Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business and to work with your hands, just as we told you, so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody.
1 Thessalonians 4:11-12
A quiet life is one that if lived without interfering with others. A life that is marked by patience, kindness, love, and humility. I think about it so much so that people may not even notice that we are around, or a part of the landscape. This is the way that we "win the respect" of people who do not know or understand God or a spiritual life. We quietly and with non-interference (there is a post on that here) serve others and allow God to work. This should be the presence we have in the world as "Christians." We serve and love others and they are attracted to Jesus as we lift him up by our service to our master by following His way.
Most of the time we are not this way, quiet. We spend our time attempting to convince, control, manage other people's lives. We become angry, upset, and frustrated because we have to change it all right now. We are not living a quiet life. It is a life that is loud, interfering, and frustrating. We win no respect from others, we lose it. We do not get to influence others, we lose all chance to do so. Christian actually comes to mean someone judgemental, unaccepting, unloving, and unkind. Is Jesus lifted up by living life out loud?
Today just try it on. Live a quiet life. Serve others. Win their respect. Humble yourself.
Namaste'
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