1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:06,760 So, I put this sermon together not realizing that there is mental health, they're going 2 00:00:06,760 --> 00:00:12,840 to have a mental health seminar in a couple of weeks, but this goes very well with that. 3 00:00:12,840 --> 00:00:16,560 My topic is silence. 4 00:00:16,560 --> 00:00:23,520 And if you can think, if you can imagine, think back to your last doctor's visit. 5 00:00:23,520 --> 00:00:25,140 What was it like? 6 00:00:25,140 --> 00:00:30,920 Can you imagine yourself walking into the doctor's office, you check in at the front 7 00:00:30,920 --> 00:00:36,480 desk, you go and you sit in the first waiting room, five minutes, ten minutes, half hour, 8 00:00:36,480 --> 00:00:45,560 maybe more, you finally get back, they take your blood pressure, they count how many times 9 00:00:45,560 --> 00:00:50,100 you breathe in a minute, they take your heart rate, and then you sit there and you wait. 10 00:00:50,100 --> 00:00:55,240 You wait there for another five minutes, maybe fifteen minutes, maybe forty-five minutes, 11 00:00:55,240 --> 00:00:57,680 maybe two hours. 12 00:00:57,680 --> 00:01:00,160 But you wait a long time. 13 00:01:00,160 --> 00:01:03,940 And then finally, the doctor walks in. 14 00:01:03,940 --> 00:01:12,080 How long do you think you get from introduction to when the doctor starts interrupting you? 15 00:01:12,080 --> 00:01:15,120 How long do you think you get? 16 00:01:15,120 --> 00:01:17,180 Five minutes? 17 00:01:17,180 --> 00:01:22,960 Five seconds? 18 00:01:22,960 --> 00:01:26,680 Five minutes total time, maybe ten minutes total time, but before they interrupt you. 19 00:01:26,680 --> 00:01:33,280 So you have to get out your story in this finite amount of time before the doctor decides 20 00:01:33,280 --> 00:01:35,520 to interrupt you. 21 00:01:35,520 --> 00:01:39,760 And you better be a fast talker, you better have researched everything you want to say, 22 00:01:39,760 --> 00:01:43,320 prepared your speech, because he's going to interrupt you at some point. 23 00:01:43,320 --> 00:01:48,340 And let's just, we'll go for the middle of the road and we'll give you that amount of 24 00:01:48,340 --> 00:02:03,920 time in silence. 25 00:02:03,920 --> 00:02:08,640 Whatever you have wrong with you, you better have described it in that amount of time. 26 00:02:08,640 --> 00:02:11,080 Fifteen seconds. 27 00:02:11,080 --> 00:02:18,160 They've done a lot of studies and found that the average time between when a doctor after 28 00:02:18,160 --> 00:02:22,440 introductions and when they interrupt you, depending on the study, you have either eleven 29 00:02:22,440 --> 00:02:26,480 seconds, you have eighteen seconds, or sixteen seconds. 30 00:02:26,480 --> 00:02:32,040 So I just averaged it out and you get about fifteen seconds of uninterrupted time. 31 00:02:32,040 --> 00:02:35,400 That's not a lot of time for the doctor to be silent. 32 00:02:35,400 --> 00:02:41,840 So, you're not able to adequately express everything that you would like to express 33 00:02:41,840 --> 00:02:47,120 to your doctor at that time and that is incredibly frustrating. 34 00:02:47,120 --> 00:02:52,120 But let's compare this to another story that I'm sure some of you have heard before, because 35 00:02:52,120 --> 00:02:54,320 I've heard it before too. 36 00:02:54,320 --> 00:02:59,480 There were some monks at a monastery, high in the mountains, deep in the woods, a long 37 00:02:59,480 --> 00:03:01,300 ways away. 38 00:03:01,300 --> 00:03:04,800 And they followed a rigid vow of silence. 39 00:03:04,800 --> 00:03:12,520 This vow could only be broken once a year, on Christmas and by only one monk. 40 00:03:12,520 --> 00:03:19,320 And so, one Christmas, Brother Thomas had his turn to speak and he said, I love the 41 00:03:19,320 --> 00:03:24,480 delightful mashed potatoes we have every year with Christmas roast. 42 00:03:24,480 --> 00:03:29,960 Then he sat down, silence for another 365 days. 43 00:03:29,960 --> 00:03:36,000 Next Christmas, Brother Michael got his turn and said, I think the mashed potatoes are 44 00:03:36,000 --> 00:03:39,280 lumpy and I truly despise them. 45 00:03:39,280 --> 00:03:41,400 Mind you, once a year. 46 00:03:41,400 --> 00:03:44,600 He's been holding this end for now two years. 47 00:03:44,600 --> 00:03:49,720 And then once again, there was silence for 365 days. 48 00:03:49,720 --> 00:03:55,880 The following Christmas, Brother Paul rose and said, I am fed up with all of this constant 49 00:03:55,880 --> 00:03:58,880 bickering. 