Two perennially basic elements of a spiritual life seem to be silence and solitude. And not just in Christianity. A lot of people have written about them over the centuries. And a lot of Christians have practiced these spiritual disciplines. Based on that alone, I think it’s worth spending some time considering them.

They are disciplines that are commonly linked with each other. They work together.

I write, I should tell you, as one who is convinced of the value of silence and solitude. And I write this on a day when we have a crew of house-painters clambering over the house as they chat and joke and whistle and shout to each other, as their boss gives directions and they respond, as their ladders clump against the house and as their footsteps thump across the porch roof so that they can paint the second story. This is also a day when a plumber is in and out of the house, working to open a clogged drain that defeated my best efforts and very minimal plumbing skills. And, finally, this is also a day I pushed a noisy, vibrating lawnmower around our property for a couple hours. My day has not been silent. I have not been hidden away from other people.

But it’s also a day that I started in silence and solitude, therefore a day in which I have renewed my side of the relationship the Lord has with me (something I need to do constantly). That means this is a day in which I carry a living awareness of my God with me. Thomas Merton spoke to the valuable and pervasive and persistent nature of these two disciplines in a small book titled “Thoughts in Solitude” (NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1958).

Of silence he wrote: “When I am liberated by silence, when I am no longer involved in the measurement of life, but in the living of it, I can discover a form of prayer in which there is effectively, no distraction. My whole life becomes a prayer. My whole silence is full of prayer. The world of silence in which I am immersed contributes to my prayer.” (page 91)

Of solitude: “As soon as a man is fully disposed to be alone with God, he is alone with God no matter where he may be–in the country, the monastery, the woods or the city.” (p. 96)

There is, he is saying, a gracious freedom that is rooted in these prayer disciplines, a freedom that carries over in space-time wherever and whenever a disciple goes. “My whole life becomes a prayer” (not just those minutes spent with folded hands and closed eyes). I am “with God no matter where [I] may be” (not just while in church or Bible study or other ministry activity).

If the image of the Christian life as pilgrimage works for you as it does for me, perhaps it will help to think of silence and solitude as the two sides of the path. On a hiking trail the exact edges are usually not clearly specific. The path blends out into the forest floor; the moss and fallen branches, the leaf litter and wildflowers blend back into the treadway. But the edges do define the difference between path and not-path. So, I think that guided both by solitude and by silence we can make our way along the spiritual pilgrimage of our lives. We may make our way without paying these disciplines any direct attention (as you can hike without concentrating on the edges of the trail). But I’d suggest that if we try to live without any silence and without any solitude, we will eventually find ourselves completely off the spiritual path, trying to bushwhack our way to our goal. It can be done, but it’s harder.

Keeping to the spiritual path is an intermediate goal that helps us along the way to God. Some days it’s easier than other days. Today it hasn’t been particularly easy. But, despite the disruptions of painters and plumber and push-mower, my heart rests in the peace that passes all understanding.

These disciplines are things I will be exploring in further posts. There are aspects of these simple-sounding spiritual tools that I think I can share, things that might make it easier for you to enjoy them too. Or at least, perhaps you will come to understand why some believers believe that paying attention to silence and solitude are vitally important.

David Benner seems to dash a founding idea of these spirituality blog posts when he writes:

“When applied to the spiritual life, the metaphor of a journey is both helpful and somewhat misleading. Helpfully it reflects the fact that the essence of spirituality is a process–specifically, a process of transformation. Unhelpfully it obscures the fact that we are already what we seek and where we long to arrive–specifically, in God. Once we realize this, the nature of the journey reveals itself to be more one of awakening than accomplishment, more one of spiritual awareness than spiritual achievement.” David G. Benner, The Gift of Being Yourself. Expanded ed. (Downers Grove, Ill: IVP Books, 2015), page 3.

Like so many other things, Benner points out, the metaphor of spiritual pilgrimage is a coin with two sides. Yes, it can be helpful; but not always and not in every detail.

I tend to find it more helpful than not. So let me speak about his objection that “it obscures the fact that we are already what we seek and where we long to arrive–specifically, in God.” This is true. But only, or especially, for people who are believers. There are others who do not (yet?) believe. They are seeking Him yet. Perhaps in unhelpful way or in unhelpful places. But seeking nonetheless. In seeking, they are on a journey to a place and to the One they do not know.

Believers, on the other hand, are clearly “already … where we long to arrive.”

So how can we use the ‘spiritual life as pilgrimage’ metaphor if we are already where we want to be, that is, close to God or even in God?

First, we say that the seekers – while already in God in a sense – are still ‘on the road’ to that place where they can finally see that God is as close as their own skin.

But, second, I believe we can also say that believers in God are still themselves ‘on the road’ as they seek a deeper and richer relationship with God. God is by definition vast, immense, huge, without boundaries of either time or extent. So there is really no way to be outside of, away from, or distant from God. But at times we may not recognize or feel how close God is. That does not mean He isn’t close. Acts 17:27 tells us that God “is actually not far from each one of us.”

So we can think of the continuing spiritual pilgrimage of believers as an exploration quest. We are engaged in poking around, sounding out, mapping, discovering for ourselves (and others, maybe) all the heights, the depths, the north-east-south-and-west of the unending beautiful landscape we call God. It’s as if we have the freedom to explore an entire continent on foot; we can never exhaust the possibilities.

That is the spiritual life I write about. That is the function of the various spiritual disciplines I want to explore. Benner is quite right that this pilgrim life is neither accomplishment nor achievement. It is not something we do or grasp or win. It is a gift we receive. It is who and what we are.

Besides all that, speaking as a long distance hiker, the metaphor strikes me as full of nuggets to mine.