Listening for the Words

Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away. - Matthew 24:35

There are times when words just don't come easy. Regardless of how we fumble and search the right way to say something just doesn't come. Funerals are a prime example. Well meaning individuals remark that "things will be better," or "they look so much better," when the best said words would be the ones which were unspoken. As a writer, sometimes we lose our muse - no matter how we struggle to find the right words nothing sounds right. Most men would joke that few women have difficulty with losing sight of having anything to say. Women respond by saying, "where there's a will there's a way."

I spoke to a classroom full of PhD's some years ago on living with a disabled child - something our family understood first hand. I had practiced my speech over and over gaining the necessary confidence to stand before this group of individuals. I stepped to the podium and looked at the rows of men and women that stretched upward when the words left me. Nothing came to mind. I stood there mortified. My hands shook and the stack of note cards I held went sailing like a deck of shuffled playing cards. The room remained silent, not even a snicker as I bent down to gather my notes. Standing, I faced the crowd and said, "There are two things in this world I can guarantee. 1) I'm a mom! I'm afraid of nothing and 2)as a mom, I will always have something to say!" Within seconds the crowd was laughing and suddenly the words came to me. When our words leave us, there's always a reason.

Perhaps we're tired or trying too hard. Maybe we need to be quiet and listen, focus or pay attention. Maybe God is trying to talk to us and we refuse to listen. It could be a matter of submission. The fact remains - we all lose our words from time to time, but there is one promise never changes. God's Word will never leave us. " Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away."

I was talking with the Father the other day, when my thoughts simply left me - mid-sentence to boot. "Well, Father, I completely lost track of what I was saying."

"So, I gathered." He remarked. My mind went blank. There was not a clue left as to what I was talking about. "Are you lost?" He asked me.

"I'd say that's a good way to put it. You're God, don't you know what I was going to say? Remind me perhaps."

"You're right. I know. And no, I have no intentions of reminding you."

"Why?"

"Because you need to listen."

"I thought I had been listening to our conversation."

"No, you were talking. I want you to listen."

"You aren't saying anything. I drive for miles and you say nothing."

"Because you aren't listening." This conversation was becoming confusing and frustrating.

"I don't get how I'm not listening."

"See. You're still talking. Shhhhh! Just listen." Running my fingers across my lips as if I were zipping a bag shut, I hushed. Not a peep. I tapped my fingers on the steering wheel of my car and waited. Nothing. And as I opened my mouth to speak, God said, "Shhhhhhh!"

In the background I heard a song play on the radio and the sentence that leaped at me was this, "It's not who you know, and it's not what you did. It's how you live."Suddenly the words came to me. The conversation returned. I had listened to what God was saying to me. It all made sense. I understood what God wanted me to hear because I hushed long enough to listen.

Sometimes we think we're quiet when we really aren't. When the words leave you, go to the Word that never passes away. Study, read - be quiet and listen to what God has to say. The words will come for the situation you face, whether it be teaching a class, speaking to a group, writing, or talking to a friend or a family member. The words will come when we listen.