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Chronicles Meditation    (an audio-visual presentation  3.17 MB)

Covenant Offering

“Morning by morning...waken...to listen...”

Dr. Bill Wilson

The prophet Isaiah, giving a word of hope for a people looking for the Messiah, reminds us - “to listen”.    As we celebrate again the Easter morning glory of Christ’s resurrection – new life for a world of sin and death  - we are daily reminded to listen.   Isaiah said,  “Morning by morning God wakens – wakens my ear to listen. . .(The Lord says) listen to me, you that pursue righteousness, you that seek the Lord.”  (Isaiah 50;4; 51:1)   The gospel writer Luke tells us of those Emmaus disciples on the road and at the table when they encountered the risen Christ –  “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us.”  (Luke 24:32)

How much we all need to be quiet in our lives and listen!   There is so much clutter of noise, volume, sounds, arrogance, bragging, arguing, words,  and verbage around us.   We enter into discussions and meetings and sharing with other people and all we want to do is talk, talk, and more talk.    We sometimes talk over others.   We sometimes are rude and not pay attention to speakers in groups and have side conversations at table.   We may sometimes be visiting with people and the conversation is all about us, and we not hear the joy, pain, concerns, expressions of hope in the other.

As an extraverted, outgoing individual I know that I struggle with listening. My wife has gently for thirty five years of marriage reminded me over and over again to stay focused on the present conversation and not scan the crowd when talking with others.   I walk into our churches and our worship is filled with sound, words, no breaks of silence or pause.    We read the Scripture lesson before preaching and never pause to let God’s word settle into the hearts and minds of the hearer.   Our prayer lives have become words and talking;  we may feel guilty that we just sit quietly and feel, experience, and live with God’s holy presence.  I wonder sometimes if we by not being quiet in prayer, just like in our human conversations, talk over and interrupt God as God  deeply tries to speak.

I confess that I have to be intentional in my Christian journey to be quiet.  I try to practice specific times to just sit and be quiet.  Some days I do well, others not.   I celebrate moments when like those disciples on the Emmaus Road I can express, “my heart burning within me while the Lord was talking to me”.   I have to be intentional to wake up a little earlier in the morning and start my day to listen to God.   I wrestle daily with keeping focused on others as I listen to those around me.  I try to get away from it always being about me or what I have to say or want.    Thank you to those around me who help me to experience the presence of the Risen Christ!     St. Benedict said it best for me, “Listen. . .listen with the ear of the heart.”      

 Grace and peace,

Bill