Introspection: Rethinking Destiny

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Rethinking Destiny

Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.

Matthew 11:28-30 (NRSV)

If you want, then start to laugh

If you must, then start to cry

Be yourself; don't hide

Just believe in destiny

Don't care what people say

Just follow your own way

Don't give up, and use the chance

To return to innocence

From "Return to Innocence" by Enigma

This year, I've made it a point to read more fiction.  A few months ago, I read The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho.  In this novel, a young shepherd named Santiago has a recurring dream in which he is told that there is a treasure buried near the pyramids of Egypt.  One day, Santiago stops in a city on his way to sell his sheep's wool, and he meets Melchizedek, the immortal king of Salem, who tells him that finding the treasure mentioned in his dream is his "Personal Legend."  According to the king, your Personal Legend is "what you have always wanted to accomplish."¹  "God has prepared a path for everyone to follow," the king tells Santiago.  "You just have to read the omens that he left for you."²

What Coelho calls Personal Legend others might call destiny.  When I use the word destiny, I do not use it in a deterministic sense.  In other words, I am not referring to what will inevitably happen in a person's life.  As a good Methodist, I've never been a big fan of determinism or predestination.  Destiny, as I have come to understand it, is what a person was born to do - that is, if the person has the determination and the courage to do it.

In years past, I stopped believing in such things because I was afraid that God wanted for me something I did not want for myself.  One way I went wrong back then was that I was listening to other people too much and listening within too little.  Though it is true that other people can help us to see things we might not see in ourselves, people sometimes have hidden agendas.  People might want us to fill roles in their lives that were never ours to fill in the first place.  I've learned the hard way that, if we do not have a purpose in life, we will be given one.

Reading The Alchemist has caused me to reconsider the possibility that each of us has destiny, that each of us was born to fulfill a unique purpose in life.

Speaking to a crowd, Jesus once invited all who "are weary and are carrying heavy burdens" to come to Him and to trade their heavy burdens for the yoke He offers, promising, "My yoke is easy, and my burden is light."  In a recent paraphrase of the Bible, The Voice, He says, regarding this yoke, "It might appear heavy at first, but it is perfectly fitted to your curves."³  In other words, the yoke He invites a person to take on is perfectly tailored for the person.  Maybe Jesus is inviting us to lay down the burdens we were never meant to carry and to embrace the purposes that were actually meant for us.

Once, for a sermon illustration, Shane Hipps used a guitar to hit wiffle balls to the people in his congregation, effectively demonstrating that a guitar can serve as an adequate wiffle ball bat.  He then gave the guitar to someone who started playing a song with it, making it obvious that the guitar was meant not for playing wiffle ball but for making music.  Similarly, though there are many things a person could do, maybe there is something specific a person is meant to do.⁴

It seems to me that, if God did create me for a specific purpose, then I must have been designed with that purpose in mind.  My purpose must be written into my programming in some way.  If this is the case, then my purpose in life is not something other people can tell me.  It is instead something I must look inward to discover.  I imagine that, if I was indeed created for a purpose, then living out my purpose would seem right to me and make me feel alive.

Melchizedek tells Santiago that "everyone, when they are young, knows what their Personal Legend is."  The king goes on to say that most people eventually convince themselves that their Personal Legends are impossible and then choose paths in life that are more practical.  He then points out a baker in the city who, like Santiago, wanted to travel when he was young but played it safe and bought a bakery instead.⁵

I tried to remember what I wanted to do with my life before I decided in college that it would be a good idea to become a computer programmer.  When I was a child I kept changing my mind about what I wanted to do when I grew up.  I probably came up with a new idea whenever someone with a particular profession came to speak at my school or whenever a particular occupation was featured on a show on PBS.  Had I followed my heart in college, I probably would have majored in either religion or philosophy, neither of which are especially practical fields of study.

A few things stand out in my memory.  I remember that, when I was a little boy, my grandfather built a tiny podium for me.  Apparently I envisioned myself as someone who spoke in front of large crowds - a teacher, a preacher, or maybe a game show host.  I also remember playing school a lot.  Incidentally, when I realized that computer programming is not all it's cracked up to be, I started teaching Sunday School and preaching occasionally at my church.  I think that such things draw me because I love sharing knowledge with people and inviting people to look at things in new ways.  I later learned that my spiritual gifts are knowledge and teaching.

