From the book “The Power of Stillness”:
Continuing from a previous post: “Obeying God by Doing Less II”
Similar to Christians the world over, we join in a very simple practice that Jesus himself taught His followers: bringing our hearts and minds together to focus attention for a short period of time on an ordinary piece of bread and a small drink of water. In this moment we renew not only our individual covenants with God but our collective sense of unity with one another as His covenant people. More than just a nice little ritual, this mindful practice is described by the Lord as “a commandment” that he pleads with us to “always do” (3 Nephi 18:12).
President David O. McKay taught, “The short period of administering the Sacrament is one of the best opportunities we have for . . . meditation—in particular, a chance to “meditate” upon his goodness.”8
More than a hope to experience His presence in the week ahead, it’s clear that in that very moment, God intends for something to happen. The scriptural record notes that “they were filled with the Spirit” after partaking of the bread and wine, a feeling clearly more than simply physical (3 Nephi 20:9).
Elder Dennis Neuenschwander taught:”Sacrament meetings really are more than just meetings. They are sacred moments in a holy place.”
Fighting for a Little More Space the Rest of the Week
In all these ways, the Sabbath can become a regular retreat to rest our hearts and minds deeply. What about the rest of the week. As prophets have encouraged for many years, our experience has been that even little steps towards more silence and stillness—retreating just a bit form the hustle on a daily basis—can be life-changing.
It was Jesus who encouraged people to intentionally get away from the rush of life to be with God: “Enter into thy closet and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to the Father . . . in secret” (Matthew 6:6). Sometime finding space takes fighting a little—pushing back on the colonization of our minds and hearts by foreign distractions or aggressive demands, kind of like boxing our for a rebound in basketball.
C.S. Lewis taught: “The real problem of the Christian life comes where people do not normally look for it. It comes the very moment you wake up each morning. All you wishes and hopes come rushing at you like wild animals. The first job each morning consists in shoving them all back; in listening to that other voice, taking that other point of view, letting the other larger, stronger, quieter life come flowing in.” He adds, “We can only do it for moments at first. But from those moments a new sort of life will be spreading through our system: because we are letting Him work at the right part of us.:11
Do you know what that feels like—to wake in the morning to a sense of demands and deadlines so tangible that you feel them in your gut? Next time that happens, see what it’s like to push back a little and find some space to breathe.
For some, the best time to reground is first thing in the morning, while others find this deeper stillness’ in pauses during the day or in a lull before bedtime. The exact time may be unique to our body’s rhythms and life circumstances, but when we consecrate a piece of our “beet time of day” to the Lord, He can touch that time, like he did the few loaves and fishes, and create soul nourishing bounty Beyond what we would expect in mere minutes.
Home is Our Primary Sanctuary
Although sweet retreat can happen at an office or anywhere, there are two places we relish most as centers of Latter-day Stillness, sanctuary and retreat. After speaking of the universal need “deep inside each of us . . . to have a place of refuge where peace and serenity prevail” within our frantic larger society, Elder Richard G. Scott went on to teach “the ideal place” to find that refuge and peace was “within the walls of your own homes.”11
President Russell M. Nelson has likewise called our homes “the primary sanctuaries of our faith, where each can be safe from the sins of the world.”12 If for many of us our homes may feel a long way from that sanctuary, moving in that direction can be a practice in itself—consistent with President Nelson’s encouragement to “diligently work to remodel your home into a center of gospel learning.”13 Consistently, one of the priesthood ordinances Latter-day Saint families are invited to participate in is the formal dedication of their homes “as sacred edifices where the Holy Spirit can reside and where family members can worship, find safety from the world, grow spiritually, and prepare for eternal family relationships.”14
Quiet places in and around our homes can become sacred to us as well. President Gordon B. Hinckley was fond of sharing the story of his elderly father, who lived in a home with a rock wall on the grounds: “It was a low wall and when the weather was warm, he would go sit on his wall. It seemed to me that he sat there for hours, thinking, meditating, pondering things.”15
Temples as Sanctuaries of Revitalizing Retreat
The temple is another place of sanctuary where we can retreat, stop, and be still. Yet our language about temple experiences can sometimes inadvertently send a different kind of message. For example, we normally talk of “temple work” and “doing a session” or “doing baptisms” or ‘doing a name.”
Clearly, sacred ordinance are the central, precious focus of temple practice. But the varying attitudes we bring with us into the temple can influence, even change, what we experience there. When we approach the temple as something to “get done,” rather than a chance to lay aside all the busy doing of our lives, we can miss out on our experiencing our time there as a joyful respite. Perhaps then, we could approach the temple as, among other things, a veritable Latter-day Saint Meditation Center.
Certainly part of that peace arises from the relative silence, stillness, and solitude of the temple—qualities shared with all mindfulness centers. Distinctive to temples, however, is the offer of a unique kind of relational meditation in a house claimed by God Himself. In ancient scripture the temple was described by Jehovah as a house where “mine eyes and mine heart shall be there perpetually” (1 Kings 9:3).
As we leave the worldly confusion behind and enter this sacred space to reconnect with the Lord, we can experience a mental and emotional setting. President Boyd K. Packer described, “At the temple the dust of distraction seems to settle out, the fog and haze seem to lift and we can ‘see’ things we were not able to see before and find our way through our troubles that we had not previously known.”16
Even that work we often joke about just to get to the temple—pushing back on different responsibilities, arranging things at home—could be embraced as anticipatory clambering that makes the sweetness of the temple hush even more vivid. And then inside, rather than simply getting through a session, we can sit with the teaching like ancient poetry. Instead of rehearsing words mentally, we can let ourselves rest in a place deeper than thought and participate in ordinances as full-bodied experiences.
The positive impact of these experiences is not some mystical abstraction. Many research studies have e demonstrated that a focused person of meditation thickens parts of the brain responsible for concentration, decision making, and awareness, while shrinking other parts responsible for fear responses.17 The results are a sense of groundedness and ability to respond to stress form a deeper, wiser mind-set. Along with the still focusing of the mind, the temple adds to those benefits by activating the symbolic, directive, and intuitive right brain.
In all these ways, the temple can, quite literally, heal our weary souls and stressed brains—both spiritually and physically. After retreating to the temple, we can then return to our daily lives and problems with fresh energy and creative insight previously untapped.
No wonder President Spencer W. Kimball loved the poetic invitation engraved in old English churches for all entering a temple: “Enter this door as if the floors were paved with Gold: And every wall with jewels all wealth untold; as if a choir in robes of fire where singing here; No shout, or rush, but hush, for God is here.”18 ~~Jacob Z.Hess, Carrie L. Skarda, Kyle D. Anderson, Ty R. Mansfield (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2019). p.33-35