50 00:03:58,880 --> 00:04:02,440 They have tons of silence. 51 00:04:02,440 --> 00:04:05,680 And can you imagine this monk being your doctor? 52 00:04:05,680 --> 00:04:10,940 You'd have plenty of time to discuss and tell them everything that's on your heart. 53 00:04:10,940 --> 00:04:14,680 You'd have plenty of time to respond, but you probably wouldn't get very good advice 54 00:04:14,680 --> 00:04:22,000 out of them, except maybe once a year and it might just be about the mashed potatoes. 55 00:04:22,000 --> 00:04:27,720 Laughter ensues. 56 00:04:27,720 --> 00:04:34,920 So we can move away from silent doctor monks and consider a secular source of silence. 57 00:04:34,920 --> 00:04:37,880 And what initially actually made me start thinking about this, it wasn't actually the 58 00:04:37,880 --> 00:04:42,100 mental health week coming up, although mental health is very important and silence plays 59 00:04:42,100 --> 00:04:45,240 a huge part in the mental health of our society. 60 00:04:45,240 --> 00:04:49,600 But the secular source that got me thinking about it was a song called The Sound of Silence. 61 00:04:49,600 --> 00:04:52,240 Has anybody here heard that song? 62 00:04:52,240 --> 00:04:54,760 I'm sure that there are a lot. 63 00:04:54,760 --> 00:04:56,760 Anybody remember who wrote it? 64 00:04:56,760 --> 00:05:03,000 Simon and Garfunkel in what year? 65 00:05:03,000 --> 00:05:06,400 1963. 66 00:05:06,400 --> 00:05:09,040 Was it initially a huge success? 67 00:05:09,040 --> 00:05:10,880 The answer is no. 68 00:05:10,880 --> 00:05:13,040 It was a resounding flop. 69 00:05:13,040 --> 00:05:16,240 When they initially wrote that song, it was a cappella. 70 00:05:16,240 --> 00:05:23,640 There was no music and it was just them singing and it went nowhere until the studio remastered 71 00:05:23,640 --> 00:05:32,600 it a year later and put some music to it and then it finally became a big hit in 1964-65 72 00:05:32,600 --> 00:05:39,680 and it became one of the, it became their first hit and well known around the world. 73 00:05:39,680 --> 00:05:47,520 In Garfunkel, introducing this song on a live performance with Simon in Harlem in June 1966 74 00:05:47,520 --> 00:05:50,080 summed up what the song means. 75 00:05:50,080 --> 00:05:55,280 It's the inability of people to communicate with each other, not particularly intentionally 76 00:05:55,280 --> 00:06:01,600 but especially emotionally so that you see around you, so what you see around you are 77 00:06:01,600 --> 00:06:05,120 people unable to love each other. 78 00:06:05,120 --> 00:06:09,440 And so let's look at a few of the song lyrics. 79 00:06:09,440 --> 00:06:13,520 And you'll just have to imagine the music because I'm not going to play the music here, 80 00:06:13,520 --> 00:06:15,240 but the music's not what's important. 81 00:06:15,240 --> 00:06:20,040 It's the words that I think are important and highlight the point. 82 00:06:20,040 --> 00:06:27,440 In the naked light I saw, 10,000 people, maybe more, people talking without speaking, people 83 00:06:27,440 --> 00:06:34,460 hearing without listening, people writing songs that voices never share, no one dared 84 00:06:34,460 --> 00:06:36,720 disturb the sound of silence. 85 00:06:36,720 --> 00:06:44,920 Fools, said I, you do not know, cancer, or silence like a cancer grows. 86 00:06:44,920 --> 00:06:51,760 Hear my words that I might teach you, take my arms that I might reach you, but my words 87 00:06:51,760 --> 00:06:57,400 like silent raindrops fell and echoed in the wells of silence. 88 00:06:57,400 --> 00:07:03,120 And the people bowed and prayed to the neon God they made and the sign flashed out its 89 00:07:03,120 --> 00:07:08,640 warning in the words that it was forming and the sign said the words of the prophet are 90 00:07:08,640 --> 00:07:15,080 written on the subway walls and tenement halls and whispered in the sounds of silence. 91 00:07:15,080 --> 00:07:16,340 So what does this song mean? 92 00:07:16,340 --> 00:07:18,620 What does this song mean to you? 93 00:07:18,620 --> 00:07:20,600 What are we replacing silence with? 94 00:07:20,600 --> 00:07:23,080 We're replacing it with noise. 95 00:07:23,080 --> 00:07:31,500 We're replacing it with neon gods known as television and any other sort of secular entertainment. 96 00:07:31,500 --> 00:07:37,320 The re-quote Garfunkel, we are often in silence because we are unable to love each other. 