In my last blog I shared how, as a young seminarian, solitude began to shape my inner-man as I learnt to love the ways of God and encounter the cosmic patience of God.

Today I have to be careful as busyness in the business of ministry, can keep me from such dedicated times of solitude. Sometimes I’m not ready for solitude, I begin well but pullout after a short time as the silence becomes increasingly uncomfortable. I often trade such times for a latté and a newspaper, because these seem much more manageable for me. I’ve also learnt over the years, that I shouldn’t be afraid to sleep - that’s a worry! That sleep is good silence. I tend to forget that, like so many adults in our frenetic paced 21st century life, it’s easy not to get sufficient sleep.

As we live in this globally connected, media saturated world, our communities are never silent – especially cities like mine. If we ever do get somewhat silent, we aren’t listening for God as much as we are listening for the next new thing; seeking answers or thinking about fixing what needs doing now, before something or someone else demands our attention.

It’s a distracted and fragmented world we live in, piping into our personal world, its noise anyway it can. We now have such a variety of electronic devices that enable endless input and communication. We are in one another’s presence, but real communication is limited because we have not learnt how to be quiet. We don’t know how to practice His presence in the discipline of solitude. Many in the Western church have become increasingly devise dependant. I’m still amazed at how we must, having dinner out with close friends, at a seminar, a meeting or even during prayer times, speak into or answer texts from our mobile phones.

British author, CS Lewis, in one of his Screwtape writings says, ‘that heaven is music, but hell is noise.’ You see music has its pregnant, wondrous silences built into the musical score. Noise however has nothing and disturbs everything. Is it any wonder then, that scientists tell us that in the universe, the Earth is the nosiest of Planets?

I believe it’s time that many of us relearn the lost art of - solitude. It is one of the most foundational of the disciplines of abstinence, the - ‘via-negativa.’ A Christian mystic that impressed me greatly in my early years, was a man named, Thomas à Kempis, he said, ‘The only person who’s safe to travel is the person who’s free to stay at home.’ And I think it was Pascal that said, ‘We would solve the world’s problems if we just learned to sit in our room alone.’ What insight! In order for us to have the right engagement with the world in which we live; grow in our ability to ‘embrace and collaborate’ with God’s Kingdom coming in the lives of ordinary men and women, we need to investigate with a new resolve, the discipline of solitude.

These precious times of solitude to me, which began way back in that simple rough-cut stone chapel at seminary, are like a canvas of silence, on which I paint sparely, with a few words and sounds. God’s unique silence is absolute resolution to all our cacophony. In fact to really be silent, you and I have to stop listening and that’s not so easy. It’s a bit like when you dive under the water, it’s just you and the water as you let the world above go on without you.

Ever watched a chess game? It’s like watching silence in motion - as it’s a game that values silence. The little noises the players make as they move their pieces are imperceptible to most. Little sighs - clinking chess pieces and hand movements, almost in slow motion. Each player in near silence, with movement only permitted in a complete respect for the game at hand.

May I suggest an exercise to help create some solitude in your life? Begin by removing some noisy distractions from your life. There won’t be total silence, but there will be more silence of a kind. Make more room to breath, to sleep, read and pray or just listen to the quiet. Go sit on a headland by the water or on a crest of a mountain ridge overlooking some escarpment.

You see silence is not a theological thing, nor is it a Protestant-Catholic fixation and may I say, it’s not just for a bunch of offbeat mystics to engage in. It is simply, as thousands of people have found through the millennia – a good thing. It brings balance to our life and assists us in creating a fresh and clear perspective to our inner-person.

It enables intimacy between God as Creator, us and His creation: it also opens us up to an invitation to the gifts of the Triune God and the manifold wisdoms of God (Eph. 3:10), which are as close as a heartbeat.

Something I recently read said this, “Silence is, in these times, incredibly cheap. Purchase some. Spend it wisely. Do something wonderful with it. Learn to be comfortable in it, rather than to running from it.”

Why not try some of it this week?