A song by Switchfoot suggests that "the shadow proves the sunshine."  In other words, sometimes a noticeable absence of something is evidence of its existence.⁶  I'm still wrestling with the idea that there is one particular thing I'm meant to do with my life, but I've reached the conclusion that there are things I was not put on this planet to do.  Perhaps the latter is evidence of the former.  Furthermore, the restlessness I sometimes feel would seem to suggest that, if there is something I'm meant to do, I'm not doing it.  The fact I still feel it at times also suggests that, if I have a destiny, I haven't lost it yet.

I enjoyed reading The Alchemist, and I would recommend it to anyone wrestling with his or her purpose in life or to anyone who simply enjoys a good story.  It challenged me to reconsider the possibility that there is something I was born to do; it reminded me that the journey is at least as important as the destination; and it warned me that pursuing my destiny, if I indeed have one, will mean turning my back on what is safe, comfortable, and predictable.


Notes:

1. Paulo Coelho.  The Alchemist (25th Anniversary Edition).  2014, Harper One.  p. 23
2. Coelho, pp. 31-32
3. Matthew 11:29 (The Voice)
4. Shane Hipps.  "Wiffle Guitar."  Mars Hill Bible Church, 06/27/2010.
5. Coelho, pp. 23-25
6. C.S. Lewis makes such an argument at the beginning of Mere Christianity.

The photograph of the Pyramids of Giza has been released to the public domain.  The photographer is in no way affiliated with this blog.

Christmas Perspective: Unlikely Messengers

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Comments are always welcomed.

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Unlikely Messengers

In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night.  Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified.  But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid; for see - I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord.  This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger."  And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying,

"Glory to God in the highest heaven,

and on earth peace among those whom he favors!"

When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us."  So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger.  When they saw this, they made known what had been told them about this child; and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds told them.

Luke 2:8-18 (NRSV)

He came down to earth from heaven

who is God and Lord of all,

and His shelter was a stable,

and His cradle was a stall:

with the poor, and meek, and lowly

lived on earth our Savior holy.

From "Once in Royal David's City" by Cecil Frances Alexander

"The Herdmans were absolutely the worst kids in the history of the world," so begins Barbara Robinson's classic children's novel The Best Christmas Pageant Ever.  The six Herdman children - Ralph, Imogene, Leroy, Claude, Ollie, and Gladys - wreaked havoc in their town, doing awful things like burning down a tool shed with a stolen chemistry set, bringing their feral pet cat to show-and-tell, and blackmailing other students.  They lived above a garage, and their favorite pastime was banging the garage door up and down, trying to pin each other beneath it.  "We figured they were headed straight for hell, by way of the state penitentiary," the young narrator of the story reports.

A closer look reveals that poverty and absent parents were at the root of the Herdman children's behavioral problems.  Their father had apparently abandoned them, and their mother had to work two shifts at a shoe factory every day to make ends meet, leaving the children to raise themselves.  Their teachers were not helping matters, for they would keep promoting them to the next grade despite their poor performance, because they could not bear the thought of having more than one Herdman in the same class.

For all the students who had to put up with the Herdmans every day at school, church had been a refuge, until one Sunday morning when the Herdmans decided to pay a visit.  That day, the pastor announced the auditions for the yearly Christmas pageant.  One week later, the Herdman hellions were cast in all the lead roles - Mary, Joseph, the Angel of the Lord, and the three Wise Men - because, for one reason or another, none of the other children in the church auditioned.  When other parishioners started voicing their concerns about a Christmas pageant starring the Herdmans, the narrator's mother, who was stuck directing the pageant, declared, "I'm going to make this the very best Christmas pageant anybody ever saw, and I'm going to do it with the Herdmans too."

During what was supposed to be the first rehearsal, the narrator's mother ended up teaching on the Christmas story, because the Herdmans, who hadn't stepped into a church until recently, were unfamiliar with the very story they would be performing.  Their irreverent yet honest questions, which quite possibly revealed a spiritual hunger, forced the narrator's mother to think seriously about the story, which had become a little too familiar to her.  She began to see the good in the Herdman children, whom nearly all of the other parishioners had written off.  The Herdmans were outraged that there was no place for Jesus to be born besides a stable, and they were enraged that King Herod sought to kill Him.