97 00:07:37,320 --> 00:07:43,360 We watch our TV, we drown ourselves in music, we surround ourselves with the noise of life 98 00:07:43,360 --> 00:07:49,420 because it makes it easier for us to comprehend that. 99 00:07:49,420 --> 00:07:54,920 We think back, if I think back in life, whenever I first moved to California, so at this point 100 00:07:54,920 --> 00:08:02,860 that's 12 years ago, I think 13 years ago, but I remember I moved from Tennessee to California 101 00:08:02,860 --> 00:08:09,280 and I remember walking onto an elevator in Loma Linda and I said hi to somebody and they 102 00:08:09,280 --> 00:08:14,440 turned and looked at me like I had three heads. 103 00:08:14,440 --> 00:08:17,280 They had no idea why I was speaking to them. 104 00:08:17,280 --> 00:08:20,200 They would rather stand there in silence. 105 00:08:20,200 --> 00:08:22,200 And I got used to it. 106 00:08:22,200 --> 00:08:25,520 You get onto the elevator, you just don't talk to anybody unless you know them and you 107 00:08:25,520 --> 00:08:29,800 can say hi, but if you don't know them, you just stand there in silence. 108 00:08:29,800 --> 00:08:35,440 Then I moved back to Tennessee, Georgia, and I get onto an elevator and this is nine years 109 00:08:35,440 --> 00:08:38,920 later and someone says hi to me. 110 00:08:38,920 --> 00:08:41,660 I look at them, why are you talking to me? 111 00:08:41,660 --> 00:08:43,760 This is weird. 112 00:08:43,760 --> 00:08:46,880 But I remember this was a thing in my past life. 113 00:08:46,880 --> 00:08:48,880 So I respond. 114 00:08:48,880 --> 00:08:54,760 And how do all of these, the responses go whenever someone says hi, how are you? 115 00:08:54,760 --> 00:08:56,440 I'm fine. 116 00:08:56,440 --> 00:09:03,640 Or you say I'm good, thank you, or you say no problems, or you say I'm fair to Midland. 117 00:09:03,640 --> 00:09:06,720 Everyone has their canned response, whatever it is. 118 00:09:06,720 --> 00:09:10,040 But it's not your true emotions, it's not your true feelings. 119 00:09:10,040 --> 00:09:15,560 You're serving out platitudes just to give them an answer but not actually connect with 120 00:09:15,560 --> 00:09:17,560 anybody. 121 00:09:17,560 --> 00:09:24,040 Rarely, and I have had people rarely tell me this when I've said how are you, they'll 122 00:09:24,040 --> 00:09:27,080 respond, I'm having a bad day. 123 00:09:27,080 --> 00:09:30,200 What's our response to that? 124 00:09:30,200 --> 00:09:32,560 Do we say I'm sorry to hear that? 125 00:09:32,560 --> 00:09:34,760 That is one thing. 126 00:09:34,760 --> 00:09:38,000 Do we stop our day and ask them how they're doing? 127 00:09:38,000 --> 00:09:41,960 Do we ask them why they're having a bad day? 128 00:09:41,960 --> 00:09:47,080 Or do we just give them the same response we always do? 129 00:09:47,080 --> 00:09:49,520 Well I'm fair to Midland, thank you. 130 00:09:49,520 --> 00:09:52,080 Not even listening to what they've said. 131 00:09:52,080 --> 00:09:58,880 I remember going to grocery stores and they say enjoy your food, or restaurants, enjoy 132 00:09:58,880 --> 00:10:02,400 your food, and I respond you too, and then I think wait, I didn't actually listen to 133 00:10:02,400 --> 00:10:04,160 what she said. 134 00:10:04,160 --> 00:10:08,160 They're not going to enjoy their food because they're checking me out. 135 00:10:08,160 --> 00:10:13,040 Or do we just continue to stand there in silence, ignoring what they've said, and try to get 136 00:10:13,040 --> 00:10:18,480 off the elevator as quick as we can because we don't want to interact with them? 137 00:10:18,480 --> 00:10:23,200 Most of us probably pick one of the ones where we don't emotionally connect with them because 138 00:10:23,200 --> 00:10:27,360 it's hard and it's vulnerable. 139 00:10:27,360 --> 00:10:31,160 And these are just terrible examples of how we deal with silence. 140 00:10:31,160 --> 00:10:37,440 Getting off the elevator, running away, or just being truly silent when we need not be. 141 00:10:37,440 --> 00:10:41,200 How did Jesus, what did Jesus do with silence? 142 00:10:41,200 --> 00:10:43,720 He used it to his advantage. 143 00:10:43,720 --> 00:10:51,520 If we look at Matthew 25, 50 to 54, and it says Jesus replied, do what you came for, 144 00:10:51,520 --> 00:10:52,520 friend. 145 00:10:52,520 --> 00:10:56,280 And this is when he's in the Garden of Gethsemane and Judas came up, gave him a hug, kissed 146 00:10:56,280 --> 00:10:57,640 him on the cheek. 