Not all noise is audible. But even inaudible noise can be loud and distracting — especially when the goal is to quiet the soul.
My morning routine is up early, about 5am, fix my cup of coffee and sit in my “quiet” place for time with God. That’s what I call it– my “quiet time.” It is honestly my favorite part of every day, regardless of what else may be happening later on. I look forward to my quiet time and tease that I’m a better person when I have that time alone with God (seriously, it’s true though).
I also love worship music. Even if it fades into the background while I’m reading or praying, I like it playing softly. I remember reading how King Saul asked for David to come and play on the harp for him to quiet his soul. I think worship still does that for us today.
Why am I telling you all this? Because the Holy Spirit whispered to my heart recently:
“Put all clamor away from you.”
Clamor? I knew this was a scripture (or part of one). And I recognized the word but not fully sure what it meant, so I went on a hunt — which by the way, is often how the Holy Spirit speaks to me and leads me. With my ipad sitting on my lap playing worship music, I opened the Bible app to look it up. Ephesians 4:31 says, “Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice.”
Hmmm… I recognized the verse but the context didn’t seem to fit the moment. So I looked up the definition. Webster defines it as a loud uproar, an outcry, to utter noisely.
Remember, I’m sitting in my “quiet place.” I’m not angry or bitter or crying out to God about some injustice. Yet clearly the Holy Spirit said: “Put all clamor away from you.”
Clamor is noise and one synonym for noise is disquiet.
As I sat there meditating on this verse and its meaning, I saw a notification on my Bible app. Someone liked a verse I highlighted. Moments earlier when I opened my ipad to find my worship playlist, I saw GroupMe had 17 notifications. I turned on my playlist but had to go clear those messages (it’s a bit of my pet peeve to leave those little red bubbles glaring at me). Then I noticed an alert on my weather app. I checked it too.
“Put all clamor away from you.”
Noise. Distractions. Even inaudible noise can distract us from our “quiet place.” I finally understood what the Holy Spirit was kindly trying to communicate to me. What’s crazy is, it’s not that I didn’t know this. In fact, I don’t look at or bring my phone to my quiet time for this reason. But I didn’t view my ipad the same way although I’ve been known to open an app on my ipad while praying, “I’m sorry Lord, I want you to be first.” And then I went ahead and cleared the messages, which more often than not, led to another distraction on my ipad, and then another, and another.
When the Holy Spirit spoke this word to me, He was really reminding me: In this season of emphasizing silent night, was I allowing God to speak peace to my soul? Or was He having to fight for my attention? I realized the clamor in my quiet time was my ipad. It wasn’t something evil. But it was worth bringing to my attention.
I don’t know what clamor may be going on in your life, but I bet you have something distracting you from fully receiving from God.
Removing the clamor is an invitation to more peace.
Here’s how simple this is: the next morning, I sat down with my coffee in my usual spot and reached for my Bible and (you guessed it) my ipad. But this time, I turned on my favorite playlist and immediately put my ipad on the pillow beside me while I opened my Bible instead of the Bible app.
It was a simple word of help and instruction but it made a world of difference. I believe the Holy Spirit has a lot more to share with me than this, but in order to hear more, I had to remove the noise and distractions.
What would help you hear more?
What word of instruction are you missing because it’s overshadowed by something else?
Whatever clamor is keeping you from hearing, I pray this small lesson will encourage you to put it away. Even as I write this, my ipad is nearby playing softly but my heart is fully engaged with hearing God more than caring about those little red bubbles. They can wait. I need my quiet time to actually be quiet.
