A call to action: Be still

"In returning and rest, you shall be saved. In quietness and trust, you will find your strength." Isaiah 30:15

One of the psalms appointed for yesterday was a favorite. Psalm 46 begins:

God is our refuge and strength, *
a very present help in trouble.

It’s a verse that has often served as a perfect doorway into my practice of silence.

After that first verse, the psalm continues: mountains tremble and topple, waters rage and foam, nations make much ado, and kingdoms are shaken.  There’s even a verse suggesting with prescience that “the earth shall melt away.” 

It feels like a description of our world, of course, with powerful earthquakes, devastating fires, massive hurricanes, a melting planet, and seemingly intractable wars. And as is often the case with sacred scripture, this psalm is also about something we experience in ourselves: our emotional storms, our unsettling relationships, our paralyzing anxieties and depressions, and our fierce inner critic who is always happy to “topple us into the depths of the sea.” 

That first verse of Psalm 46, though, invites us to shift our focus and center of gravity:

God is our refuge and strength, *
a very present help in trouble.

This is not an invitation to denial or escape.  Rather, it is an invitation to renewed strength, hope, and purpose.  Psalm 46 recognizes that we are often full of worries, anxieties, and foreboding thoughts about what is becoming of our world and our lives. But it’s time to let go of these obsessive thoughts, the psalm seems to say. Discover an unexpected strength and very present help, as you release yourself into stillness. The psalm continues:

Come now and look upon the works of the Lord, *
what awesome things he has done on earth.

It is he who makes war to cease in all the world; *
he breaks the bow, and shatters the spear, and burns the shields with fire.

There is a power and presence – in the world and in ourselves – that is far greater than what troubles us. The last verses point to the paradoxical way: Be still.

Be still, then, and know that I am God. …
The Lord of hosts is with us.  

Too often, many of us have riveted our attention on the fear, division, ugliness, and chaos – in our world and in ourselves.  These troubling thoughts and narratives can become our dominant experience, seemingly defining our lives.

Psalm 46 responds, “Be still and know.”  Release yourself, along with the thoughts, emotions, and anxieties that are beginning to define you.  Release it all into the silence and emptiness where Another waits for you.

In this stillness and silence, we come into the presence of “our refuge and strength,” our “very present help.” A short poem by Kabir (1440-1518) comes to mind; it begins:

You are sitting in a wagon being
drawn by a horse whose
reins you hold.

There are two inside of you
who can steer.

Though most never hand the reins to Me
so they go from place to place the
best they can, though
rarely happy.

We sense a Presence, who would be happy to take the reins from our smaller, anxious self. The poem concludes:

If you feel tired, dear,
my shoulder is soft,
I'd be glad to 
steer a 
while. 

Music to our souls.  Finally, we can stop our erratic careening through life and allow Another to steer.  Our smaller self will be back, of course, always needing to be in control. But in the stillness, perhaps only briefly and dimly, we have “known” something that is difficult to forget: there is Another within to whom we may continuously return.

But again, this is not a way of escape, denial, or abdication of responsibility; rather, it is a way of deeper engagement for the sake of others. Because that which we sought – a “refuge and strength” and a “very present help” – we are now becoming for others.  Little by little, and perhaps only in fits and starts, we are gradually becoming who we most truly are, a refuge and strength, and a very present help in trouble, for the well-being of the world.