147 00:10:57,640 --> 00:11:03,160 And his response is, do what you came for, friend. 148 00:11:03,160 --> 00:11:08,280 And he responds, put your sword back in its place, Jesus said, for all who draw the sword 149 00:11:08,280 --> 00:11:10,240 will die by the sword. 150 00:11:10,240 --> 00:11:15,080 Do you think I cannot call on my Father and He will at once put at my disposal more than 151 00:11:15,080 --> 00:11:17,720 12 lesions of angels? 152 00:11:17,720 --> 00:11:23,500 But how then would the scripture be fulfilled that say it must happen in this way? 153 00:11:23,500 --> 00:11:28,960 If we look to Matthew 26, 11, 14, and this is later on in the story when he's standing 154 00:11:28,960 --> 00:11:30,600 in the judgment hall. 155 00:11:30,600 --> 00:11:36,240 Meanwhile, Jesus stood before the governor and the governor asked him, are you the king 156 00:11:36,240 --> 00:11:37,240 of the Jews? 157 00:11:37,240 --> 00:11:39,480 What did Jesus say? 158 00:11:39,480 --> 00:11:41,620 You say that I am. 159 00:11:41,620 --> 00:11:45,640 When he was accused by the chief priests and the elders, he gave no answer. 160 00:11:45,640 --> 00:11:51,640 Then Pilate asked him, don't you hear their testimony they were bringing against you? 161 00:11:51,640 --> 00:11:58,360 But Jesus made no reply, not even to a single charge to the great amazement of the governor. 162 00:11:58,360 --> 00:12:02,320 So how did Jesus use silence? 163 00:12:02,320 --> 00:12:04,860 He didn't try to justify his acts. 164 00:12:04,860 --> 00:12:08,640 He didn't try to fight against him because he knew he would not win. 165 00:12:08,640 --> 00:12:14,700 He knew that he would not bring any glory to God. 166 00:12:14,700 --> 00:12:21,320 So he used silence to his advantage, not because it helped him emotionally, but because it's 167 00:12:21,320 --> 00:12:25,040 what was needed at the time. 168 00:12:25,040 --> 00:12:33,600 As Lao Tao said, silence is a great source of strength and Jesus used it to his great 169 00:12:33,600 --> 00:12:34,600 advantage. 170 00:12:34,600 --> 00:12:40,280 And if that's not brusque enough for you, Will Rogers very plainly said, never miss 171 00:12:40,280 --> 00:12:44,920 a good chance to shut up. 172 00:12:44,920 --> 00:12:53,560 Because oftentimes we speak to cover up our own insecurities. 173 00:12:53,560 --> 00:12:57,200 But Jesus let the truth ring from his actions. 174 00:12:57,200 --> 00:13:03,000 He chose, for the most part, to keep silent and embrace the words of Ecclesiastes 3.7, 175 00:13:03,000 --> 00:13:07,200 there's a time to be quiet and a time to speak. 176 00:13:07,200 --> 00:13:08,360 But why? 177 00:13:08,360 --> 00:13:10,080 Why be silent? 178 00:13:10,080 --> 00:13:11,600 What does that bring us? 179 00:13:11,600 --> 00:13:14,160 How does that help us as an individual? 180 00:13:14,160 --> 00:13:21,280 Well, there's one reason that we can't bear to remain silent is because it makes us feel 181 00:13:21,280 --> 00:13:24,120 helpless. 182 00:13:24,120 --> 00:13:31,160 We are so accustomed to relying on the words, upon words to manage and control others. 183 00:13:31,160 --> 00:13:33,880 If we are silent, who will take control? 184 00:13:33,880 --> 00:13:39,200 Do we let God take control? 185 00:13:39,200 --> 00:13:44,320 But we will never let God take control until we trust him. 186 00:13:44,320 --> 00:13:48,000 Silence is intimately related to trust. 187 00:13:48,000 --> 00:13:54,840 The tongue is our most powerful weapon of manipulation, a frantic stream of words that 188 00:13:54,840 --> 00:14:01,000 flows from us because we are in a constant process of adjusting our public image. 189 00:14:01,000 --> 00:14:08,480 We fear so deeply what we think other people see in us that we talk in order to straighten 190 00:14:08,480 --> 00:14:12,820 out what we understand that they think about us. 191 00:14:12,820 --> 00:14:20,040 If we have done something wrong or even some think that I think you may misunderstand and 192 00:14:20,040 --> 00:14:26,540 discover you know about that, then you'll be tempted, then I will help you understand 193 00:14:26,540 --> 00:14:27,540 my decision. 194 00:14:27,540 --> 00:14:30,540 I don't know if that made sense. 195 00:14:30,540 --> 00:14:40,280 But if I am trying to guess what it is you're thinking and what you're thinking about me, 196 00:14:40,280 --> 00:14:44,960 then I'm going to try to adjust what it is that I'm, how I'm portraying myself so that 197 00:14:44,960 --> 00:14:49,500 you understand me better. 