If I were a Pokémon, I’d be a Snorlax
If I were a Pokémon, I’d be a Snorlax. At least that’s what my daughter says. If you aren’t into Pokémon, then let me explain.
Pokémon is an animated television show that started in the 90s. Several months ago, it came out as a smartphone app. The show (and the game) is about people trying to catch and train these cute animal-like creatures called Pokémon.
Now a Snorlax is a Pokémon that — well — looks like me. It has the sumo wrestler physique. Its day typically consists of either eating or sleeping, hence the name Snorlax.
I get a good laugh when my daughter says “Daddy is a Snorlax!” But I don’t want to be compared to a Snorlax forever. I’d rather be likened to an athletic Pokémon like Pikachu. Or a scary fire-spewing Pokémon like Dragonite. But a Snorlax?
I decided to change that image. It was time to get fit! I got a Garmin fitness tracker and started counting my steps. My goal? To do 10,000+ steps per day.
Yesterday, I decided to take a walk. These days, I have been trying to be prayerful when I walk. Please don’t mistake this for holiness. It’s really multi-tasking. There is nothing more efficient than being able to simultaneously check off 2 items on your checklist (prayer time and exercise).
The problem with trying to be prayerful during a 90 minute walk is that you will run out of things to pray about. I mean I already prayed about my dog. And my co-worker. And my co-worker’s cousin. And my co-worker’s cousin’s dog. In desperation, I tried something that I don’t do enough of…
I shut up and listened.
At first, it felt wierd. I tried to walk quietly and listened to the sound of the gentle breeze. I said, “Lord, please guide me with this listening thing, I’m not very good at it.”
After a while, I felt very peaceful. Then, I sensed these words in my heart: “Just be (still).”
Bam! Just like that, the Lord taught me one of the best ways to pray. I’m sure that at times, he wants me to be like a Chatty Cathy doll and just lay it all on him. At other times he probably just wants me to try to let go of all my thoughts and concerns and just be still. In other words, he sometimes wants me to just shut up and listen! After all, it’s not very easy to listen to him when I’m doing all the talking.
The prophet Elijah learned this lesson at Mount Horeb. He was getting desperate. He was running for his life. He hid in a cave sulking. He just wanted to die. The Lord, tired of his whining, commanded him: “Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord; the Lord will pass by.”
So he went out of the cave and tried to listen. He tried to listen to God through a great and strong wind, but he could not hear God. He tried listening to the Lord through an earthquake, but God was not there either. How about fire?
Nope.
Instead, he heard God through the “sound of a gentle wind blowing”. I like the translation from the King James Version better. The KJV noted that Elijah heard God in a “still small voice”.
There are times in our lives when I think the Lord would use a loud, booming voice. When, we, his children, are in grave danger, I would imagine he would use his James Earl Jones voice to catch our attention.
However, more often than not, he prefers to speak in a “still, small voice”.
I pray that we spend enough time in silent prayer to hear him.
