Speaking and Silence

As a preacher, pastor, evangelist, and Christian, I find myself within the tension of the following statements:

"What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence."

"God is the one subject of whom we must never stop speaking."

"He whom we cannot speak of is the one about whom and to whom we must never stop speaking."

Mother Theresa once said that she doesn't speak when she prays, she listens.

Jesus once said of his disciples "If they keep quiet, the rocks will cry out."

The prophet Jeremiah spoke of his attempts to keep silent, "But if I say, 'I will not mention him or speak any more in his name,' His word is in my heart like a fire, a fire shut up in my bones. I am weary of holding it in; indeed, I cannot."

Habbakuk reads, "The Lord is in His holy temple, let all the earth keep silent before Him."

We need to shut up more. And we need to shut up less. We need to have a humility that demands silence and a passion that must speak lest we burst.