I feel mildly guilty blasting Neon Bible as I write tonight, because I feel that perhaps I have squandered a wonderful gift that has lasted almost two weeks, and unfortunately, ends tomorrow. You see, the people that I live with have been on vacation, and I have had the incredible pleasure to have the house to myself, and along with that, a sufficient amount of personal time.

This whole period of time has given me a lot of potential quiet. Something that I absolutely adore and don’t get enough of. Unfortunately though, I have listened to music almost the entire time. Not that music is necessarily bad, but anything is in excess. For example, the family that I live with is loud. They’re incredible. I love them all. I have never in my whole life encountered a louder bunch of hooligans. Never! And I can deal with that; they’re very respectful and truly, are just humorous, so I never mind their naturally booming voices and deafening and nonsensical conversations. They keep their loudness in check. I have enjoyed them being gone though, and the newfound peace and quiet that have re-entered my life in their absence.

C.S. Lewis speculated in his Screwtape Letters that noise comes from the devil. He states that noise is one of their many means employed in the effort to take over the universe, and it makes sense. Noise brings with it confusion and lack of focus, noise can even be a cover for fear to enter in. Just watch dogs and children on the fourth of July and how they react to the loud crashes and booms that seem to never end.

Consider the example of Elijah hiding out in the cave in 1 Kings 19. God passes by, and there’s wind that shatters rocks on the mountain, then an earthquake hits, and even fire passes by the mouth of the cave, but it says that God was not to be found in any of this stuff. Rather, He speaks in a still, small voice after the fire. The noise had to be gone before God could be heard.

I think that noise would more than sufficiently hide something like a still, small voice.
Perhaps that’s why the devil likes it.

So my noise is gone, has been for a couple of weeks, but returns tomorrow. I guess I should say one aspect of my noise, because as I have mentioned, I’ve been ghetto-blasting music all around the house all week, has probably robbed me of some time to shut up and listen to what God has to say. When they all get back, I should tell them that they’re all the devil’s tools working for his cause to keep me from hearing what God has to say to me. That should go over well.