Having just learned about the Christmas story, the Herdman children played their parts in the ways that came natural for them, but, instead of ruining the pageant as the church folk had feared, they really did make it the best Christmas pageant the church had ever seen.

According to the narrator, Imogene and Ralph, who played Mary and Joseph, entered the sanctuary looking confused and out of place like refugees, reminding the congregation that the real Holy Couple were far from home with nowhere to go.

Imogene burped the doll that represented the Christ Child before laying it in the manger, reminding the congregation that, in Christ, the Almighty Creator of the universe took on flesh and became a baby - a real baby who needed to be burped.

Gladys, who played the Angel of the Lord screamed, "Hey!  Unto you a child is born!" like it was "the best news in the world," reminding the congregation that the angel's message to the shepherds was indeed "the best news in the world."

Leroy, Claude, and Ollie, who played the Wise Men, pitched their pretend gold, frankincense, and myrrh and instead brought forward the ham from the food box that the church's charitable works committee had taken to the Herdman family, reminding the congregation that Christ deserves our best.

The church folk who were concerned about the Herdmans' participation in the Christmas pageant had treated the Christmas story like a toy that must be kept in mint condition in its original packaging, lest it depreciate in value.  When the Herdmans took the proverbial toy out of the box and started playing with it, the same church folk began to appreciate it in a whole new way.

The Herdman hellions became unlikely messengers of the birth of Christ.

When I was a child, my third grade teacher read this novel to my class.  When I had the opportunity to read this story two years ago, one thing that stood out to me was that the children's last name Herdman is very similar to the word shepherd.  Shepherds are, after all, herdsmen of sheep.

In the Gospel of Luke, we read that, when Jesus was born in a stable in Bethlehem, there were some shepherds nearby who were guarding their sheep during the night.  Suddenly, an angel appeared in their midst, and the glory of God shone around them.  Naturally, the shepherds were frightened out of their minds.  I imagine they thought that Judgment Day had come, at least for them, and that they did not expect to fare well, since they weren't exactly upstanding religious folk.  Instead of judgment, the angel brought them "good news of great joy for all the people" that their long awaited Messiah had been born.  The angel told them that they would find their newborn Savior lying in a manger in a stable in Bethlehem.

The shepherds ran into Bethlehem and found the Christ Child in the stable with His parents, and then they went out to spread the news of the birth of their Messiah to everyone who would listen.  These shepherds had been chosen by God to be the very first messengers to announce the birth of Christ to the people.

Like the Herdman children, the shepherds were the poor, unkempt, uncouth kind of people one probably would not want to see around the manger, but, like the Herdmans, they became unlikely messengers of the birth of Christ.  Throughout the biblical narrative, we can see that God has a tendency to choose unlikely messengers - the kind of messengers most people are all too ready to write off.  I suspect that God still likes to choose unlikely people to speak for God.

This Christmas season, may we consider the unlikely messengers in our midst whom we readily dismiss, and may we be willing to listen to what God might be saying to us through them.

But as far as I'm concerned, Mary is always going to look a lot like Imogene Herdman - sort of nervous and bewildered, but ready to cobber anyone who laid a hand on her baby.  And the Wise Men are always going to be Leroy and his brothers, bearing ham.

The copyright of the cover of the first edition of The Best Christmas Pageant Ever is most likely owned by either author Barbara Robinson or publisher Harper & Row.  It is believed that its use to illustrate a blog post that discusses the same work qualifies as fair use.  The image was taken from the Wikipedia article about the work.

Lenten Perspective: Won't Somebody Please Listen to the Children?!

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Won't Somebody Please Listen to the Children?!

Let no one despise your youth, but set the believers an example in speech and conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.

1 Timothy 4:12 (NRSV)

Who's to blame for the lives that tragedies claim?

No matter what you say

It don't take away the pain

That I feel inside, I'm tired of all the lies

Don't nobody know why

It's the blind leading the blind

From "Youth of the Nation" by P.O.D.

