Picking Up Mixed Signals

You and I are like soldiers on the battlefield who have the difficult task of deciphering the real message—the divine message of our mission—being transmitted among the many mixed signals.

Whose voice, whose message are we receiving—our divine commander’s, or our enemy’s?
It is imperative that we become capable of sifting through the messages and discerning the Vox of the divine commander.

To receive God’s message and carry it out, it is essential that we embrace periods of silence throughout the day for the purpose of intentionally listening to God and discerning His voice in our hearts.
Carving out time for silence and embracing silence is becoming exceedingly difficult for modern man.

The enemy is bent on keeping you from the silence.

Consider the constant assault on our beings.
Whether we are at the grocery store, or a restaurant, gas station, or in our car, music, television, and smartphones bombard us and invade us with countless messages, robbing us of our ability to hear and discern God’s voice.

The enemy tempts us to turn on the radio when we are in the car, to have the television continually running in the background, to check and send emails and texts, all in order to fill us with something other than God.

The evil one is satisfied with giving us “good things” as long as those good things keep us from the “greatest thing”—communion with God.

The evil one is bent on keeping our minds occupied, racing, concerned; he lures us to be busy to distract us from hearing the Vox of God that will reveal God’s mission, vision, and plan for your life.

As Thomas Merton said,
“The biggest disease in North America is busyness.”

You and I have a choice. We can listen to the voice of the devil, which has saturated most of today’s technological mediums, and become like him: a weak, selfish, restless, anxious, manipulative, uncontrolled user; or we can regularly enter silence before God, and become like Him, reflecting His power, beauty, strength, mercy, and wisdom.

Perhaps you are thinking: What do I do while I am in silence?

Scripture notes that St. Joseph turned aside and considered the matter of Mary’s pregnancy.
In other words, he entered the silence and presented himself to the Lord.
This is Joseph’s first step to his call to fatherly greatness.
Joseph simply stopped what he was doing and placed himself in God’s presence and remained there.
He didn’t bombard God with a host of requests or a litany of empty words.
He trustingly waited on the Lord, believing that God would direct his life.

And God did.

St. John Vianney noticed that a peasant farmer would silently sit in his church each morning for an extended time.
The Curé of Ars asked him what he was doing and the peasant responded,

“I don’t say anything to God, I just sit and look at Him and He looks at me.”

This is our first step to fatherly greatness: to be courageous enough to simply stop, look at Him, and listen, and believe that He will speak and direct our lives to glory.

One of the greatest challenges for men is to carve space into their oversaturated schedule and make time for God.
And that is one of the main reasons why so many men are highly ineffective in changing the world for the better, living a fulfilled life, and winning souls for God. Commit yourself to carving out that sacred time each day for God.
Hint: Make your meeting with God the same time every day.