Sometimes I don’t understand what God’s doing in me, through me, or around me. Do you ever feel that way, too? Like you’re playing a part in some great adventure but you have no clue what it’s all about or what you’re doing in the middle of it all?

Each day you show up, interact with all the characters on Life’s Stage because that’s what God’s asked you to do. Some days it all makes sense – the tasks and conversations all point to some significance – but other days you struggle with your lines and your stage presence is awkward at best. You stand there listening for any backstage cues, but all you hear is silence.

Bustling busyness surrounds you and yet you’re frozen in one spot, still listening for some direction, a line, a clue and you’re left standing there in awkward, crazy nothingness. Uneasy and feeling quite useless, you race backstage, rummage for your script to find it’s blank – no lines, no direction – nothing. Taking your obviously defective script to the director, you ask for a trade, but he refuses – barely takes his eyes off the action on Life’s Stage – says it’s supposed to be blank.

“Just take your place,” the director smirks. “It’ll all make sense in the end.”

Isn’t that life sometimes? I sit here today, late with my post because I hear no words – just silence. In the midst of busyness and swirling adventures, I’m standing, waiting for direction and only silence welcomes me. Silence works for us writers when words fill in the gaps, but when there’s no words the gaps feel uncomfortable, like something is missing or we’ve missed something.

So, I’m going about my day on high alert, searching my heart, asking God to speak. If, at the close of today, I still hear silence, I’m reassured that God’s still up to something. And knowing that I’m in the midst of it all is enough because it’ll all make sense in the end.

How about you? What do you do when all you hear is silence?