Major point from yesterday, be aware of the negative effects of technology in providing you a great deal of distraction. Today, I want us to think about how noise causes us to have scattered and hurried hearts and minds.

I spend a great deal of time in Starbucks (I often call them my “office”). From discipleship meetings to sermon preparation, it is one of the few places I can sit for long stretches of time and not have to spend much money. I began to notice a few weeks back that even though I throw my ear buds on & play soft contemplative music, I still have muted conversations, strange jazz music, and that lovely sound of steamed milk in the back ground, all the while I am trying to focus in on FF Bruce’s working through the Greek of Acts 17!!

It would seem to me, your life has similar environments. Think about it…is your own living space quiet? I bet its like mine, with road noise busting in even when you try and turn everything off for a quiet moment. Or, maybe you go to the library, but that study group is just on the other side of the partition. Face it; it is almost impossible to get any extended or regular times of peace here inside the city.

Here is the really bad news about all of this…there really isn’t a whole lot we can do about it. Its not like we all have cars we can drive down to the local park and listen to the quiet of the birds chirp. Nor can we just pop over to the Library of Congress once a day for some peace and quiet…this is just one of the realities of living in a major city.

Although, each of you live and work in environments that will allow you to get some level of peacefulness and I would encourage you to try and tap into those things as often as you can throughout the day.

I have noticed that the thing I thought was helping me was, at times, hurting. My listening to soft music actually cluttered my mind more than quieted it. Having sounds of conversations & other varied noises in the back ground were better to still my heart and mind instead of simply adding a noise in soft music. Now, that isn’t always the case, but I did find it to be much more helpful than I first thought.

Bottom line for today…take notice of the varied, and voluminous noises that exist around you throughout your day. I think what you will find is that there is always noise…much of it we can do nothing about…its just a reality, but we have to first become aware of the noise around us and only then can we determine if and when we can bring some silence into be a part of our day. So, pay attention today, take note, and lets come back tomorrow for some practical suggestions on helping create a mind that is unhurried, de-cluttered, and operates at a good pace so as to allow depth.