As I was sitting at a traffic light on my way home the other day, I noticed the sign at the corner gas station. The price read $4.95. I found myself looking twice, just to be sure I was seeing it correctly. Yep—regular unleaded.
It wasn’t just the number. It was that moment of pause. The quiet realization that something had shifted again… and not in a small way.
And I imagine I’m not the only one who has had that kind of moment recently. You see it at the pump. You feel it at the grocery store. You hear it in the conversations around you. Something isn’t lining up the way it used to.
That’s what this past week has felt like.
Like trying to listen to a radio station with the signal cutting in and out. You hear one thing, then another, and they don’t quite line up. You watch the headlines roll in—one story replacing another, one explanation competing with the next.
And maybe the most unsettling part isn’t just what’s happening. It’s the not-so-subtle pressure to ignore what we can already see. To move on. To look somewhere else. To accept an explanation that doesn’t quite match reality.
This isn’t just noise like a crowded room. This is the kind of static that distracts, redirects, and dulls our attention until we’re no longer sure what’s true or what deserves our focus. Truth doesn’t become less true just because we’re told to look somewhere else.
When that goes on long enough, we don’t just get confused—we get tired. We become reactive. We stop paying close attention. And eventually, we begin to accept things we would have questioned before.
Part of my calling—and part of the church’s calling—is to keep paying attention. To refuse to look away from what is real. To keep the light shining on what matters. To speak truth, even when it’s inconvenient. Not to add to the noise, but to resist the distortion.
But here’s the danger. If we spend all our energy reacting to the noise out there, we never learn how to quiet the noise in here. And if we lose that, we lose our ability to discern the voice that matters most.
We’ve been asking a simple question in this series: Why run when Jesus walked? But the truth is, most of us aren’t just running—we’re reacting, scrolling, absorbing, and responding—without ever becoming still.
That’s why this matters. Silence, solitude, and prayer are not escapes from reality. They are how we return to reality with clarity. They are not disengagement. They are resistance to a world that is constantly trying to tell us what to think about, what to fear, and what to ignore.
If we cannot find silence, we will be shaped by the loudest voice in the room. And that is not just a problem out there. It is a formation problem within us.
At this point in the series, it’s worth pausing to remember where we’ve been with our companion book, The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry. The opening chapters name the problem plainly: hurry is not just a pace issue—it is a spiritual one. It erodes our attention, fragments our relationships, and quietly pulls us away from the life Jesus invites us to live.
If hurry is the problem, then the answer cannot be more effort or better time management. It requires something deeper. It requires a different way of living.
This is where our companion book shifts from diagnosis to practice. Not abstract ideas, but embodied rhythms that reshape our lives: silence and solitude, Sabbath, simplicity, and slowing. These are not techniques for self-improvement. They are ways to create space—space to notice, to listen, and to be present to God and to one another.
And it begins here, with silence and solitude. Not because it is easy, but because it is foundational. Before anything else can be reordered, our attention has to be reclaimed.
Which brings us to Jesus.
The Apostle Mark shares a story about a time when everything began to accelerate for Jesus. The crowds are growing. The needs are real. The demands are urgent. By every measure, this is the moment to do more, to move faster, to respond to every opportunity in front of him. This is where most of us have learned to increase our pace to the point of running.
First-century Palestine was neither quiet nor simple. It was a land under the rule of the Roman Empire—an authoritarian system marked by power, control, and, at times, ruthless enforcement. Local rulers like Herod Antipas governed with their own interests in mind, maintaining order in ways that benefited themselves more than the people they led. Heavy taxes, economic strain, and a constant awareness that authority could be exercised quickly and with little recourse were present.
And it wasn’t only political. The religious landscape was complex as well. Some leaders were deeply faithful, while others had become entangled with the very systems that burdened the people. For many ordinary men and women, the lines between truth and power could feel blurred.
People were seeing one thing…and often being told to believe something different.
They were navigating competing voices—political, religious, cultural—all claiming authority over their lives. In that sense, the world around Jesus was not nearly as distant from ours as we might like to think.
