When our children were teenagers, I came home from work most nights to discover that my house was moving. My sons had commandeered my stereo and were playing music that sounded like angry cats chasing a bagpiper. The place was shaking. “Good vibrations,” they called it. Now don’t get me wrong. I love loud music. I don’t think Heaven will be a quiet place where we sit on rockers tuning our harps.
When I was a lad, noise was a big part of my life. Summertimes I worked in construction with jackhammers and nail guns. At night I put on headphones and fell asleep somewhere between Chicago and Boston. Sometimes I miss the good old days. But I also miss my hearing.
Noise exposure is now a leading cause of hearing loss for millennials, Gen Z and Gen Alpha. Hearing loss is the third most common chronic physical condition in North America. Gaming, in particular, has been the focus of recent studies examining its potential risks to hearing. A 2024 Pew Research Center survey noted that 85% of Gen Zers play video games, with almost half saying they play daily.
One day I stood in a cafeteria line beside a teenager who had surgically-implanted headphones just above his earrings. I smiled at him, then mouthed a question. Kindly removing the headphones, he cocked his head.
“Are you okay?” I asked. “It sounds like someone’s killing chickens in there.” He laughed. “Killing chickens,” he said, sliding the headphones back into place and turning up the chickens.
Noise induced hearing loss, as the experts call it, is by no means a new problem. Ancient papyrus from Egypt shows that men working near Nile waterfalls developed it. So did those working in print shops, shipyards, and church nurseries. But in the last decade the culture of noise has descended on us with a vengeance. Movie theatres have pumped up the volume. So have sporting events. Bands at wedding receptions are tired of being background music. Dr. Marin Allen, of the National Institutes of Health says “Every part of our environment has increased its noise.” She cites an increase in urban traffic, heavy equipment, and the use of power tools.
Could it be that we are losing something even more valuable than our hearing?
C.S. Lewis thought so. In his book The Screwtape Letters, wicked Uncle Screwtape boasts, “We will make the whole universe a noise. The melodies and silences of Heaven will be shouted down in the end.” Richard Foster, author of Freedom of Simplicity, agrees: “Our Adversary majors in three things,” he writes, “noise, hurry and crowds. If he can keep us engaged in ‘muchness’ and ‘manyness,’ he will rest satisfied.”
Some of us seem fearful of silence. If we stop, we might have to think for ourselves. So we miss the still small whisperings of God. He can be heard anywhere of course, but he rarely speaks as we sit in traffic jams honking our horns. God is best heard where noise does not distract and interrupt.
The Bible has much to say about the merits of quietness. Psalm 23 celebrates a shepherd who leads us beside still waters, who restores our soul. Isaiah 30:15 (NLT) says,
“In quietness and confidence is your strength.”
A hundred things happen when we chill out, get quiet, and watch a birdfeeder or a sunset rather than a television. Here are a few. We notice the works of God. We grow in wisdom, find direction, seeing that we are finite and God is eternal. We begin to enjoy a calm confidence in the one who gave us His Son and the joy begins to return. This calm won’t come from lack of trouble; but from an unflinching faith in the God who deepens us in the quiet places.
No one loves a good movie or a loud celebration more than I, but there’s a time to be still and listen. Pulling the plug on the kingdom of noise can do that, even bringing our laughter back. As my son discovered when he first heard my old Bee Gees albums.
