladies, I'm not gonna tell you what your percentage is.
SPEAKER_00: It'll puff you up.
SPEAKER_00: It'll make you prideful, okay?
SPEAKER_00: I won't do that to you.
SPEAKER_00: Men, 67% of men could not sit alone with their thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: They would rather go get an electrical shock than just sit still and quiet in the silence free of input for 15 minutes.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what the researchers would say.
SPEAKER_00: Being alone with one's thoughts may be an unpleasant experience for many, leading people to seek even a painful distraction.
UNKNOWN: Wow.
SPEAKER_00: But hey, listen up, church folk.
SPEAKER_00: You may not be electrocuting yourself or giving yourself an electric shock, but sometimes we'll even use good godly Bible study practices to do the same thing.
SPEAKER_00: It's what one author calls spiritual bypassing It's a tendency to use spiritual practices to sidestep or avoid facing unresolved emotional issues, psychological wounds, and unfinished developmental tasks.
SPEAKER_00: Like, I'll just, you know, sermons and podcasts and Bibles and this, that, you know, all that stuff.
SPEAKER_00: Great, but you could be using it to distract yourself from just sitting alone in the silence and the quiet with God.
SPEAKER_00: So be careful of it.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't this why solitary confinement, it's like the worst punishment imaginable?
SPEAKER_00: Because it's just you and your thoughts and nothing else.
SPEAKER_00: Some have even said the death penalty is more humane than solitary confinement because an executioner kills it once.
SPEAKER_00: but solitary confinement kills gradually.
SPEAKER_00: Another reason we don't practice this discipline of silence and solitude is we don't live in a culture that's conducive to it.
SPEAKER_00: Like I don't know if you've heard it described before, like we live in an attention economy.
SPEAKER_00: It's your attention that is on sale.
SPEAKER_00: And so everything, every screen is designed with two things in mind, to distract you and to addict you.
SPEAKER_00: It is an attention economy.
SPEAKER_00: We just gotta own it.
SPEAKER_00: This is all we've ever known.
SPEAKER_00: Beeps and buzzes and TVs and radios and sound.
SPEAKER_00: 150 years ago, that's not the case.
SPEAKER_00: Your forefathers, your ancestors, they were working in a field all day.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe no one else, no other news or media, this, that, or the other, right?
SPEAKER_00: So we are living in the matrix, or maybe you prefer Plato's Allegory of the Cave, but we just were born into this.
SPEAKER_00: It's all we've ever known are all these stimuli and inputs and beeps and buzzes.
SPEAKER_00: And so Jim Elliot, here's what he says.
SPEAKER_00: He's a missionary martyr.
SPEAKER_00: If you don't know his story, look it up.
SPEAKER_00: It's incredible.
SPEAKER_00: But he writes this so profound.
SPEAKER_00: He says, I think the devil has made it his business to monopolize on three elements.
SPEAKER_00: What do you think those are?
SPEAKER_00: That the devil, if he could monopolize on three elements, what would they be?
SPEAKER_00: Here's what Jim Elliot thinks.
SPEAKER_00: He thinks it's noise, it's hurry, and it's crowd.
SPEAKER_00: He goes on to say, Satan is quite aware of the power of silence and solitude.
SPEAKER_00: Unfortunately for us, we are the first people in the history of the world that are trying to follow God with one of these in our pockets attached to us at all times.
SPEAKER_00: New research coming out, young adults, 30%, almost one third of young adults sleep with their phones.
SPEAKER_00: Not beside it, like literally with it.
SPEAKER_00: Like what does that do to a soul?
SPEAKER_00: But this is the life we live in.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you cannot remember the last time you actually experienced internal and external silence.
SPEAKER_00: Like it's hard to sit in a waiting room without grabbing that thing and getting it out.
SPEAKER_00: It's hard to stand in a line at Starbucks without, you know, can't see the red light without going for it.
SPEAKER_00: Some people can't even drive without holding onto it.
SPEAKER_00: But we wake up and the TV's on and the music's on and there's a song or a podcast all day long.
SPEAKER_00: Just tons of inputs.
SPEAKER_00: So what do we do?
SPEAKER_00: What do we do?
SPEAKER_00: One author said, like a patient who travels to a foreign land, to seek a treatment outside of the cures that are offered in their familiar territory.
SPEAKER_00: Spiritual seekers looking for something that cannot be found within the borders as we know.
SPEAKER_00: We've run to the edges of our own answers.
SPEAKER_00: What if the answer for this type of trust becoming like Christ is outside of all these inputs?
SPEAKER_00: Like a foreign land called silence and solitude.
SPEAKER_00: Spoke to one gentleman in the lobby.
SPEAKER_00: He said, 59 years old, I've never once done this.
SPEAKER_00: Man, so how do we do that?
SPEAKER_00: I wanna be very practical, just give you a few steps, because I know you're gonna try it this week, right?
SPEAKER_00: I've enticed you enough, kind of got that curiosity welling up.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe 10 minutes a day, 15 minutes a day, maybe one hour this week, who knows?
SPEAKER_00: Who knows, maybe this summer, you'll take a whole weekend.
SPEAKER_00: How do we do it?
SPEAKER_00: I see a pattern emerge from 1 Kings 19 with Elijah.
SPEAKER_00: Don't have time to get into that.
SPEAKER_00: You're welcome to go study that on your own.
SPEAKER_00: Don't let it be a distraction for you, but feel free to study it.
