The band Twenty One Pilots has a song called “Car Radio.” One day my brother-in-law and I were talking about this song, and I still sometimes think about what he said.
The song is all about how we hide from silence. We run from it, choosing any type of distraction to hide from silence. For in silence we have to face things. Our fears are there, our guilt is there, our thoughts are there. In silence we suddenly have to face all those questions—questions that are deep.
Why do we run? Why do we want to be more zombie than human? Twenty One Pilots makes a very interesting point in this song when it is said “faith is to be awake, and to be awake is for us to think, and for us to think is to be alive.” We are choosing sleep and a “life” without life.
In the silence we face our monsters (within and without), our regrets, our bloody hands. We hide behind the sound, too scared to face all of this. I am so incredibly guilty of this. All day I was guilty of this, hiding behind movies, music, anything so I didn’t actually have to think or feel lonely or feel guilty.
But, dear friends, there is a reason why the Bible says “let him sit alone in silence” and ”be still and know that I am God.” God speaks to us in the silence. In the silence we do have to face our fears, our guilt, our questions and doubts. But when we face them, we grow. And as we are seeking, we are finding. As we ask these questions, God provides the answers. He cleanses us and removes our fears.
Now, I plead with you and myself as Twenty One Pilots does. “And I will try with every rhyme to come across like I am dying to let you know you need to try to think.”