On February 14, a former student walked into Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida with a semi-automatic assault rifle.  He killed seventeen people - fourteen students and three staff members - and wounded seventeen more.  In the days that followed, some of the students who survived the shooting began organizing public demonstrations, demanding that lawmakers take action to prevent future massacres.¹  Last week, on the one-month anniversary of the shooting, students all around the United States walked out of their schools at 10:00am for seventeen minutes, in memory of the seventeen people who were killed.²

These students are angry.  They live in age when mass shootings are an all-too-common occurrence, and they have grown up knowing that shootings in schools are a very real possibility.  This most recent school shooting has only served to confirm their fears that the grownups in charge are not doing their jobs.  They've had enough, so they're talking action.

Reactions to the student-led demonstrations have been mixed.  Some people have applauded the young activists for their passion, their drive, and their courage.  Others have been more dismissive, suggesting that these students have become puppets for a particular political agenda.  Some have even gone so far as to concoct conspiracy theories about the students leading the protests.  One writer astutely commented that adults only think that young people are wise when they happen to agree with them.³

In the Bible, we read about a boy named Samuel who grew up in a temple in Shiloh, serving the elderly high priest Eli.  One night, while Samuel was trying to sleep, he heard somebody call his name.  He got up and ran to Eli, supposing Eli had called him.  Eli said that he hadn't called him and told him to go back to bed.  Samuel went back to bed and heard someone call his name again, so he got up and ran back to Eli.  Again, Eli had not called him.  When Samuel ran back to Eli a third time, the old priest realized that God might be calling out to Samuel, so he told the boy to lie back down and, if he heard someone call him again, to say, "Speak, for your servant is listening."⁴

Samuel did as Eli instructed, and when he heard someone call his name again, he said what Eli told him to say.  God revealed to Samuel that judgment would soon befall Eli and his family.⁵  Eli's two sons were also priests, and they were utterly corrupt.  When people brought sacrifices to the temple, they took portions of the offerings for themselves, and they sexually exploited women who served at the temple.  Eli once gave his sons a stern talking-to, but he did nothing else to stop them from abusing their positions of authority.⁶

In the morning, Samuel reported to Eli what God told him.  The boy grew up to become a great leader in Israel.⁷

In this story, we see God's calling a child to be a leader at a time when the old guy in charge failed to do his job.

Whether or not you agree with the young activists' views on the issues at hand, you would do well to take these young people seriously.  Scripture shows us that it is not outside the realm of possibility that God would call young people to be prophets.  God once called a boy named Jeremiah to speak on God's behalf, at a time when his nation of Judah was in a very bad way.  Jeremiah objected, saying, "I don't know how to speak because I'm only a child."  God replied, "Don't say, 'I'm only a child.'  Where I send you, you must go; what I tell you, you must say."^{8 9}

When Jesus began His public ministry, He traveled from town to town proclaiming, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news."¹⁰  Later on, Jesus told His disciples that the Kingdom of God belongs to the childlike.¹¹  I once heard my friend Aaron, a philosopher, suggest that philosophers take seriously what everybody else takes for granted.  As I see it, children do naturally what philosophers have to relearn.  Children are not set in their ways, and they have not grown accustomed to the world as it is.  They do not accept unquestioningly the way the world works, and they can even envision a world that works differently.

Jesus once said to a respected religious leader, "I assure you, unless someone is born anew, it's not possible to see God's kingdom."¹²  If one must be born anew in order to see the Kingdom of God, I wonder if part of being born anew means learning to see everything with fresh eyes.

We are nearing the end of Lent, a season on the Church calendar set aside for soul-searching and repentance.  As I've noted many times in the past, repentance is a change of heart and mind that results in a change of conduct.  If God is indeed doing something new in the world, as Jesus suggested when He announced the coming of the Kingdom of God, then we must not be set in our ways.  We must have the humility and open-mindedness of children.

I am not trying to tell you what to think about the problem of gun violence.  I am warning you not to be so arrogant to think that people younger than you couldn't possibly have anything to teach you or that they couldn't possibly have a message of their own to share with the world.  Their youth might actually give them advantages you don't have, and they might have a message that you really need to hear.  May you be willing to listen to the prophets in your midst, no matter how young or old they happen to be.


