Signal and Noise
Here's to More and Less
If everything is an emergency, then nothing is an emergency.
I don’t recall the first time I heard that statement; several years ago, I was “in charge” of safety in our lab group at work (as much as any person can be “in charge” of safety. On second thought, that would be a fool’s errand!); this expression came up from time to time. It was usually related to the idea that something, when it comes to safety, has to have priority. Otherwise, you won’t know where to give your attention.
Maybe that was where I was first introduced to it, although it’s one of those ideas that seems to have always been near.
In any case, there’s a related thought that seems even more “to the point” lately:
If everything has your attention, then nothing has your attention.
It’s late November, and I’m sitting here, yet again. I don’t like it here.
The “here” in this case is with and within a deep sense of sadness, an acidic melancholy that seems to have coated my insides. Dramatic, maybe, but an intense sorrow has crept in, and there is little I can do to stop it, even were that healthy.
Feelings are not the enemy, so it is said. They just clue a person into something that is going on below the surface, however deep.
This feeling has little to do with the fact that we are on the cusp of the Christmas season, staring down the improbability that another calendar year is almost gone, although that might be a contributing factor. How did it, in fact, slip by so quickly? How are my kids growing and moving on without us? How can my son now carry me across the living room like a large sack of wet laundry? (And why are Abby and I the only ones who know how to wash, dry, fold, and distribute laundry? Probably off topic, but still a valid question.)
Emotions are said to be a signal of sorts. This one is close. No real depth here. Signal received. And I know where it’s coming from, if not what the message is.
At an otherwise joyful event, I lost my composure. It may not have seemed that way from the outside, but I knew it, and those around me knew something was up. My words were not kind, which is the ultimate irony since I was responding to words that I found, in the moment, to be unkind themselves.
To be fair, some of it was probably the PTSD from a week home with the kids and dogs during Thanksgiving break. No one prepares you for that level of family togetherness. There was never a warning given or even a friendly heads-up about the joy and pain that kind of close-quarters fellowship can cause. I love them all more than life itself (not the dogs - the dogs I barely like), but come on! Daddy needs a moment!
Sitting in the present, I replay the night I unraveled a bit. My mind at the time was racing, and I felt the familiar flush of - what - indignation? An inability to come to terms with another point of view? A perception of condemnation from others for how I see things? A guilt for not knowing enough about what I was so oddly passionate about?
Yes, and yes, and yes, and...ouch, yes. At least in part.
In any case, too much caffeine, a festive drink, and all of the buzzwords and key concepts that have slowly scrolled along and through my browsers and apps in recent months, working together to create a slow-building din.
Strips of land and fractured people groups and promises made by God to nations that were/are important to him. Politicians who are doing what politicians must do to stay in office, and some spiritual leaders doing the same. Heroes of faith and heroes of polity, and who knows the difference anymore? Worries about kids, and worries about looking foolish. Too many headlines, too many clips, too few long, thoughtful reads. Much too little silence.
And much, much too little time inviting God to reveal truth.
Too much noise, not nearly enough signal.
In the book of Kings, there is an account where a man named Elijah, whose literal job it was to (a) hear from God and (b) relay God’s message to others, gets what appears to be a visceral lesson in deciphering the signal amongst the noise. He is told to stand on the mountain “before the Lord” because the Lord is going to pass by. As he does so, there is a progression of violent, awe-inspiring phenomena that occur around him.
A rock-breaking wind storm. An earthquake. A fire.
But God is “not in” the noise and chaos, at least not at that moment.
Instead, there is a whisper, and Elijah seems to know at once that this is the voice of God.
What I find really interesting is that this lesson comes at a time when Elijah seems to have reached the end of his rope. Immediately before this revelation, Elijah is running for his life and is seeking shelter. God asks him what he is doing, reveals Himself in the whisper, and then repeats the question.
Elijah’s reply, in essence: I’ve done the job you gave me to do, no one is listening; in fact, they are trying to kill me, just like they have all of the others you sent.
Translation: I’m afraid, I’m tired, and I’m done.
God, who has in the past and will again reveal Himself in dramatic ways, responds so as to counter both the natural and political chaos surrounding Elijah, whispering his reply. I’m surprised Elijah could hear him after all of the turbulence of the previous moments. God must have been very close.
Possible translation of this act, if not the words actually whispered: I know. But you need to hear from me, and I’m not in all that noise. For at least this moment, I won’t be found there.
I don’t know, but I wouldn’t be surprised if this is the same lesson God was trying to teach humanity years later when he chose the small village of Bethlehem as the birthplace for his Son instead of one of the global capitals of the time. Or how his angel choir was sent to sing for a few lonely shepherds in an open, remote field instead of in a popular public forum.
For now, at least, God is to be found far from the noise.
Jesus, the ultimate whisper in a loud world.
Days after my overreaction, I’m still stinging from the incident. Like happens nearly every time in these situations, what I meant to say hits me later, and boy, would it have been so much better. What I should have said was NOTHING. Or the conversational equivalent of it, a throwaway phrase like, “Well, that’s something to think about,” or even “That’s above my pay grade \- pass the chips\!”
If something more substantial was warranted, perhaps I should have just bared a piece of my unsettled heart, should have said something along the lines of, “I’m just afraid we - and I do mean we, those of who confess that Jesus is not simply a respectable figure for whom we should sing carols at years end - are not acting in our political theaters like we do in our homes and our churches. And it’s hurting people.”
That’s not how I responded, though, and by doing so, I spread the hurt by which I was so offended.
That is, as they say, the bad news (BTW, I’d love even a fraction of the royalties “they” must be receiving for all of these phrases “they” have coined. I could pay for at least part of the therapy caused by all of these “feelings”.) But there is also good news, a Gospel, so to speak. God, through that same Son born in a backwater town, is the originator of mercy, that mercy being renewed every morning.
In my life, part of that mercy is evident by merciful people who reflect a good God, those who allow me to fall flat on my face and then on my proverbial sword and ask for forgiveness. In this case, I was given the chance to at least show those I responded poorly to that I know my response was not right, even if my intention was, well, at least closer to that. And I was, in turn, met with undeserved kindness and forgiveness.
That mercy also manifested in yet another opportunity to deny the noise in favor of the whisper.
Perhaps you’re like me in this way. Perhaps you have looked to the noise to find, if not God, then at least meaning. Perhaps, like me, you STILL return to the noise because sometimes there is an uncertainty and discomfort in the quiet, and you just think that a bit of distraction will help. Perhaps you have discovered, like me, that these distractions, ironically, not only do not stave off anxiety and fear but nurture it, being themselves the very conduits for the chaos. Perhaps, feeding off the commotion, you have defended a position out of pride or spoken out of a sense of indignation born of shame.
Maybe you have stood honestly and echoed Elijah: I am scared, and I am tired, and I am done.
But maybe, in those times when you have slowed down enough to invite the still, small voice to whisper into your life, you have been astounded by what it has said, and it has changed you.
The signal amongst the noise.
In any case, if you’re reading this (and assuming I have been given another moment to publish it), it is another day. Another day to eschew the noise and pursue the voice of God. Another available well of mercy.
And tomorrow? Another year.
Here’s to whatever time we have left being consumed with trading the noise for something much better.
What is God whispering to you?
He always whispers love. A love to be conveyed and shared in abundance. Without assigning me the task of judgment- in fact, that being the thing He tells me not to do. Bless you Phil for allowing us the privilege of witnessing you taking responsibility for something you did that you wish you would have done differently. That takes courage and character and is something we can all relate to.