The Awful Dynne: A Reflection on The Beauty of Silence

When I lived in Athens, my life. was. loud. I thought I loved it. Barking dogs, the sounds of the bars and restaurants; the homeless, the buskers, the Thirsty Thursday beer trucks. Shouting, brawling, sirens. Cops, fights, the street-cleaners, the lawn-mowers. I heard every car's music at the red lights. Lots of Adele. Frat parties went late into the night. Horns blasted, car crashes crunched, dump-trucks rattled the dishes, and a very sweet owl liked to wake me up at 3 am most nights. Shows at 40 Watt and the Georgia Theatre left my ears ringing till I woke up. 

The "drunk obnoxious Georgia fans" didn't exactly reserve their enthusiasm for game-day (I worked at Sanford Stadium. Oh, heavens...)

Hey, what's that coming down the track?
A huge machine that's red and black!
Ain't nothing finer int he land
than drunk, obnoxious Georgia fans!
go dawgs GO DAWGS 
go dawgs GO DAWGS
GOOOOOO DAWGS! SIC 'EM! ROOROOAROOROO!

The preachers at Tate Plaza shouted all day long. The bell was always ringing, the line at Barberito's was always moving. Jittery Joe's hipster playlist was never-ending, and the AO study rooms were...not quiet. And it wasn't a ride to devo with the Pulaski Boys if Rage Against the Machine wasn't knocking your teeth out.


When I got out of the car when we first got to the ranch, I couldn't figure out what was going on. Was I breathing? Did the air taste different? Was I standing up? I'm actually not being dramatic: it took me a good five minutes to figure out what was so different. Then it hit me. It was quiet.  ...  After that stunning realisation, I began to experience the layers of the silence. The wind hummed through the sagebrush, but snapped at my jacket. It rippled the water perfectly, but howled and whistled when I turned my head. I was the cause of the only noises I could hear! I was out of place. It was humbling! I was a part of something huge, something that existed long before I was even imagined, and I was being loud just by standing there. I felt so squirmy. If you know me...well, I make a lot of noise. I'm clumsy, I'm dramatic. I am not still. 

Psalm 46.10

be still and know that I AM God.

As I listened to the nothingness, sitting on the ground, holding my knees so that I didn't disturb the perfection of the masterpiece around me, I began to hear. I heard the command to be still, and I heard God. I saw Him, I felt Him, and I knew Him with an entirely new song.

Suddenly, it became the loudest silence I had ever experienced. It was rich. It was fulfilling. It was full of secrets and directions, hopes and dreams. And I NEVER would have heard it over Passion Pit or motorcycles.


It reminded me one of my favourite passages in the old testament. 
1 Kings 19:1-18 <-- read me!
The Lord passes by the mouth of the cave where an exhausted and frightened Elijah is hiding. He speaks to Elijah...not in a hurricane, not in an earthquake, and not in a fire, but in a quiet and gentle whisper. Read it. It's rad.            *****          
Guess what God tells Elijah, in that stillness? That he's not alone. That he will have victory. That he has help back in Israel. That he can TRUST GOD to protect him. To get up. To fight again.
I bet Satan didn't want Elijah to hear that!


I have grown to adore the stillness here. Of course, now that nannying has taken off, there's a lot of noise. But, when I get a chance to run, do yoga, or just drive around, I revel in the stillness. I have learned so much about myself and about my Lord. It's easy to listen when you're quiet. It kind of goes hand in hand with this Chocolate Trust study I'm working on. In this silence, I have heard God telling me to trust him. Something I'm not good at.

God asks Elijah, "What are you doing here?"

God asks Emma, "What are you doing here?"

If this is where I needed to come, to learn to shut my mouth and open the Word, to take my thoughts captive, and to embrace the Freedom of quietude....amen, amen. I can be such a slave to the war of Noise. My words, thoughts, my emotions, my memories and my questions. I am learning to take those shackles off. It is dopey.

Peace. Be still. 

Chocolate Trust, Part I

This study is a work in progress. I am learning to trust God, and that doesn't really happen overnight. 


I nanny two kids. Abigail is 9 months old, and Charlie is 3 1/2. This lesson is about Charlie. Charlie is strong-willed and confident, smart and funny. He is one of the sweetest, kindest, and funniest kids I've worked with in a long time. I like him, and I like to give him the things he wants. Sometimes, though, he asks for things I just can't give him. For example, he asks to drive the truck, or for me to make it stop raining. Sometimes, the things he asks for are just bad for him: he wants to drink chocolate milk that's 7 parts chocolate and 1 part milk, or to play with the lawn-mower. And, other times, I just want him to learn that he can't have everything he wants.

Like most three-year-olds, Charlie knows the power of a decent whine. It can be trying, and initially, I had no idea how to make him stop. I wanted to sob and stomp along with him.

Then I just decided that I'd treat him the way I'd want to be treated. My approach to his little episodes of displeasure has been to ask him to look me in the eye and say, "you can trust me."

Charlie can trust me. I always hear what he asks for (he's definitely persistent). And I want him to be happy! I want to give him the things he wants and thinks he needs ("But, but I have to use my duck-call inside!"). But I guess, somehow, that being older and a little bit wiser helps me to see that having every request granted doesn't produce instant or lasting joy. Duh.

But how often do I forget that for myself? I pray and pray and pray and when God doesn't respond the way I expected, immediately, I straight up curse God and die. It's humbling to compare myself and my periods of doubt and anger with the Lord to Charlie and his little tantrums. But it's so accurate. I do not trust that God hears me, loves me, and has plans to prosper me. No matter how many times He tells me, no matter how many times He shows me...I doubt God.

But I may have had a breakthrough last night. I'll talk about Charlie's breakthrough, first, though.

Charlie is a guy's guy, through and through. He pees outside, run around naked, and rolls in the mud. Yesterday, he wiped out on a major hill on his bike. He lay in the dirt, a sob rising in his chest. My heart stopped: I got on my hands and knees to help him up, clean him off, talk him through it, get him in the bath, dry him off, hug him, promise him that it was going to be okay. He was very quiet. He barely made eye-contact. I couldn't really blame him -- I'm sure it was a little humiliating to need such holistic and even invasive help from his brand new nanny. But that afternoon, he came downstairs and crawled onto my lap. He snuggled and giggled for almost half an hour. It was unbelievable. He's never been affectionate with me before. I felt so warm, so loved, and so special. I felt like he knew I was there for him, that I was his friend, and that there wasn't anything I wouldn't do for him.

I felt like gold.


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