The Most Important Step to Hearing God

photo by Jocelyn Maloney

I decided to take an additional week off after the holiday to spend time with someone special. Kicking back after Christmas made me realize I was lonely for lack of a certain relationship. Christmas prep, family commitments, work, and responsibilities, had me so busy, I'd neglected the number one person God gave me charge over -- me.

Do you ever do that? Get so busy seeing after everyone and everything else, you forget to take care of you?

Not just "eat well, exercise, go to bed on time, tidy up, etc." kind of take-care. (Because to me, those still seem like commitments I must power through.) I'm not talking about the kind of "self-care" that comes in kits, containers, subscriptions, programs, pills and products.

Nope. I'm talking about hanging out and listening to yourself. Thinking about what you want rather than just responding to what everyone else wants from you. Getting quiet inside to make room for your soul to speak. Taking time to notice what's happening in your heart.

Asking yourself questions you rarely take time to ask. Writing down the answers you'll otherwise forget in the hullabaloo of everyday living. Pondering the places where your spirit is dry and thirsty, then giving it the drink it needs.

No agenda, no action, no errands, no expectations. Maybe a slow walk outside, time in the open air. A journal, a hot cup of coffee and a cooling of your jets. Lavish, uninterrupted, "closed-door" time to be intimate with the one God adores beyond all time, space, worlds, and dimensions. (Yes -- that's you.)

Sounds kinda sexy, right?

That's because it is. And it's essential to make your relationship with you work.

This fast-paced, agenda-driven, productivity-paunchy culture will not give you permission to court yourself. You must be bold enough to claim it.

I know, I know. I can hear some of you rebutting,

I just can't.
That's too indulgent.
There's no time.
That's self-centered.
I don't deserve it.
I don't want to.
What will people say?

No matter your argument, I have one question-
If you don't, who will?

If you don't... listen to you, care for you, nurture you, encourage you, feed you, believe in you... who will? Who will take care of the only asset for which God actually gave you free will and choice?

Nada. Nobody. And if you sit around waiting on and expecting someone else to see the value in and care for your most precious asset, you might turn into a petrified rock. (You'll also get really aggravated and pitiful and potentially poisonous.)

In a world that worships "self and individualism" over "God and community," this post runs the risk of ruffling some religious feathers. I totally get it.

But here's the thing -- until we can learn to recognize and respect God's most prized creation (aka you and me)... until we can sit with said creation comfortably and consciously, until we can be still with our own souls, we will struggle to hear the voice of God.

And admit it, we struggle.

We say God isn't "talking to us," but frankly, we aren't talking to ourselves.

We are the portal, the vehicle, the living temple of God. So we must make time and take practice to go into that temple and listen. It is there, in that Holy place, we will begin to hear God speak to us again.

Are you ready to hear God speak to you?

I am.