Very early the next morning, long before daylight, Jesus got up and left the house. He went out of town to a lonely place, where he prayed.
Mark 1:35–39
And into that world, Jesus did speak truth. He challenged hypocrisy. He named injustic e. He refused to be controlled by either political pressure or religious expectation.
But what’s striking is how He did it.
He did not become reactive. He did not allow the loudest voices to set his agenda. He did not lose himself in the urgency of every demand placed upon him.
Instead, he remained anchored.
Which brings us back to the story Mark wanted us to hear. Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus gets up, leaves the house, and goes to a solitary place to pray.
Before the voices. Before the expectations. Before the noise. Jesus withdraws. Before the crowds could define His priorities and before the day’s noise could take hold, Jesus stepped away. He sought silence. He embraced solitude. He prayed.
And it doesn’t go unnoticed. The disciples go looking for him. When they find him, they say what all of us might be thinking: “Everyone is searching for you.” In other words, there are people waiting… there is work to be done… why are you out here? Perhaps they were worried Jesus was disengaging from the world.
Jesus’ response reveals something deeper. He does not return in a hurry to meet every expectation. He moves forward with clarity. He knows where He is going, and just as importantly, where He is not.
What we see here is not avoidance. It is not disengagement. It is not indifference to the needs around him.
Taking time for solitude, silence, and prayer allowed Jesus to stay faithful in a world full of competing claims and constant pressure. Jesus wasn’t tuning out. He was tuning in. Tuning into the truth that could not be drowned out.
Jesus steps away from the noise, not because the world doesn’t matter, but because it does. In the quiet, he listens. In solitude, he is grounded. In prayer, he is anchored in the voice that matters most.
And from that place, he is able to move through a noisy, demanding world without being controlled by it.
This is where silence and solitude begin to make sense for us. Not as an escape from reality, but as a way of returning to it—clearer, steadier, and more faithful.
Because if Jesus needed that kind of space… we probably do, too.
So what does life begin to look like when we make room for silence, solitude, and prayer? Not perfect. Not untouched by the world around us. But different.
We begin to notice what we were too hurried to see. Our reactions slow. Our attention steadies. We are less easily pulled in every direction by every headline, every opinion, every urgent demand. Instead of being shaped by the loudest voice in the room, we learn to listen more deeply for the truest one.
Clarity begins to replace confusion. Not because every question is answered, but because we are no longer trying to answer them all at once. We learn to discern what is ours to carry and what is not. We become more present—to God, to one another, and even to the realities of the world we are called to face.
There is also a quiet strength that begins to take root. The kind that does not need to react to everything immediately. The kind that can hold conviction without being consumed by it. The kind that allows us to stay engaged with what is real without being overwhelmed by it.
And perhaps most importantly, we begin to recover a sense of alignment. Like Jesus, we are no longer driven only by what is urgent. We are guided by what is true. We are able to move through a noisy, demanding world with a steadiness that does not come from us, but from the One we have learned to listen to.
This is not escape. It is formation. It is how we learn to stay faithful without tuning out.
So where do we begin?
Start small. Set aside a few minutes each day this week. You might try earlier than you normally would, if possible, and sit in silence. No phone. No noise. No agenda beyond being present. Let the quiet feel unfamiliar if it needs to.
Choose one simple prayer to return to when your mind begins to wander. It could be as simple as, “Speak, Lord, I’m listening,” or “Here I am.” Let it anchor you.
And pay attention. Notice what surfaces in the silence—not just around you, but within you. Not to judge it, but to become aware of it.
You don’t have to withdraw from the world to do this. But you may need to step away long enough to hear clearly again.
Because if we cannot find silence, we will be shaped by the loudest voice in the room.
But if we learn to be still… we may begin to hear the voice that has been there all along.
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This is a reminder that we publish a weekly newsletter called the Circuit Rider. You can request this publication by email by sending a request to FlintAsburyUMC@gmail.com, or let us know when you send a message through our website. We post an archive of past editions on our website under Connect – choose Newsletters.
Pastor Tommy
Some content comes from John Mark Comer. The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry. Colorado Springs : WaterBrook, 2019. ISBN 9780525653097.