198 00:14:49,500 --> 00:14:54,080 And I will be very tempted to help you understand my action. 199 00:14:54,080 --> 00:14:58,080 Silence is one of the deepest disciplines of the spirit simply because it puts the stopper 200 00:14:58,080 --> 00:15:02,280 on all self justification. 201 00:15:02,280 --> 00:15:06,440 And about Jesus, Charles Spurgeon puts it very well. 202 00:15:06,440 --> 00:15:13,480 His was the silence of patience, not of indifference, of courage, not of cowardice. 203 00:15:13,480 --> 00:15:22,800 So Jesus' silence was very apt, very appropriate and of a strong will that was meant to win 204 00:15:22,800 --> 00:15:28,000 the hearts of those that he could win. 205 00:15:28,000 --> 00:15:35,000 Let's read, let's look at 1 Corinthians 3, 4 and 6. 206 00:15:35,000 --> 00:15:38,360 It says, love is patient, love is kind. 207 00:15:38,360 --> 00:15:41,760 It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 208 00:15:41,760 --> 00:15:45,740 It does not dishonor others, it is not self seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps 209 00:15:45,740 --> 00:15:48,000 no records of wrongs. 210 00:15:48,000 --> 00:15:53,280 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices in the truth. 211 00:15:53,280 --> 00:15:57,800 Silence if required must be out of love. 212 00:15:57,800 --> 00:16:02,960 Love is not out of love, then the silence is a lie. 213 00:16:02,960 --> 00:16:07,000 So whenever we're standing on those elevator and someone says, how are you? 214 00:16:07,000 --> 00:16:11,180 Or when you ask somebody how they are and they say, my day is bad. 215 00:16:11,180 --> 00:16:15,520 And your response is silence, your response is a canned response, your response is anything 216 00:16:15,520 --> 00:16:20,240 other than emotional, why are you feeling bad today? 217 00:16:20,240 --> 00:16:22,840 Then your response to them is a lie. 218 00:16:22,840 --> 00:16:24,820 And we should always work to do better. 219 00:16:24,820 --> 00:16:26,000 And this isn't a sermon for you. 220 00:16:26,000 --> 00:16:29,240 This is a sermon for me because this is what I do. 221 00:16:29,240 --> 00:16:35,000 I get on the elevator, I'm a doctor, I'm trying to see my patients as quick as I can, I want 222 00:16:35,000 --> 00:16:41,040 to be southern nice, but I don't really have that time to spend and listen to your half-hour 223 00:16:41,040 --> 00:16:44,600 story about why your day is bad. 224 00:16:44,600 --> 00:16:51,920 So we need to mentally adjust that in our heads with Jesus' help so that we can act 225 00:16:51,920 --> 00:16:56,880 out of love. 226 00:16:56,880 --> 00:16:58,080 We are disheartened. 227 00:16:58,080 --> 00:17:06,160 So thinking back to our own brains, why do we abhor silence? 228 00:17:06,160 --> 00:17:08,440 Our brains are built around stimulation. 229 00:17:08,440 --> 00:17:12,520 They are built around noise, emotion, actions, planning. 230 00:17:12,520 --> 00:17:15,520 As children, we never sit down or we rarely sit down. 231 00:17:15,520 --> 00:17:18,080 We're always doing something. 232 00:17:18,080 --> 00:17:21,560 Because we have lots of stuff to do, we are trying to train our brains, we are trying 233 00:17:21,560 --> 00:17:28,120 to stimulate our brains in order to be a productive human being. 234 00:17:28,120 --> 00:17:34,120 We are born with about 100 billion neurons, brain cells. 235 00:17:34,120 --> 00:17:37,880 And each of those neurons are connected to other neurons. 236 00:17:37,880 --> 00:17:41,800 Sometimes each neuron will be connected to five other cells, sometimes it will be 100 237 00:17:41,800 --> 00:17:43,600 or 200 or more. 238 00:17:43,600 --> 00:17:46,200 But they're connected to a lot. 239 00:17:46,200 --> 00:17:51,120 Some of those connections are completely pointless and they do nothing and those cells die. 240 00:17:51,120 --> 00:17:58,360 Some of those cells are very important for stuff like walking, eating, you know, speaking 241 00:17:58,360 --> 00:18:02,080 up front, doing those things of life. 242 00:18:02,080 --> 00:18:07,720 But we have to train the excess connections to go away. 243 00:18:07,720 --> 00:18:12,700 And the only way we can do that is by using the important ones and not using the least 244 00:18:12,700 --> 00:18:14,160 important ones. 245 00:18:14,160 --> 00:18:24,200 So doing nothing, being in silent is not our natural state of growth. 246 00:18:24,200 --> 00:18:26,760 It is the use it or lose it model. 