Notes:

1. Wikipedia: "Stoneman Douglas High School shooting"
2. Camila Domonoske.  "Across The Country, Students Walk Out To Protest Gun Violence."  the two-way, 03/14/2018.
3. https://twitter.com/DavidAFrench/status/965678855636836359
4. 1 Samuel 3:1-9 (NRSV)
5. 1 Samuel 3:10-14
6. 1 Samuel 2:12-17, 22-25
7. 1 Samuel 3:15-21
8. Jeremiah 1:6-7 (CEB)
9. I must give credit to The Wired Word for the recent article that juxtaposed the story of the student-led protests with the biblical stories of young prophets.  I must also give credit to the TRAIL class at Travelers Rest United Methodist Church, with whom I discussed this article.
10. Mark 1:14-15 (NRSV)
11. Mark 10:13-16
12. John 3:3 (CEB)

Samuel Relating to Eli the Judgements of God upon Eli's House was painted by John Singleton Copley in 1780.

Lenten Perspective: Saying the Right Thing Wrongly

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Comments are always welcomed.

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Saying the Right Thing Wrongly

Don't be quick with your mouth or say anything hastily before God, because God is in heaven, but you are on earth.  Therefore, let your words be few.

Ecclesiastes 5:2 (CEB)

Be careful little lips what you say

For empty words and promises lead broken hearts astray

From "Slow Fade" by Casting Crowns

For nearly four years, I have been using the daily readings from the Revised Common Lectionary as a plan for my daily Scripture reading.  For each day, there is a Psalm, a passage from the Old Testament, and at least one passage from the New Testament.¹  I do not read all of the assigned passages for the day: typically I choose only one of the passages for reading and reflection.  If two or more days have consecutive passages, I might read them together on one day.

In the Past, I have been hesitant to read any assigned passage from the Book of Job.  I might make an exception for passages taken from the prologue, which sets the stage for the rest of the story, or from God's monologue at the end, which is mostly made up of questions directed at the titular character.  Throughout most of the book, Job and his friends talk with each other about God, until they finally find out that they didn't really know what they were talking about all along.  After God finally speaks at the end, Job confesses that he had been speaking out of ignorance, and then God chastises Job's friends for speaking wrongly.²

I believe that the Book of Job, as a whole, teaches us some important lessons, but I did not want to read a passage out of context and and reflect on potential falsehoods about God.

For the last few weeks, I've been participating in a somewhat intensive study of the New Testament at my church, so I've limited any of my readings from the Lectionary to the selections from the Old Testament.  To my dismay, some of the Old Testament selections for the last few weeks happened to be from the Book of Job.  I decided to wade into the murky waters of this story, reading with a critical eye to see if either Job or his friends actually say anything of worth, always keeping in mind what they learn at the end of the story.

At the beginning of the story, Job tragically loses his wealth, his health, and his children.  Three of his friends come to visit him, and they sit with him in silence for seven days, until Job finally speaks, cursing the day he was born.³  Ever present in this story is the assumption that suffering is punishment for sin.  Job, unable to think of anything he did wrong, believes that God has acted unfairly toward him, but his friends, who do not believe that God would ever act unfairly, believe that Job must have done something displeasing to God.

The first of Job's friends to speak is a man named Eliphaz.  First Eliphaz points out that, for someone who has ministered to people who were suffering, Job is not being very patient in the midst of his own suffering.  He then asks if God has ever punished an innocent person, arguing that people reap what they sow.  Eliphaz goes on to ask if there is anyone who is truly righteous before God.  If God holds even the angels accountable, then how can mere mortals expect to get away with wrongdoing?⁴

Eliphaz advises Job to turn to God, who provides rain to nourish the earth, lifts up the poor and the humble, and brings down the arrogant and the wicked.  He then encourages Job not to resent correction from God because it is for his own good.⁵

I don't think that Eliphaz is totally wrong in what he says to Job.  Much of what he says can be found in other parts of Scripture, particularly the Book of Proverbs.  God does indeed side with the poor and the humble over the wicked and the arrogant.  We read in Proverbs,

The Lord's curse is on the house of the wicked,

but he blesses the abode of the righteous.

