Not knowing is a great opportunity to stop and simply break into your current state of thought. Thoughts are artificial signposts that lead away from the straight way and the narrow gate to which Jesus pointed his followers.

Thoughts are random firings of the mind. “This new flavor of Cheerios is too ‘almondy’. I spent way too much money on these flavorless tomatoes.”

I sit each morning waiting for these kinds of thoughts to die out. They are temporary grumblings that the mind loves to generate to muddy the waters of silence.

Silence is a knowing substance which our being cries out for. It is society’s downfall and therefore called “awkward gaps” in conversations.

We are called to silence by the words of Jesus.

We enter into the straight gate of silence and there is a chance for renewal to happen. Renewal never happens in idle chatter or pompous orations. Jesus might have said, “Keep it simple, stupid.”

So this Friday morning finds me stringing out a few words and then throwing them into the silence.

Silence, the great sea of the soul, changes the words into nothingness.

Out of the deeps a peace arises, enough to feed the five thousand.

Peace, be still.

Love is found deep within the suffering soul as it waits on God and God erases clumsy words and replaces them with silence, the substance of transmutation. We are fed, truly fed, from within.

Vicki Woodyard