247 00:18:26,760 --> 00:18:30,360 We have to use those synapses in our brain that become important. 248 00:18:30,360 --> 00:18:34,360 And so then as adults, we still have that same mentality. 249 00:18:34,360 --> 00:18:35,840 We have to use it or lose it. 250 00:18:35,840 --> 00:18:41,780 And so naturally we think, well, I must talk, I must do something sitting around in silence. 251 00:18:41,780 --> 00:18:46,260 That's not the right answer because that's not how I've grown up. 252 00:18:46,260 --> 00:18:54,720 We are programmed to abhor inactivity, the silence, that which is not stimulating because 253 00:18:54,720 --> 00:19:01,600 only actions aids in us being in a longer survival. 254 00:19:01,600 --> 00:19:07,320 So because of this, whenever God is silent, our first response is what? 255 00:19:07,320 --> 00:19:11,240 To put words in God's mouth, to try to speak for God. 256 00:19:11,240 --> 00:19:24,480 It takes training, it takes discipline in order to accept silence and not stimulation. 257 00:19:24,480 --> 00:19:29,680 However, the Bible gives us some advice. 258 00:19:29,680 --> 00:19:36,880 Psalms 37, 7, it basically says, shut up, but no, what it really says is be silent in 259 00:19:36,880 --> 00:19:40,000 the Lord's presence and wait patiently for Him. 260 00:19:40,000 --> 00:19:44,320 In other words, be silent and don't speak for God. 261 00:19:44,320 --> 00:19:47,160 And that's really hard for us to do. 262 00:19:47,160 --> 00:19:53,480 Or we can look at Psalms 141, 3, oh Lord, set a guard at my mouth, keep watch over the 263 00:19:53,480 --> 00:19:55,280 door of my lips. 264 00:19:55,280 --> 00:19:57,100 What does that mean? 265 00:19:57,100 --> 00:20:01,040 It means that we shouldn't tell others the words of God. 266 00:20:01,040 --> 00:20:10,200 And there are quite a few people out there that claim to speak for God, Pope, that may 267 00:20:10,200 --> 00:20:13,840 not actually be the voice of God. 268 00:20:13,840 --> 00:20:18,420 Psalms 46, 10, come, behold the works of the Lord. 269 00:20:18,420 --> 00:20:20,840 How He has brought desolations on the earth. 270 00:20:20,840 --> 00:20:25,820 He makes wars cease to the end of the earth. 271 00:20:25,820 --> 00:20:28,340 He breaks the bow and shatters the spear. 272 00:20:28,340 --> 00:20:30,740 He burns the chariots with fire. 273 00:20:30,740 --> 00:20:33,480 Be still and know that I am God. 274 00:20:33,480 --> 00:20:35,520 I will be exalted among the nations. 275 00:20:35,520 --> 00:20:37,520 I will be exalted in the earth. 276 00:20:37,520 --> 00:20:39,140 The Lord of hosts is with us. 277 00:20:39,140 --> 00:20:41,480 The God of Jacob is our fortress. 278 00:20:41,480 --> 00:20:44,800 Don't try to do the work of God, but let Him do the work. 279 00:20:44,800 --> 00:20:45,800 Sorry. 280 00:20:45,800 --> 00:20:50,320 And what that means to me is don't try to do the work of God, but let Him do that work 281 00:20:50,320 --> 00:20:51,320 through you. 282 00:20:51,320 --> 00:20:53,080 But it just seems so odd. 283 00:20:53,080 --> 00:20:57,760 Be still and know that I'm God is inserted in the middle of all of this stuff that God 284 00:20:57,760 --> 00:20:59,520 is doing. 285 00:20:59,520 --> 00:21:07,240 He will win wars, He will break spears, He will be exalted, He will be your fortress. 286 00:21:07,240 --> 00:21:11,420 But in the middle of all of that it says be still and know that I am God. 287 00:21:11,420 --> 00:21:16,000 And that takes training. 288 00:21:16,000 --> 00:21:23,940 Proverbs 19, 20 and 21, listen to advice and accept instruction that you may gain wisdom 289 00:21:23,940 --> 00:21:25,920 in the future. 290 00:21:25,920 --> 00:21:31,400 Many are the plans in the mind of man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that we will 291 00:21:31,400 --> 00:21:32,400 stand. 292 00:21:32,400 --> 00:21:39,200 Essentially, to me that means let thy will not my will prevail. 293 00:21:39,200 --> 00:21:46,440 And the last one, Proverbs 8, 13, if one gives an answer before he hears, it is his folly 294 00:21:46,440 --> 00:21:48,280 and shame. 295 00:21:48,280 --> 00:21:54,640 Therefore doctors, be quiet, let your patients speak for more than 15 seconds because it 296 00:21:54,640 --> 00:22:00,720 is to your benefit and they've done studies that showed that people that doctors that 297 00:22:00,720 --> 00:22:06,920 listen longer, those patients will give you 90% of the information that you need even 298 00:22:06,920 --> 00:22:09,080 without you having to ask a question. 