Listening for Truth

A couple years ago, while I was visiting my spiritual director in Calgary, I did something really dumb:  in trying to park my car on a residential street, I backed into a pickup truck.  Twice.  (Yes, you read that correctly.)  As it happened, the owner of the truck was in his vehicle and I was soon treated to a stream of curses and insults that I shall not repeat here.  I do not defend my poor judgement in trying to negotiate this parking space blindly; there is no doubt that I messed up.

Despite, or perhaps because of, the angry barrage of words hurled at me that afternoon, something wonderful happened, gifting me with a warm memory that I cherish even today.  In the midst of the rage and accusations, from somewhere deep inside of myself, came a gentle, yet firm voice that said this:  “You are not defined by this parking mistake today.  This man’s insults do not speak to who you are.  You are worthy of dignity and respect and honour, even in this moment of stupidity.”

It was a voice that calmed me amid my feelings of embarrassment and shame.  It brought me peace in the face of anger.  It left me feeling grounded.  It absolutely clarified for me the truth of who and what I was in the eyes of God.  It was what I would describe as the voice of God.

From time to time, in my job as a junior high school chaplain and Religion teacher, a student will ask:  “How do you know if God is talking to you?”  This can be such a difficult question to answer, because my experience has been that God speaks to each and every one of us in a way that is lovingly adapted to us, our personalities and our backgrounds.  However, the beginnings of an answer to this question can, I think, be found in Paul’s letter to Timothy where he writes:  “For God did not give us a spirit of cowardice, but rather a spirit of power and of love and of self-discipline.”  To me this means, in part, if the voice that we hear speaking to us in prayer degrades us or leads to feelings of worthlessness, then we can be certain that this is not the voice of God.  God’s voice brings us peace, a sense of knowing that we are loved and cherished, and the knowledge of our inherent dignity as children of God.  It gives us courage and leads us to be more loving to ourselves and to those around us.

Martin Luther King Jr., an American civil rights activist, once said “A lie cannot live.”  On that residential street in Calgary two years ago, I knew, through the grace of God, that I was listening to a stream of lies, lies that could not stand before the power of God’s truth.  Somewhere inside all of us is that place where God speaks, calmly contradicting the many voices in our world that tell us that we are somehow not enough and that our mistakes define who we are.  Let us strive to listen to the voice that gives us life and courage.

Michelle Langlois fcJ