Note: On Tuesdays and some Sundays, you can find me at Your Daily Tripod, owned by my friend TonyD. A longer version of the post below appears there.
I find as time goes on, the less I talk and the more I listen when it comes to my friends… and God.
It’s not that I don’t have anything to share with the folks I care for; there’s plenty I could say about work and 
love and education and research and fears and joys and health scares and physical triumphs. But for this particular time, I feel called to listen… not to give advice, solicited or unsolicited, in most cases or to withhold information in a passive-aggressive way, but to listen. There just isn’t as much need for verbal processing as there once was.
Strangely, or perhaps not so strangely, I’m also listening to the Lord more. Maybe it’s because I’ve grown in faith; months of some intentional prayers have worked out in the main as I had hoped. But I also had arrived at a place where if the Father’s wisdom of what was best for me had been different than my own view, I could have accepted it, and in a much more serene state than I would have thought just a few months ago.
Babbling like pagans (Matthew 6:7-8) has its short-term benefits. If you do it, you don’t have to listen to the real hurts and agonies of others… or to the gentle direction of the Lord. But it takes a lot of energy, and doesn’t get us any closer to heaven. In this Lenten season, let’s remember the Lord has it under control… and is delighted to share His plans for us if we give Him the chance to get a word or two into the conversation.
