Learning To Be Still

The art of being still is not easy. Someone may appear serene, but on the inside they are troubled and anxious. Whatever our natural disposition, only God can provide inner stillness and peace. I'd love to learn more of the Bible by heart, so I can bring it to mind throughout the day when I face different situations that either leave me stressed or confused. And a perfect psalm to learn (at only 3 verses!) is Psalm 131, where we are allowed intimate access to someone who has learned to be still:

"My heart is not proud, Lord, 
my eyes are not haughty:
I do not concern myself with great matters 
or things too wonderful for me.
But I have calmed and quieted myself,
I am like a weaned child with its mother;
like a weaned child I am content.
Israel, put your hope in the Lord
both now and forevermore."

What peaceful simplicity David writes about here. This is someone who knows the 'peace that passes understanding' we read about in Philippians 4. This person isn't noisy inside. They're not on edge, obsessed and overwhelmed by their to do list. They aren't thinking about what others make of them, dissatisfied and irritated by people and his relationships. They are quiet. 
Are you quiet inside? If the answer is often no, then you need to ask yourself, 'what is the noise going on inside me?' I've been challenged to pray and ask God what distractions are going on inside of me, which take my eyes and heart away from trusting in Him.

David wrote the original words three thousand years ago - and he was far from perfect. Although a talented man and skilled political strategist, he was also an adulterer and murderer and a broken hearted man. But God said he was 'a man after his own heart' (1 Samuel 13:14). God had chosen him and was with him. That's why David can write in this Psalm that he is both calm and content. 

Having faith in God helps us with our biggest problem: pride. In verse 1, David writes 'he is not proud' - in other words, he is not headstrong, opinionated and self-seeking. He is not absorbed in himself - something I find almost impossible to be without knowing God! But not only that, his 'eyes are not haughty' If pride is thinking too much of yourself, then being haughty is looking down at others - judging and continually criticising people.
 
Instead, David writes, he doesn't concern himself 'with matters too great' for him. He's humble and realises that he doesn't have the answers to all of life's questions, and doesn't presume to think he has it all right himself. This is so powerful. How often do we find ourselves questioning God and situations we find ourselves in, which lead to either despondency and lack of generosity to others? We are to trust in God and 'put our hope in the Lord' because we weren't made to know and understand everything. We are like children in that sense - we can't compute what God has done or is doing. We are on this side of eternity and we only see in a 'mirror dimly' (1 Corinthians 13:12).

The image of weaning a child is directly relevant to me, as we're currently weaning our second son, Jude! I can say that it is definitely a process - going from milk to solids isn't immediate... and it's also a very messy business! So it is with being changed by the Holy Spirit, from restlessness and fussiness, to someone who can sit still when life hits us with the impossible. As David writes, once a child is weaned, they can sit on their mother's lap without rooting and desperately trying to find milk. So can we learn to be patient with God - to wait on him to provide our daily bread at the right time.

The Psalm ends with hope. Where pride forces us to look inwards, hope lifts up our heads to the Lord. Ultimately it is Jesus who is our hope - who has taken away our desperate desire to be like God to ourselves, and has made us right with him again. I'm reminded of the passage in Romans 8:24 which describes hope in more detail: 'Now who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience'. Just like in Psalm 131, the gift of learning to be still and at peace isn't knowing everything, but waiting for the day God will put all things right, with patience and hope.