299 00:22:09,080 --> 00:22:14,240 You just have to sit there and be willing to listen. 300 00:22:14,240 --> 00:22:17,720 But is silence always the right answer? 301 00:22:17,720 --> 00:22:26,160 As we've kind of sort of discussed before, silence is not always the right answer. 302 00:22:26,160 --> 00:22:31,160 Matthew 21, 12 and 13, what happened? 303 00:22:31,160 --> 00:22:34,960 Jesus entered the temple courts and drove out all who were buying and selling. 304 00:22:34,960 --> 00:22:39,320 He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those who were selling 305 00:22:39,320 --> 00:22:40,320 doves. 306 00:22:40,320 --> 00:22:45,520 It is written, he says, my house will be called a house of prayer, but you are making it a 307 00:22:45,520 --> 00:22:47,240 den of robbers. 308 00:22:47,240 --> 00:22:50,880 So this is the example, Jesus was not silent. 309 00:22:50,880 --> 00:22:55,040 It was not needed in this case. 310 00:22:55,040 --> 00:23:05,960 And if we apply that to our world today and thinking about the good words coming to us 311 00:23:05,960 --> 00:23:12,480 are getting drowned out by everything around us, the loudness of our world is simply getting 312 00:23:12,480 --> 00:23:16,360 louder, making it harder to hear truth. 313 00:23:16,360 --> 00:23:23,760 And I'm talking simply just in the volume of everyday things around us. 314 00:23:23,760 --> 00:23:30,240 The wise and God-centered voice is being drowned out by all of these competing interests. 315 00:23:30,240 --> 00:23:37,720 May it be music, may it be our cell phones, may it be traffic if you live in a big city. 316 00:23:37,720 --> 00:23:40,740 It is getting drowned out. 317 00:23:40,740 --> 00:23:47,200 So even when a good and godly person does stand up, their voice is drowned and they 318 00:23:47,200 --> 00:23:51,000 are just not heard. 319 00:23:51,000 --> 00:23:57,520 And if someone does speak and if someone is heard, then they are yelled at and they are 320 00:23:57,520 --> 00:24:02,820 chastised for their truth and then they are ignored. 321 00:24:02,820 --> 00:24:05,340 And they are, what do they call that? 322 00:24:05,340 --> 00:24:08,160 Whenever you get deplatformed. 323 00:24:08,160 --> 00:24:12,840 You get deplatformed, shunned is the word. 324 00:24:12,840 --> 00:24:15,840 Canceled. 325 00:24:15,840 --> 00:24:22,360 You get cancelled is the new word for it. 326 00:24:22,360 --> 00:24:28,080 And so then nobody is going to listen to you at all anymore. 327 00:24:28,080 --> 00:24:30,640 If they disagree with your opinion, then they will cancel you. 328 00:24:30,640 --> 00:24:33,880 So let's look at one example. 329 00:24:33,880 --> 00:24:36,320 The world is getting louder. 330 00:24:36,320 --> 00:24:41,160 Loudness above 85 decibels are damaging to our hearing. 331 00:24:41,160 --> 00:24:45,200 And above 70 decibels over the long term can cause hearing loss. 332 00:24:45,200 --> 00:24:50,800 So I had to nap on my phone just to see what the average volume was during Sabbath school 333 00:24:50,800 --> 00:24:53,280 and during the special music. 334 00:24:53,280 --> 00:24:58,620 During Sabbath school it was about 54 decibels, which is about average talking loudness. 335 00:24:58,620 --> 00:25:02,680 And during special music it was 75 to 85 decibels. 336 00:25:02,680 --> 00:25:07,920 So certainly a little bit louder, but not damaging. 337 00:25:07,920 --> 00:25:11,320 But let's think about fire trucks. 338 00:25:11,320 --> 00:25:15,560 Fire trucks have to be louder than all of the noise around us, otherwise you don't hear 339 00:25:15,560 --> 00:25:17,920 them. 340 00:25:17,920 --> 00:25:26,280 And so back in 1912, siren, fire truck sirens were at 96 decibels, which is, you know, not 341 00:25:26,280 --> 00:25:31,360 damaging over, you know, a few minutes of time while the truck is passing you. 342 00:25:31,360 --> 00:25:36,480 Then in 1974 they had to increase it to 114 decibels. 343 00:25:36,480 --> 00:25:41,760 And then in 2019 they had to increase it to 123 decibels. 344 00:25:41,760 --> 00:25:50,480 And if anybody remembers the decibel scale, an average rock concert is 120 decibels. 345 00:25:50,480 --> 00:25:55,920 So the loudness of fire trucks just going past us just to get over the drone of life 346 00:25:55,920 --> 00:26:05,280 that it is now, it has to be louder than a rock concert for anybody to hear it. 347 00:26:05,280 --> 00:26:10,120 Music has increased in volume by 39% in the last 20 years. 