unfollow the noise
- Rolanda Sue
- May 3, 2020
- 4 min read
This month I turned 28, wooooh, i’m getting old. At 28 society and my notepad of goals say that I should be happily married with a house bordered with a white picket fence and children to fill it. Some may call it the American dream, the image that was drummed in my tiny immigrant brain long before social media even came into play.
If there is one thing that I have truly fined tuned this month is that Jesus loves to break the script. It’s in breaking the script that the moments happen to matter the most. Sitting back reflecting on this month it seemed as if I was a rollercoaster of emotions. It all started with day 1 of November when it hit me that the year was almost over and I was almost a year older and half of the things on my list for 2018 had already faltered. I was sitting there trying to rewind the time and reverse some decisions that I had not thoughtfully made. Realizing that it was too late the sadness of it all seemed to consume me. In this selfie world we live in all we see are images of perceived prosperity with no struggle. A media era where everyone is no longer trying to keep up with the Joneses but rather the Kardashians. Success story one after the other filled my timeline and the devil was busy and quick to pick up where the timeline left off adding to the thoughts doubt and unworthiness.
As November went on anxiety of “not enough” built as I prepared for a work trip to Camden, NJ. My coworkers were all so excited about this time of fellowship, growth and a freshwind but I personally was dreading it. The thought of being with 20+ people for 4 days without any ‘me’ space was creating more anxiety that I had anticipated. I was embarrassed to share this with my coworkers because how could I be trusted to lead the group from my site in the purpose of this trip when I myself wasn’t in the best attitude about it. So, for the entire week prior to the trip I prayed that God would help my spirit man. A simple but necessary prayer if I wanted to be all in on this trip.
It was on the trip that God showed up like he always does. The devil wants us to miss what God has for us as much. He creates distractions and smoke screens so that we can lose focus of the blessings that God wants to communicate to us. The overall theme of this years’ work summit was “Stories of Faith.” Throughout each session I was reminded over and over of how God had been faithful to the many sites represented at the summit. Little did I know that the story that would resonate with me the most was one told by one of my student leaders. She, a senior in high school has had a tough childhood and still struggles to cope with the PTSD that she encountered while having to grow up in a home with an alcoholic mother. She recalls nights where she would make dinner and make sure her sibling was tucked away for bed and early mornings where she would wake early to make sure that breakfast was made and her sibling was off to school on time. A job that a mother should have done but couldn’t due to the influence of alcohol.
For many years she lived in this cycle of watching her mother struggle and having to be a parent even though she had never birthed any children of her own. We were sitting there in a small group of four in this high roofed church that resembled an aged cathedral from a movie. In this session we were asked to share our stories of faith. As she sat there sharing her story, tears in her eyes she looks at me and says, “Rolanda doesn’t know this but she was my prayer answered.” My eyes welled with tears as she continued to share. She had been praying for a woman of God to enter her life and be a model of what a relationship with Christ could look like. That night, all weekend, and still now all I could hear was that I was an answered prayer. Suddenly the list of unaccomplished goals, the detours, the struggle of this year was as if they were all for that one moment in time. No longer was the noise about where I should be, who I should be married to, or how many children I should have, plaguing my brain.
Jesus knew how to “unfollow the noise.” He is always our true example of how to deal with the wilds of the world. Jesus teaches us in Matthew that we must study the word of God so that we are able to combat the noise of the devil when he tries to throw us off track. Paul follows up in Corinthians assuring us that Jesus is the good news that can keep us and in Luke we’re reminded that we need to withdraw from the noise and pray. It is so easy to fall into a comparison trap especially in this social media era we live in but it’s in our noisiest moments that Jesus is calling us to unfollow it and listen to his still, sweet voice.
Scripture: Matthew 4:1-11, 1 Corinthians 15:1-3, Luke 5:16.
Prayer: Jesus, thanks for always being our true, unadulterated example. Help us to unfollow the noise of the world that isn’t your will or truth for our lives. Help us to trust your word so that we can live a life pleasing to you. Amen.
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