Today's meditation was written by Cathy Self, Senior Vice-President for the Baptist Healing Trust.

"I have often repented of having spoken, but never of having kept silent" – Arsenius, early Christian Desert Father.

Not too many weeks ago the sweet respite of silence came to me as a gift on a weekend retreat. Many who know me well were astonished that I would knowingly and then capably enter into extended silence (it seems the gift of gab is written into my DNA and there is usually music playing in my office/car/home). Nevertheless, the experience of silence on that weekend retreat was not only welcomed by my heart and mind but relished in my soul.

Wayne Muller, author of a gentle yet firm encouragement to practice Sabbath, speaks of silence with words shared with you here today in a piece simply titled Silence: 

"When Eugene Peterson served as pastor of a church in Maryland, he took his Sabbath on Monday. He and his wife regularly packed lunches and binoculars into their backpacks, and drove a short way to a trailhead that meandered along a river or into the mountains. Before they began the hike, they would read a psalm, and then pray. After that, they hiked in complete silence for the next two or three hours, until they stopped for lunch. "We walk leisurely,' he writes, 'emptying ourselves, opening oruselves to what is there: fern shapes, flower fragrances, bird-song, granite outcropping, oaks, and sycamores, rain, snow, sleet, wind.' And when it was time for lunch, they broke the silence with a prayer of blessing for the food, the river, the forest. Then, free to talk, they shared their bird sightings, observations, feelings, and thoughts."

"This kind of silence alters perception," continues Muller. "We see differently in silence, when we are not expected to comment, analyze, or respond. The Buddhist precept of Right Speech includes the concept of refraining from speaking words that are not absolutely necessary. Things find their way deeper into our body when we are not in such a hurry to spit them back out."

"Things are born in quiet that cannot be heard in the din of our overly verbal days. Sabbath time," suggets Muller, "is enriched by some period of intentional silence." What might emerge in your life today during a period of intentional silence? Try taking a few minutes on a walk, sitting in your office or car, and just be silent. Notice what arises in that silence – perhaps an impulse to speak, to judge, to respond to what you see, hear, feel. Silence can be a place of sweet and genuine sanctuary in time, if we are but willing to go there.