Hearing God's Voice

     I've found myself awake throughout the night, multiple times a night, for the last several nights. Okay actually lets be real here... it's been the last several MONTHS of nights. I honestly couldn't tell you the last time I was able to sleep through the night. I wake up because I hear a noise or I need to use the bathroom and then it's all downhill from there... my mind wanders and I start thinking of all the things that are on my heart and troubling my spirit. Many times I've grabbed my phone, clicked open 'Safari', and found myself scrolling through Facebook or reading random blogs.
     I think if we're being honest, that's become our default these days, even in the dead of night when we should be sleeping... "oh I have nothing to do, might as well scroll through Facebook or Instagram for the 107th time today" never mind asking yourself the question of "why am I really awake & why can't I seem to fall back asleep?" .. are ya with me on that or am I the only one that does this even when I tell myself I won't (insert hands over eyes monkey emoji here) .....

     As I sit here and really begin to think about it, like literally right now I'm mulling it over in my head, we (lets change that 'w' to 'm' for ME .. I'm talking about myself here!!) fill so much of our days with busyness and nonsense white noise that we've seen or heard multiple times. Silence and stillness are a thing of the past ... t.v.'s are always on, music is constantly playing in the background, we're texting 5 different people, our days are completely full ... all of this so that we don't find ourselves sitting in

                                                                                           S I L E N C E.

     There's something intimidating and overwhelming about silence. Well, at least to me there is. I dare you to put your computer/iPad/iPhone/Galaxy 74/whatever it is your holding down, turn the TV/music off, and just sit for 5 minutes. Right now, really, go try it .....

                              Did you do it? How was it? Was it as difficult, awkward, & kind of intimidating for you as it is for me? Just me? ... Okay, moving on.

     I've found that with silence comes the perfect time for God to whisper to me, a chance to hear His voice, the perfect opportunity to close my eyes and really focus on what He's trying to tell me. But if you're anything like me I babble on when I pray, ask God to speak to me when I'm done, don't hear anything for the 3 seconds that I'm sitting silent and still & so I move on and begin to drown out the beauty of the silence with my phone, computer, tv, washing machine, etc. I've heard it so many times, and have even thought/said it myself, that it's like God doesn't speak to us anymore, at least not how He used to speak in the Bible.

BUT WHAT IF WE'RE WRONG . . . 

     Perhaps our problem isn't that God doesn't speak to us anymore, perhaps it's that we're missing His voice because we're filling our days with so much busyness/white-noise and He can't break through to get our attention. Maybe my problem at night isn't that I need to use the restroom even though I just did 4 hours before that or that I heard a noise and now I can't fall back asleep ...
     maybe it's that God has to use these 2 things every single night to wake me up because it's the only time I'm laying still, He has my full attention, & is finally able to speak to me ... in the silence. . .