By Tom Thomas –
Sometimes when unpredictable things happen to us in life over which we have no control, for example, a child getting injured and hurt and we are unable to do anything to help his/her pain, we feel so helpless and our instinct is to do something physically, anything really , to get through that moment. But the Bible tells us that these are also moments to “Be Still”. Being in Stillness at times can be more powerful than being in physical action. Being in Stillness means to be calm and not in a state of mental and physical agitation.
Let us take a quick look at the number of times the term, “Be Still”, appears in the Bible (ESV Catholic Edition):
- (Ps 37:7): Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him; fret not yourself over the one who prospers in his way, over the man who carries out evil devices!
- (Ps 46:10): “Be still, and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth!”
- (Ps 83:1): O God, do not keep silence; do not hold your peace or be still, O God!
- (Ps 107:29): He made the storm be still, and the waves of the sea were hushed.
- (Ps 9:9): Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be still wiser; teach a righteous man, and he will increase in learning.
- (Is 23:2): Be still, O inhabitants of the coast; the merchants of Sidon, who cross the sea, have filled you.
- (Jer 47:6): Ah, sword of the Lord! How long till you are quiet? Put yourself into your scabbard; rest and be still!
- (Mk 4:39): And he awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm.
- And specifically related to the topic in the Gospel passage about Martha and Mary, we read in Luke 10: 41-42
But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.”
We can infer from these passages that we need to experience moments of Stillness in turbulent times to listen to the voice of God which might be a soft whisper as Elijah did in 1 Kings 19: 11-12 .
There are moments in life therefore when “busyness” will not help us realize God’s plan for us. We have to Be Still and allow Him to guide us. Otherwise as noted by the travel writer Pico Iyer in his book, The Art of Stillness: “With machines coming to seem part of our nervous systems, while increasing their speed every season, we’ve lost our Sundays, our weekends, our nights off – our holy days, as some would have it; our bosses, junk mailers, our parents can find us wherever we are, at any time of day or night. More and more of us feel like emergency-room physicians, permanently on call, required to heal ourselves but unable to find the prescription for all the clutter on our desk.”
I think the most profound moment of Stillness we see in Station 4 of the Stations of the Cross; “Jesus meets His Afflicted Mother”. That must have indeed been a moment of Stillness for Mother Mary when she could do nothing to take her beloved Son out of the path of anguish and impending death on the Mount Calvary, but to Be Still in the moment and submit to the Divine Plan and Will. This anguish of Mother Mary is so well depicted in the moving hymn Stabat Mater. In the history of devotion to the Sorrowful Mother in the tradition of the Church puts before us the “key image” of the “Mother Standing” in the sacred arts, poetry, sacred writings, devotions and hymns, especially in Stabat Mater by 14th Century Franciscan Jacopone Todi.
There is a mother-son bond that unites Mary with Christ Jesus during his experience of suffering and death. This empathetic bond indicates that Our Lady shared in her Son’s suffering. As the faithful disciple, Our Blessed Mother invites us to unite our personal suffering with her own. We can share in Jesus’ burden on the Cross as Mary did at Calvary
Let us draw inspiration from Mother Mary on how to Be Still in turbulent moments in our lives over which we have no apparent control, and let us be assured that the Lord is in control, always, and the outcome of the moment will be for our ultimate good. This is the power of Stillness…