Lead An Impactful But Quiet Life

Shakespeare’s famous words from Macbeth, "full of sound and fury, signifying nothing," may well describe our times: everyone with content and without content, with credibility and without credibility, is showing up and showing off on social media and on other public platforms. Paul instructed the early Christians in 1 Thessalonians 4: 11 “Make it your goal to lead a quiet life, minding your own business and working with your hands.” It is said that Buddha, the enlightened one, lived a quiet life and passed through this world noiselessly.

Look at a day in the life of Jesus (Mark 1: 29-39), he is preaching in the synagogue, praying alone in a silent place, healing people, casting away demons, and more. The devil could not keep silence; but Jesus did not allow them to talk about him. Many were searching for him to hear him or to be healed by him, and some others perhaps were also searching for him to destroy and kill him. Jesus makes no big noise about neither of them. He lived a quite life.

Ben-Hur (1959) is a film directed by William Wyler showing Judea and Nazareth of Jesus’ time; it has depicted the Sermon on the Mount and the crucifixion of Christ. It is an adaptation of the 1880 novel by Lew Wallace, called, Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ. It is a big film, winning 11 academy awards at the Oscars. In this grand tale of the Christ, interestingly, we never see the face of Jesus on screen. Realistically speaking, at the time of Jesus, in spite of all the works he did, that is all the visibility and prominence Jesus had. He did not want to be famous. He was just a carpenter’s son living in Nazareth and going around doing good to all.

Christian life, in the pattern of Jesus is to be a quiet life, like yeast in the dough (Matthew 13:33). Jesus said, when giving let not your left hand know what your right hand is doing (Matthew 6:3). About Jesus it was said, “He will not break a bruised reed, or put out a smouldering wick” (Matthew 12:20). As the Church begins the season of Lent, on Ash Wednesday, we read, “be careful not to make a show of your righteous acts before people…, when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites. They love to stand and pray in the synagogues or on street corners to be seen by everyone. When you fast do not put on a gloomy face as the hypocrites do…. The Father who sees what you do in secret will reward you” (Matthew 6: 1-8, 16-18).

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