Making room for the spirit

The Rev Dr Richard Frazer highlights the importance of taking time to ‘pause and be’.

A WISE woman shared with me the story of a retreat she led with some women from her community.

They used the well-known Biblical phrase, ‘Be still and know that I am God’. They began by reflecting on the entire phrase. At each stage of their retreat they dropped a word or two. As they took out each word, they considered together how the phrase impacted them. ‘Be still and know that I am’, ‘Be still and know’, ‘Be still’, and finally ‘Be’. You could try this yourself. Take some time to reflect on the phrase and how it impacts on you, until you get to the final word, ‘Be’.

The exercise, she said, helped her fellow women who were all busy members of her church community to recognise that sometimes we can become so bound up in active doing that we fail just to be still and sometimes fail simply to be.

There is a memorable story of Martha and Mary in the Gospel that illustrates the difference. Jesus loved both sisters equally, along with their brother Lazarus. But the story of Martha bustling around in the kitchen whilst Mary sits quietly at Jesus’s feet illustrates the wise woman’s point.

When Martha explodes out of the kitchen indignant with her sister with so much work to do to prepare dinner for their guests, Jesus reminds Martha how important it is sometimes simply to be. In one of our children’s Bibles, the story concludes with Jesus saying to Martha that when he is finished sharing his message he would help Martha with the washing up!

One of the phrases I have used about myself is ‘demented activism’. I have occasionally felt that I have not been still enough, that I have not always managed just to be. It can mean that we don’t make room for the Spirit in our lives, it is all about urgent doing.

Not long ago, a friend of ours lost her father. She came to us, just to talk about her dad and ask some advice about what reading might be appropriate for his funeral. It was good to listen and enable this friend to share the deep sense of loss she felt. She talked about his love of the sea and sailing and the many adventures he’d had on the water in his younger years, as well as his deep faith and trust in God’s protection.

Eventually, she asked if I could suggest a text that might be used in the funeral. I went to fetch my Bible and found what I was looking for. But, as I opened my Bible, a piece of paper slipped out. It had obviously been there for many years. On the paper was well-known prayer, ‘Protect me, O God, for my boat is so small and your sea is so big’. It felt that it had been waiting, tucked in my Bible for this moment, when it would be so fitting to be read, for it summed up his faith and trust so well. It was all entirely unplanned, but so helpful at that moment.

“ Time and again, the Holy Spirit had nudged me at exactly the right moment to call and see someone.

There have been other times when I have drawn up plans and set myself deadlines. Then a person whom I had not thought about popped into my head, unbidden. For a long time I did nothing about it, but I began many years ago to respond to these promptings. Time and again, the Holy Spirit had nudged me at exactly the right moment to call and see someone.

We live in the midst of miracle and wonder at every moment, God beckons to when we have the grace to pause and be. ¤