Toward the scorners he is scornful,

but to the humble he shows favor.⁶

Eliphaz's advice isn't that bad either.  We should always turn to God, regardless of our circumstances, and, if God does discipline us, we can trust that God only has our best interests in heart.  Again, we read in Proverbs,

My child, do not despise the Lord's discipline

or be weary of his reproof,

for the Lord reproves the one he loves,

as a father the son in whom he delights.⁷

As I see it, sin does indeed cause suffering, in one way or another.  I think that perhaps the main reason that God hates sin is that God loves us and does not want us to inflict suffering upon ourselves or others.  Also, we do tend to reap what we sow.  We might get away with wrongdoing for a while, but, if we persist in a destructive path, we will inevitably suffer the consequences for it.  That said, I do not think that all suffering is necessarily caused by sin.  Sometimes we suffer because of our own choices; sometimes we suffer because of the choices of others; and sometimes we suffer for no other reason but unfavorable circumstances.

I once heard Rob Bell say that there can be rightness in our wrongness and wrongness in our rightness.  I would say that the latter is true of Eliphaz.  I do not think that Eliphaz says anything wrong; rather, I think he is wrong to say what he says because what he says is not appropriate for Job's situation.  His statements are right, but his underlying assumptions are wrong.  Job is not being punished for wrongdoing, nor is he being disciplined by God.  We know from the prologue of the story that Job has not done anything to warrant divine punishment.  We can almost hear the delight in God's voice when God says, "Have you considered my servant Job?  There is no one like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man who fears God and turns away from evil."⁸

Eliphaz rightly says that people reap what they sow, but he has wrongly assumed that Job is reaping what he has sown.

Eliphaz rightly says that Job should turn to God, but he has wrongly assumed that Job had somehow turned away from God.

Eliphaz rightly says that God sides with the poor and the humble over the wicked and the arrogant, but he has wrongly assumed that Job is in the latter group.

Eliphaz rightly says that Job should accept discipline from God, but he has wrongly assumed that Job's suffering is discipline from God.

Sometimes we're guilty of saying the wrong thing, but sometimes we guilty of saying the right thing wrongly.

I think that far too often Christians use the call to "speak the truth in love"⁹ as an excuse to speak hurtfully just because they believe what they say happens to be true.  Sometimes it is appropriate and even necessary to be brutally honest with someone, but it is never appropriate to be unnecessarily brutal, no matter how accurate or honest one's statements happen to be.  When we feel the need to "speak the truth in love," we need to check our motives to be sure that we really are speaking in love.

Like Eliphaz, we might end up saying right statements at the wrong moments because we have made the wrong assumptions about a person or about his or her situation.  Jesus, in the Sermon on the Mount, warns us not to judge others, because our judgments have a way of coming back to haunt us.¹⁰  St. James encourages us to be "quick to listen" and "slow to speak."¹¹  It has been said that each of us has two ears but only one mouth because we are meant to listen twice as much as we speak.

It is currently the season of Lent, a time on the Church calendar marked by self-examination and repentance.  This season is a good time to examine why we say the things we say and to repent of any ways in which we speak hurtfully to others.  A good friend of mine likes to say that whatever does not build up breaks down.  In the words of St. Paul, "Let no evil talk come out of your mouths, but only what is useful for building up, as there is need, so that your words may give grace to those who hear."¹²


Notes:

1. http://www.commontexts.org/publications/
2. Job 42:1-9
3. Job 1-3
4. Job 4
5. Job 5
6. Prov 3:33-34 (NRSV)
7. Prov 3:11-12 (NRSV)
8. Job 1:8 (NRSV)
9. Ephesians 4:15
10. Matthew 7:1-2
11. James 1:19
12. Ephesians 4:29 (NRSV)

The photograph above is of a fresco of Job and his three friends, painted in the 1500s in the Cathedral of the Annunciation.

Lenten Perspective: Stillness and Silence

I share these thoughts hoping they are of help to someone else.

Comments are always welcomed.

If you find these thoughts helpful, please share.

Stillness and Silence

He said, "Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by."  Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence.

