The Voice of Utter Silence
David C. Myers
June 29, 2008
I Kings 19:1 - 15a
Luke 9:18 - 22
Text: ". . . , and after the fire a voice of utter silence.". . . I Kings 19:12b
There is in our day a longing on the part of many for an experience of God - something which will enable us to say, "I know that there is a God. And because of that I know that there is something more to life than just the physical living and dying." It is a yearning to see the face of God and to see it clearly; it is a desire to hear the voice of God as distinctly as so many of the heroes and heroines of our faith seemed to have heard. Perhaps even to have the kind of unmistakable call from God that Paul had when he was surrounded by a great light and blinded for three days; . . . well, perhaps just the great light - most of us could do without being blinded for three days.
There is a story about a young pastor serving a rural church who felt such an urge for a clear word from God. He confessed to his lay leader, a wise old farmer, that he had never had a direct revelation from God and desperately wanted one. The farmer told him to stand outside that night and look up to the heavens for an hour. Later that evening the preacher called the farmer to complain that he had been given some bad advice. Angrily, he said, "You realize it rained tonight and there I stood looking up at the sky getting soaking wet. I feel like a fool." "Well," said the farmer, "that ain't a bad revelation for the first time!!"
Well, some of us have a great deal of sympathy with that young minister because our direct revelations have been at that same level. It strikes me, in fact, that while mystical experiences seem to come rather easily to some people, other of us seem to have been born without a "mystical muscle," or cell, or whatever it is that determines one's receptivity to such experiences.
I was interested to read, some time ago, in an article entitled, "Are We A Nation of Mystics?"1 written by two well-respected social researchers, that a surprising number of Americans - over 40% in their sample, have had some type of mystical experience - described as a lifting out of one's self; a sort of emptying and refilling during an altered state of consciousness. But . . . if my subtraction is correct that leaves 60% of Americans who can claim no such mystical experience. What about those of us who yearn to be faithful but somehow are forced to live without the certainty of some mystical experience? Is there any hope for us non-mystics? For those of us who are not overwhelmed by the voice of God, is there any place where we might hear the Voice of God calling us to a specific purpose? Or at least - once and for all - setting our spirits at ease by knowing that, indeed, we are loved and life is worthwhile?
Well . . . I would submit that Elijah is a kindred spirit with us, because he needed very much to have a definitive word from God. As we enter the story that Jen read from the First Book of Kings we find that Elijah the prophet had just engaged in a vicious battle with priests of an opposing religion and now he is being pursued by the messengers of Jezebel to get even, perhaps even have his life. So he stumbles on foot for 300 miles to get to Mount Sinai. Why Mount Sinai? That's a long way to stumble on foot to get away from your enemies, and there were a dozen high mountains closer than Sinai, but Elijah went to Sinai because that's where God had been heard before - remember Moses? Now Elijah desperately needed God to speak to him, to tell him what to do. Well, Moses heard God clearly - you may remember the mountain thundered and was surrounded by mysterious light. Surely God would speak loud and clear to Elijah at Mount Sinai.
It's the feeling that perhaps you and I have had; the yearning from direction. As if to say, "God, if I ever needed to hear from You, it is now."
So Elijah waited for the Voice of God. And then there was a great wind; but no voice from God. Then there was an earthquake, and God said nothing. And then there was a fire, and still no voice from God. And then, according to the familiar translation, Elijah heard a "still small voice" - which was the Voice of God. And while that's beautiful poetry, it's not a very accurate translation. The more accurate reading from the Hebrew, according to my rabbinical friends is not really "still small voice"" but rather, "utter silence". The New Revised Standard Version calls it "a sound of sheer silence." There, on the mountain, listening for the voice of God, Elijah heard God in "utter silence."
And that is tremendously exciting and assuring to me! Elijah, you see, is one of us! All this time, we've been listening for a direct revelation from God, or at least a "still small voice"; and come to find out - Elijah met God in "utter silence." For us, God can be that incomprehensible mystery of grace that pervades our existence, if we are willing to find God in the "voice of utter silence."
Elijah was a broken man on Mount Sinai and he was made whole by listening to the voice of a silent God. And we bump up against God in the silence or brokenness wherever life is torn and wounded - wherever there are broken dreams, broken hearts, broken bodies, and broken lives.
If we dare to take seriously the struggle to be fully human, we will, sooner or later, come up against an "utter silence"; a terrible silence. It is when death strikes too close to be ignored; it is when you fear you are losing you're mind; it is when someone you thought to be your friend treats you with disregard and contempt; it is when you're caught and torn by the cruel teeth of circumstances and you're left sobbing or cursing. You cry out, rage, whimper, defy - but there is no response, no warm glow, no quick comfort - just silence.
