Loud Noises

The only line of the Mell Brooks movie "Silent Movie" is a well known mime yelling "No".
This is my introduction to a sort of recap of my weekend without media. It was an assignment for my youth culture class. But the part I liked the most was a Rob Bell Nooma video. (I watch them from time to time.) But the video was about silence, and since the weekend felt like I was engulfed in silence, I thought it was a fitting video to watch. Rob mentioned a documentary guy makes nature sound recordings. He said it now takes a very long time to get an hour straight of uninterrupted nature sounds, some other sound always pops up. This was how I look at my music intake. I always had music on. I couldn't fall asleep without it, I didn't wake up without it. I studied, exercised, drove, and goofed off with music. I had songs for when I was sad about girl relationships, songs about frustrations with God, songs about happiness in girl relationships, songs about praising God. But the quietness that came this weekend. It emptied my head of these songs. Instead of turning to music to keep me in the mood I was already in, I was able to do something else, and move on. So after a while my head was finally emptied of the music, and the noise from the amount of music I had been cramming in my ears.
The video talked about Elijah, and how he is on a mountain and a wind came, then an earthquake, and then a fire, but then the whisper of God. The whisper that can only be heard when the noise of the world is gone. We don't have Billy Joel singing "For the Longest Time", or even Dave Crowder singing about "an unforeseen kiss" playing in our heads. But we are listening for His words and for His guidance. Ironically Switchfoot has a song "Adding to the Noise", where the lyrics actually say, "If were adding to the noise, turn off this song". I worry I have been putting God in my media box. Having Him there just to affirm what I am thinking, and what mood I am in, just like the songs I listen to. I just realized how long this is, and most of it seems to be rambling.... So I will conclude by saying, boo to too much music, and yeah to listening for God's direction. Media fast is a good idea.