Stop the Noise: Listen to God!
By Kelvin Banda OP & Felisberto J Dumbo SCJ – The way people are living today has silently blocked out the concept and practice of listening to others and God.
To talk about an experience of listening seems to be a bit bizarre because it gives the impression that one wants people to live as if they are in the medieval period.
All this is because people today rarely listen to each other—and, even worse, they rarely listen to God.
Listening is a challenge. However, God is always open to us, even when we believe we can live away from him.
In the times of joys and crises, God welcomes us and helps us to be good listeners, to read the signs of the times. Look to heaven from where our help comes as humanity does not only live by bread alone. These are the possibilities.
In our world today, one may easily follow the fashion of not listening to God because the media has brainwashed us. We have been moving from a world of a divine Guide to a world of relativism whereby each one feels comfortable with anything that is noisy in order to avoid silence.
But that silence is a time to reflect upon oneself, a time to think about the Creator.
Human beings are like passengers in a train who avoid the experience of listening either to others or to God. So the call to silence to a noisy humanity is a seemingly insurmountable challenge—but yet, there always is a possibility, because God is forever telling us: Do not be afraid.
In the time of crisis, the grace of God is our comfort. We just need to listen to his Word.
Go to your room and listen to God
The natural disaster of Covid-19 reminds us that there is a need for us to go into our rooms and experience the presence of God, and to listen to his Word.
Listening to God is a challenge because we live in a world of opportunities, a world of forgetfulness due to the accelerated rhythm of life. Many times, we forget what is essential— the mystery of our existence.
Globalisation has caused us to forget who we are. We are beings created in the image and likeness of God. Unfortunately, there are times when we behave like animals and we ignore the inner voice—the ontological conscience which reminds us to stop for a while, to be silent and experience God and the wonders he has done through his creation.
Consequently, people forget that the truth of man and nature is far beyond what one can verify and experience. People have reduced everything to the positivism of reason.
But there are limits which we cannot overcome because we live not only on physical food but also on every Word that proceeds from mouth of God (Mt 4:4; Lk 4:4).
It is high time we stopped and listened to God and experienced his presence in the world. It is time to restore ourselves, breath afresh and listen to the Divine appeal and follow his laws and commandments.
We have been moving away from him. That is why, ungrateful souls as we may be, we must turn to him, especially during this current situation, and dialogue with God in order to understand what God wants from us.
We forget to read God’s signs because of the new lifestyle which the world has proposed to us. Nevertheless, God is still in our midst. God just wants us to lament and to amend our faults of ignoring his sign and Word.
The possibility of restoring our dignity does not depend on us because only God can forgive our sins and give back human dignity. Only God is merciful and just. That is why only God is the Lord.
Turn back to him, talk to him and listen to his Word; know that humans created false gods that lead us to perdition and death.
It is possible to renew our covenant with God; listen, listen, listen to him because God cannot forget about us (Is 49:15).
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