And then we have no choice but to name that silence - we may choose to call it "indifferent", or we may call it "benevolent" - we may choose to call the silence "despair", or decide to call it "hope. Sometimes it's the only choice we have. Victor Frankl, a survivor of Auschwitz, and a student of what that kind of horror can teach the human race, says "that the last human freedom, which no one can take from you, is to choose one's attitude toward any set of circumstances, no matter how miserable they might be."
O, but that God would make it all better, instead of forcing us to simply choose our attitude.
Yes, part of that choosing in the face of a silent God is to learn that God is a salvager. That needs a little explanation.
When Debbie and I lived in Lowell, Massachusetts during my first appointment, we would have to put out the trash containers on the sidewalk on Sunday evening because the garbage trucks would be around early on Monday morning. But very early on trash day, prior to the arrival of the garbage truck, along would come an old, beat-up, station wagon which would stop at each pile of rubbish and quietly a man would collect whatever was useful for his purposes and the move on to the next house. He was a salvager - going from trash heap to trash heap salvaging things and recycling them - putting them back into the stream of life and usefulness.
And the witness of the faithful community is that when you come to what seems to be the end of your resources, you bump against that "utter silence". And there, if your dare trust the silence as benevolent, or to call it hope, life and meaning can be salvaged from the worst kind of defeats.
A woman lives through the great sorrow of a broken marriage and comes out on the other side of it, able to risk not less love, but more. A man loses a job, and the pain of the silence seems unbearable at times, but finally he discovers in a new, less prestigious job, time and peace which he hadn't even realized he was missing as life was rushing by him.
One very meaningful translation of Psalm 84 reads: "Blessed is the one . . . who, going through the vale of misery uses it for a well." (verse 6) Isn't that magnificent imagery? Passing through a vale of misery, but coming out on the other side more revived than when you went in!
"Just guts!" you may say, and you may well be right. But it may be that there, in the "utter silence", is the God Who is the very inventor of salvaging - bringing us back to the stream of life and usefulness. As Martin Luther King, Jr. suggests, "God doesn't keep bad things from happening, but wrings the good out of them."
Our God, Who could take even the cross; which, far from being the thing of beauty which we have come to think of it, was a horrible act of injustice - and surely looked like total and tragic defeat - God, Who could even take a cross and from it salvage the small beginnings of the Christian Church into which we have all been baptized.
Do you dare to trust that God? Do you renew your allegiance to that God, the salvager, the One Whose Voice we hear in the "utter silence?"
Oh sure, there's so much more we'd like to know! We'd like to know so much more about what, or Who, we're up against there in the utter and awful silence. We'd like to have the mystics' dramatic vision with the assurance which it brings. But most of us are forced to decide without that.
How do you think the disciples felt? They asked Jesus Who He was. And He answered them, "Who do you say I am?" They fumbled for answers, "some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah"; and in the face of Jesus' silence, Peter said, "You are God's Christ." And then this Son of God Who so often speaks in utter silence - commanded His disciples to be . . . silent! Jesus responded by telling His disciples not to tell anyone, and further warned them that if they were to follow Him that they must deny themselves, and lose their life in order to save it. Surely, that is not the clear cut kind of direction we seek from the Source of faith in our life.
Well, maybe you say that there must have been more of an exchange than was recorded in the Bible; and you might be right, but would it really make all that much difference? Because when it comes to the real life changing decisions, don't we have to learn the answers to our questions along the way?
Who ever really moves to a new location having the answers to all the questions? Who ever really has a baby knowing exactly how they will be as parents? Who ever really gets married knowing the answers to all the unknowns of sharing life intimately with another? What church, facing the future square in the eye with difficult decisions before it and assuredly say, this is absolutely the right choice?
We learn the answers along the way.
And when Christ dares us to trust the "utter silence" and to believe that there is even a loving, benevolent God in it, we want to know Who this God is before we follow Him or Her. And that is understandable enough, except that the truth of the matter is that it is only in following Christ that we begin to find out Who Christ is. You do not come fully to understand a person and them to love them, but love comes first and out of that, then understanding begins to emerge.
Elijah went to the mountain to hear the definitive word of God; to learn what God expected of him. There he heard the voice of God in "utter silence".
The disciples wanted to know exactly Who Jesus was - and then they were told that to follow Him they had to give up their life.
Do we dare to trust the voice of "utter silence", the voice of God the salvager?
We have the same choice the disciples had - either let the relationship with Jesus go, or to answer with their feet and to follow. For faith has been described as "the direction our feet start moving when we find that we are loved. Faith is stepping out into the unknown with nothing to guide us but a hand just beyond our grasp."
Do you dare to trust the silence?
Do you dare to start your feet moving without knowing all the ups and downs of the tension, or even without knowing where the path will finally take you?
Do you dare to embrace the silence and believe that there is love in it?
Do you dare to listen to the Voice of God even when it comes to you in "utter silence"?