Hearing God’s Whisper A still, small voice

‘Elijah must have climbed Mount Horeb with great expectations. He knew very well that this was where Moses had received the Ten Commandments. Stone tablets had been inscribed by the very finger of God amid howling winds, burning trees and boulders split by lightning. And sure enough, these same signs do indeed break loose... These were exactly the kinds of phenomena Elijah had anticipated as hallmarks of God’s presence, and yet after each one a very surprising thing is said: ‘The Lord was not in the wind . . . The Lord was not in the earthquake . . . The Lord was not in the fire.’

Where, then, is God? And the answer, of course, is that his presence is manifest in the dullness after the drama. The Great Elemental Force shows himself gentle and makes himself personal in ‘a still small voice’ (1 Kgs 19:12, KJV) or, as the original Hebrew says, ‘the sound of gentle silence’.

We expect the King of kings to shout with primal power in earthquake, wind and fire. Of course we do! ...Elijah knew very well, and so do we, that Yahweh is absolutely able to speak in dramatic ways... But perhaps the problem with such displays of power, and the reason God patently refrains from speaking in such ways most of the time, is that they belie the fundamental gentleness and intimacy of his heart. Dramatic revelations impress, for sure, but they can also intimidate, dominate and alienate those on the receiving end. And so the ‘Potentate of time, Creator of the rolling spheres, ineffably sublime’ chooses to whisper in our ear way more often than he shouts from the skies.

This is important. If we are ever to feel fully safe and truly loved by the Lord of all the earth, we must eventually – like Elijah on Horeb, and that couple on the Emmaus road – learn to listen for his voice in the anti-climax of life’s non-events.

Breathe through the heat of our desire thy coolness and thy balm;

Let sense be dumb, let flesh retire;

Speak through the earthquake, wind and fire, O still, small voice of calm.'

I spend a few moments in silence with God, listening for his still, small voice.