Too many busy days. Too many early mornings and way too many late nights.

All by my own choice. All fun. All enjoyable.

All have left me feeling the need to reacquaint my backside with my recliner, take an evening and just do nothing but sit still, maybe watch a little football, maybe read a book. Maybe just sit.

And ponder.

Ponder again the insatiable need we all feel to rush around like we’re a user in search of his next fix, his next hit. It’s like we get drunk on the possibility of our own self-importance. On our own inflated idea of our self-worth. The have-tos crowd out the sanity in all of us.

We find ourselves rushing, forging ahead when all along our souls are crying out for relief, for release. Until finally we burst into angry sobs because we’re just too tired.

Too tired of rushing. 

Too tired of malls,

Too tired of fake Santa.

Too tired of other shoppers,

Tired of yelling,

Tired of apologizing for yelling. 

Tired of rudeness in ourselves and others.

We long for the easy, lazy days of days gone by. We want to just get back to when life was easy. When it was slow. When we weren’t keeping up with the Joneses, outdoing one another with the gifts we buy.

We want nothing more really than to just be allowed to stay home for an evening with our feet up. But there’s choirs to hear, malls to visit, parties to attend, and the list goes on.

I’ve felt this way. Today. As if one more thing to do is five things more than I can handle. I’ve whispered in prayer over and over, “Oh Lord, I just need a silent night.”

I need a night of silence. A night to reflect on the Silent Night of so many years and centuries ago. I need a night of nothing.

Tis the season for going-going-going. It’s hard to be silent when you’re bombarded with noise, the rush and crush of shoppers, fellow employees, the squeal of tires, Christmas carols on the radio, on the cd, in the stores.

Is it even possible to have a silent night anymore?

I’m here to say it has to be possible. It has to be possible to have a silent night in the midst of my crazy rushing around. It has to be. I have to be able to have a silent night in the midst of a crowd of people.

It has to be.

A silent night is, I’m convinced, more a thing of the heart than of circumstance. Can we quiet our hearts in the midst of the busy season and be silent before Him as we behold Him? Can we trust Him to give us the peace we need, the joy we need, the hope we need, the love we need like He already promised?

Does He really richly supply us with the things we need? Even if all we really need is a silent night in the midst of a loud schedule.

I say it is.

And I, for one, am changing my heart attitude. I want an attitude like His. Like His attitude that said, “I willingly lay down my life for you. Come to Me you who are burdened and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. I am God. But I became a man, like you, a servant so you might always be with Me.”

His attitude that says, “I love you to death.”