Whispering God

Do you want God to prove himself to you with fireworks & something dramatic, to speak clearly to you? But, what if God’s main speech is to whisper into your ear, head & heart? 

Elijah on Mt Horeb had to silence his fears & desist his demand for the dramatic before the ‘still small voice’ came through. I think God whispers to us all the time, if only we’d be still enough to listen. 

CS Lewis said, “We can ignore even pleasure. But pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.” But might pain often be God’s last resort? Much better to listen large for God’s regular whispers than to have him blaring in your lugs. But am I too busy and distracted by noise, my phone, activity, to hear & heed God’s whispers?

Jesus comes alongside the Emmaus Road two. He warms their hearts explaining from the Scriptures why Jesus had to die. The stranger suggests he has somewhere else to be when they get to Emmaus. They haven’t recognised Jesus yet but persuade him to come in for some food and in the ordinary breaking of bread the penny drops, it’s ‘Jesus’! 

“Could it be that the Creator of the cosmos is meek and not pushy? Humble and not presumptuous? Unassuming and not intrusive? Jesus wears his charisma lightly. He seems perfectly content to walk away from the spotlight of human attention and adulation.” (Peter Greig, ‘Hearing God’) 

God is almighty, all-knowing, all-seeing, always present, all loving, mysterious, marvellous and way beyond our ken and comprehension, but chooses to come to us in person through the ordinary and extraordinary birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. God comes quietly to our world, in it for the long haul of helping a world come to its senses. 

“Billions of people wake up each day precariously balanced upon a rock traveling at 66,727 miles per hour around the sun in a galaxy that is itself moving at 1,342,160 miles per hour in relation to extra-galactical frames of reference. Quietly these people make themselves coffee, stare out at the dawn breaking, the dew glistening and, for the most part, barely give the maker of so much mystery a second thought. Their three-pound brains churn through 11 million bits of information per second, and their 10ounce hearts pump five litres of blood through 100,000 miles of tubing, and yet the great Giver of Life demands neither allegiance, acknowledgement or thanks. ‘The Lord is not slack…but is long-suffering toward us, not willing that any should perish’ (2 Peter 3:9, NKJV)” (P. Greig) 

If I don’t take time each morning to be quiet, still and listen to God through Bible, books like Pete Greig’s, prayer and journaling I easily move into the day ‘out of sync’ with God. Without regular pauses in my day to look, listen and let God whisper in my ear to show what’s really going on in & around me, I miss so much. OBEDIENCE comes from the Latin OB AUDIENS, which means ‘Listen Intently’. Help me to be all ears, Lord!