Three months after the new Denver International Airport (DIA) opened in February 1995, several hundred people threw a loud party to celebrate something they hadn't heard for many years--silence. The celebrants were residents of Denver's Park Hill neighborhood, near Stapleton International Airport, which closed when DIA opened.

"It's just like we moved and settled in a new place," one man said. "You can carry on conversations, listen to television, and work in the yard without noise."

We often call our personal devotions a "quiet time." For a few minutes each day, we shut out the sounds of the world to obey the Almighty's command, "Be still, and know that I am God" (Ps. 46:10).

It seems strange, then, to fill the rest of the day with headphones, background music, radio talk shows, and television sets blaring in empty rooms. Have we become threatened by stillness? T. S. Eliot wrote, "Where shall the word be found, where will the word resound? Not here, there is not enough silence."

We can't stop the thundering planes. But what can we turn off today so that we can listen more carefully and quietly to hear the voice of God?  — David C. McCasland