SPEAKER_00: But here's what we see Elijah doing.
SPEAKER_00: Again, not, we have to do it this way, just a pattern for you to consider.
SPEAKER_00: Number one, when you do this, rest and wait.
SPEAKER_00: Rest and wait.
SPEAKER_00: So you gotta get quiet.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta still your mind, which is so incredibly hard.
SPEAKER_00: Like I'm doing it and just like all my to-do lists are coming up.
SPEAKER_00: So I'll actually just kind of sit with my phone for a little bit and just like get all that stuff out of there so I can just clear my mind.
SPEAKER_00: Distraction free, no inputs.
SPEAKER_00: Just begin breathing.
SPEAKER_00: I'm just kind of doing some deep breaths.
SPEAKER_00: For me, what I'm doing is as I breathe in, I say, more of you.
SPEAKER_00: As I breathe out, less of me.
SPEAKER_00: More of you, less of me.
SPEAKER_00: Whatever it is for you just to quiet, to still your mind, to hear from the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: I literally try to picture Jesus like sitting with me or beside me in this moment.
SPEAKER_00: But here's what you realize.
SPEAKER_00: This is so crazy tough.
SPEAKER_00: You and I, it's been described like we're like a jar of river water.
SPEAKER_00: You ever take one of them ball glass jars and just scoop it up with some river water?
SPEAKER_00: Here's algae and sediment and dirt and rocks and everything like that.
SPEAKER_00: That's us all the time.
SPEAKER_00: And until we just let it sit still...
SPEAKER_00: Finally, over time, everything will start to settle.
SPEAKER_00: And then we get a little bit of clarity.
SPEAKER_00: And this is you and I.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we're just shaking up so many stimuli, so many inputs all day long.
SPEAKER_00: And this is gonna take some time for us to sit still.
SPEAKER_00: Let things settle before we get some clarity.
SPEAKER_00: Rest and wait.
SPEAKER_00: Number two, feel and name.
SPEAKER_00: Let that turtle of a soul come on out, right?
SPEAKER_00: What's really going on in here?
SPEAKER_00: Who am I really?
SPEAKER_00: Name it.
SPEAKER_00: Talk about it to God.
SPEAKER_00: Number three, hear and be transformed.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, in these moments, I'm trying to say, Lord, speak to me.
SPEAKER_00: Your servant is listening.
SPEAKER_00: God, what do you wanna say to me about me?
SPEAKER_00: And be transformed.
SPEAKER_00: And pray the Garden of Gethsemane prayer.
SPEAKER_00: When he brings something up, make sure it fits under the authority of Scripture, but go, okay.
SPEAKER_00: Thy will be done.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
SPEAKER_00: Now I'll move forward in obedience to that thing.
SPEAKER_00: God's brought some really interesting things in my life to me recently.
SPEAKER_00: Lastly, as we re-enter.
SPEAKER_00: So we retreat from so that we can come back for.
SPEAKER_00: It's the come and go rhythm we see Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: It's not just, man, let's get out of here, right?
SPEAKER_00: But we go become more like Christ so we can enter the world and be salt and light and ambassadors for him.
SPEAKER_00: Again, that's the goal.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you don't like the Elijah pattern.
SPEAKER_00: Use what we find in Psalm 62.
SPEAKER_00: Wait in silence, pour out your heart, trust in the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Whichever one you like, we're gonna do it right now.
SPEAKER_00: Ha ha, gotcha, okay?
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna put this into practice.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna see how you do.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna see what's going on in there a little bit.
SPEAKER_00: So we're just gonna take really simple baby steps.
SPEAKER_00: Three minutes.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna put on the clock.
SPEAKER_00: For some of you, maybe the first time in your whole life you've ever done this.
SPEAKER_00: And just try to rid ourselves of inputs.
SPEAKER_00: Man, just you and the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: God, what do you wanna say to me about me?
SPEAKER_00: Try to just still your mind.
SPEAKER_00: And we'll see what he does, even in three minutes.
SPEAKER_00: And then I'll come back and close the service.
SPEAKER_00: Three minutes, go.
SPEAKER_00: You guys did it.
SPEAKER_00: Great job.
SPEAKER_00: A lot of, surprisingly for a room of 700 people, great external silence.
SPEAKER_00: How was the internal?
SPEAKER_00: Man, just imagine what God wants to say to you, how he wants to form you, how he wants to grow your trust in him.
SPEAKER_00: In 15 minutes, 30 minutes, an hour, quiet, still, silence.
SPEAKER_00: I hope you would this week.
SPEAKER_00: Try something very different, very distinct, very unique.
SPEAKER_00: I think I'd encourage you with David's words in Psalm 131.
SPEAKER_00: He said, like a weaned soul or like a weaned child, my soul waits in silence.
SPEAKER_00: If you've never practiced silence and solitude before, it may feel like being weaned from mother's milk.
SPEAKER_00: And there's an irritability, no, I need all those things.
SPEAKER_00: I need those devotions and commentaries and inputs.
SPEAKER_00: But if you persist in it, I think there's a maturity that can come and you can actually find comfort and solace without needing those former things you thought you were so desperate and dependent on.
SPEAKER_00: God is waiting just outside the noise and the busyness of your life.
SPEAKER_00: I hope and pray you hear from him.
SPEAKER_00: He transforms you more into a person of love, more into a person that is like him.
SPEAKER_00: Let's respond in worship.