1 Kings 19:11-12 (NRSV)

Can anybody hear me?

The silence is deafening

Why do You feel so far away?

When I know You're here with me

But I just need the faith to see

Nothing can separate me from Your love

From "Can Anybody Hear Me?" by Meredith Andrews

It was a dark time in the Northern Kingdom.  Ahab, the king, was the worst in a string corrupt rulers, and his consort Jezebel sought to eliminate all of the prophets of Israel's God and replace them with prophets of her false gods.¹  When the prophet Elijah entered the scene, he announced a drought which effectively demonstrated the ineffectiveness of the fertility gods the king and queen had been promoting.²

After spending nearly three years in hiding during the drought, Elijah returns and challenges Jezebel's false prophets to a showdown that ultimately results in their execution.³  When Jezebel hears what has happened, she swears by her gods to make sure that Elijah ends up just like one of them.  Elijah receives word that the queen wants him dead, and, fearing for his life, he flees into the wilderness.  Exhausted, he collapses under a tree and begs God to let him die.  In response, an angel brings him food so that he will have strength for the journey ahead of him.

Elijah spends forty days and forty nights in the wilderness, making his way toward Mt. Horeb, an important site in his people's history that is sometimes called the Mountain of God.  When he reaches his destination, he takes shelter in a cave, where God asks him, "What are you doing here, Elijah?"  It is one of those existential questions we all need to be asked once in a while.

Elijah spills his guts to God, saying, "I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword.  I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away."  Elijah feels that he is all alone in the world, and, as a wanted man, he is ready to give up.  Such is the life of a prophet.  Nowadays, people like to think of themselves as prophetic but often have no idea what the word really means.  Prophets speak hard truths that the privileged and the powerful do not want to hear, and they suffer dearly as a result.

Elijah learns that God will soon pass by the mountain.  First, there is a windstorm with gusts powerful enough to break rocks.  Next, there is an earthquake.  After that, there is a wildfire.  Finally, after the ravages of the elements, there is sheer silence.  Interestingly, God, we are told, is not in the wind, in the earthquake, or in the fire.  It is in the stillness and the silence that God speaks, asking once again, "What are you doing here, Elijah?"⁴

For some reason, I have a certain fondness for this particular Bible story.  There are times in my life when I wish that, like Elijah, I could run away, far from everything I find painful, scary, or threatening, and end up in a sacred place where I experience God in a profound way.

I think this story has something to teach us about the way we relate to God.  Often, when we want to hear from God, we look for wind, fire, and earthquakes, figuratively speaking.  We want explosions and special effects.  We want God to bring the noise, but what we need to remember is that God is at work in the silence.  God is not always at work in the spectacle, and the absence of any attention-grabbing "signs and wonders" does not mean that God is inactive or absent.

Late last year, I helped with a spiritual formation retreat.  As the retreat drew near, though I knew I would be busy the whole weekend, I began to hope that God would give me an epiphany of some sort, as others have received on such weekends.  I wanted something that would give me some clarity for my journey.  I received no such revelation.  That said, I should not interpret the lack of an epiphany as a sign that God has nothing to say to me or a sign that God is not already at work in my life in some way.

Elijah feels that he is the last man standing among those faithful to God.  He feels alone and overwhelmed, but God does not leave him in that state.  God gives Elijah some help, instructing him to appoint a man named Elisha as his disciple and ultimately his successor.  God also reassures him that he is not alone, for there are still seven thousand people in Israel who have not forsaken God.

The story of Elijah's encounter with God in the silence is a reminder to us that when God seems silent, God is not absent or inactive.  Maybe this story also offers us a challenge, especially in this season of repentance and introspection we call Lent.  Perhaps we need to stop waiting for God to hit us over the head with whatever revelation we seek and to instead take refuge in stillness and silence, away from the noise that is so pervasive in our lives, so that we may actually listen for God.


Notes:

1. 1 Kings 16:29-33, 1 Kings 18:4
2. 1 Kings 17:1
3. 1 Kings 18
4. The majority of this perspective is based on 1 Kings 19:1-18.  Quotations are taken from the NRSV.

The painting featured in this perspective was painted by Dieric Bouts in the 1460s.