Our daughter was born with three heart defects. I would often lay with my ear pressed against her, so I could listen to her heart beat. It brought peace to my anxious mind every time I heard the steady thump-thump of her little heart.
After she graduated to Glory, I sought comfort in the sound of my husband’s heartbeat—the steady rhythm reminding me that I was safe in his arms. For almost 25 years, that sound lulled me to sleep at night. Even now, if I am very still, I can almost remember the cadence.
I don’t know why I did it, but I distinctly remember, just after the doctor called time of death, I laid my head on Jeremy’s chest and listened. It was the most deafening silence I have ever heard.
That silence followed me home. It went to bed with me. It woke up with me. Its scream drowned out all other voices, including the still, small voice of God.
I grew to fear this silence. I immersed myself in busyness and ministry: reading, listening, writing, teaching… anything but the suffocating stillness that exposed the nothingness.
Then, cancer.
She snuck in the back gate and ravaged what was left. She took from me. She left me with scars. But the most cruel offense of all? She forced me to be still.
Turns out, that was also the gift she gave.
Eight weeks in a hyperbaric chamber can give a girl a lot of time to reflect. No books. No phone. No podcasts or sermons or music. Nobody to talk to. Not even a pencil. Just me, oxygen, and God.
It was there that I began to learn to be still. There, in the stillness and solitude, I finally began to hear it.
Thump-thump.
A steady cadence from the heart of the Father. A love that transcends life and death, sickness and sorrow, sin and the grave. A grace that gave everything to make me His.
His heartbeat.
And oh, the healing that holy heartbeat brings! It provides peace for my anxious mind. It offers hope that restores my soul. It lulls me to sleep at night, as its steady rhythm reminds me that I am safe in His arms. What I would have missed, had it not been for the smothering of silence that forced me to gasp for the breath of God!
We need not fear the silence, valley-walkers. The heart of our Creator is for us! He proved that on the cross, when He willingly stopped His own heart in our stead.
I will forever be grateful for the silence, for it was in its grasp I drew so near to my Savior, I heard His heartbeat.
“My soul waits in silence for God only; from him is my salvation. … My soul, waits in silence for God only, for my hope is from Him” (Psalm 62:1, 5)
I will forever be grateful for the silence, for it was in its grasp I drew so near to my Savior, I heard His heartbeat.
