1 Kings 19:11–13 (NRSV)

11 He said, “Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.” Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind, and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake, 12 and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire, and after the fire a sound of sheer silence. 13 When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. Then there came a voice to him that said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”

Be with us, O God,

in all things.

Wendell Berry

“Accept what comes from silence.

Make the best you can of it.

Of the little words that come

out of the silence, like prayers

prayed back to the one who prays,

make a poem that does not disturb

the silence from which it came.”

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Ecclesiastes 3:1, 11 (NRSV)

For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven.

He has made everything suitable for its time; moreover he has put a sense of past and future into their minds, yet they cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.

Teach us to trust, O God,

the work you are doing in us.

The Cloud of Unknowing

“For this is the work of the soul that most pleaseth God,

to wait in stillness and in trust.

Not striving to see clearly,

nor desiring to feel greatly,

but choosing to rest in the dark knowing

that God is at work beyond our understanding.

For love may reach God in this life,

but knowing never can.

And therefore, be content to remain in this cloud,

trusting that God is nearer than you know.”

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Mark 4:26–29 (NRSV)

He also said, “The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground,

and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow,

he does not know how.

The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head.

But when the grain is ripe, at once he goes in with his sickle, because the harvest has come.”

Teach us to see, O God,

what is already before us.

Meister Eckhart

“The soul must forget itself and all things

and must be empty of all images.

For where there is emptiness,

there is room for God to work.

Nothing is so unlike God as distraction,

and nothing so like God

as stillness.”

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