348 00:26:10,120 --> 00:26:14,180 And that's not the loud part of the music, that's the silent part of the music has gotten 349 00:26:14,180 --> 00:26:16,060 significantly louder. 350 00:26:16,060 --> 00:26:20,520 So there is no silent parts of music anymore. 351 00:26:20,520 --> 00:26:25,240 Construction equipment is still a construction equipment, but it continues to be very loud 352 00:26:25,240 --> 00:26:29,840 at about 90 decibels, but it's all the time because there's so much construction going 353 00:26:29,840 --> 00:26:31,400 on. 354 00:26:31,400 --> 00:26:36,840 Ambient noise in cities and traffic, ambient noise in cities are due mainly to traffic 355 00:26:36,840 --> 00:26:40,380 and it accounts for about 80% of the sound. 356 00:26:40,380 --> 00:26:43,920 And that's a 40% increase in the last 25 years. 357 00:26:43,920 --> 00:26:49,520 In some areas of New York City, it can be 73 decibels, which is pretty common. 358 00:26:49,520 --> 00:26:53,760 And remember, over the long term, that's damaging to our hearing. 359 00:26:53,760 --> 00:26:56,400 And it can be even be over 90 decibels. 360 00:26:56,400 --> 00:27:02,520 And the highway and federal highway administration says that average traffic is about 70 to 80 361 00:27:02,520 --> 00:27:03,520 decibels. 362 00:27:03,520 --> 00:27:07,600 So the world is just loud. 363 00:27:07,600 --> 00:27:15,600 Can you imagine living next to a running washing machine all the time, which is about 70 decibels, 364 00:27:15,600 --> 00:27:20,840 day in, day out, sleeping, awake, always next to that washing machine? 365 00:27:20,840 --> 00:27:25,000 And that would be hard. 366 00:27:25,000 --> 00:27:28,680 You would never be able to have a good conversation because when I'm standing next to it, I can't 367 00:27:28,680 --> 00:27:29,680 hear much. 368 00:27:29,680 --> 00:27:33,400 I'm getting older, I know. 369 00:27:33,400 --> 00:27:37,160 And I probably listened to a little bit too much loud music when I was younger. 370 00:27:37,160 --> 00:27:39,120 But it makes conversations hard. 371 00:27:39,120 --> 00:27:40,440 It makes listening to God hard. 372 00:27:40,440 --> 00:27:43,600 It makes listening to other people hard. 373 00:27:43,600 --> 00:27:48,080 And this comes with a lot of side effects personally, physically, like increased risk 374 00:27:48,080 --> 00:27:53,240 of strokes, of heart attacks, of heart, just hypertension. 375 00:27:53,240 --> 00:27:56,720 But then it also comes at an increased cost of our connection with others, our connection 376 00:27:56,720 --> 00:27:58,800 with God. 377 00:27:58,800 --> 00:28:05,320 Proverbs 31, 9 says, speak up, judge righteously and defend the rights of the afflicted and 378 00:28:05,320 --> 00:28:06,600 the oppressed. 379 00:28:06,600 --> 00:28:12,600 So when we use our voice, it should be for truth, it should be for the good and for God. 380 00:28:12,600 --> 00:28:18,800 Proverbs 5, 11, do not participate in unfruitful deeds of darkness, but expose them. 381 00:28:18,800 --> 00:28:25,960 John 15, 18 and 19, if the world hates you, you know that it hated me first. 382 00:28:25,960 --> 00:28:29,700 If you were of the world, the world would love its own. 383 00:28:29,700 --> 00:28:34,260 But because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore 384 00:28:34,260 --> 00:28:36,600 the world hated you. 385 00:28:36,600 --> 00:28:41,240 Silence is not always wrong, nor is a loud voice. 386 00:28:41,240 --> 00:28:47,360 May we not let the silence go around us, nor that we are drowned in a sea of boisterous 387 00:28:47,360 --> 00:28:49,640 noises. 388 00:28:49,640 --> 00:28:58,440 Either way, but rather we need to incorporate this biblical advice to listen with intent 389 00:28:58,440 --> 00:29:00,640 to those that are around us. 390 00:29:00,640 --> 00:29:06,120 Act with fervor for the oppressed, the sick and the lonely, and to be quiet when we need 391 00:29:06,120 --> 00:29:07,760 to be. 392 00:29:07,760 --> 00:29:13,520 And then I'll close with one final quote from Theodore Rothke, an American poet who won 393 00:29:13,520 --> 00:29:16,640 the Pulitzer Prize in 1958. 394 00:29:16,640 --> 00:29:19,960 And he said, may my silence become more accurate. 395 00:29:19,960 --> 00:29:26,320 And I think that should always be our ongoing prayer that we would know when to be silent 396 00:29:26,320 --> 00:29:30,980 and when we need to listen to those around us for their mental health, and then if others 397 00:29:30,980 --> 00:29:37,980 listen to us for our mental health as well.