Deafening silence

Micah 3:7

So the seers shall be ashamed,
And the diviners abashed;
Indeed they shall all cover their lips;
For there is no answer from God.”

Thought for the day – The deafening silence

In today’s chapter Micah is speaking out against the false prophets that are crying peace when actually they should have been calling for repentance. But there is something about that verse today that speaks to me of those times when God is silent, and God doesn't answer, and just how frustrating it must be not to be heard.

The creator of the 24-7 prayer movement, Pete Grieg has a book called ‘God on mute’. And in the book he asks the question why God doesn't answer our prayers. It's not an easy read. It's full of personal anecdotes about his wife and when she got poorly. About evil in times of the Holocaust. It's a harrowing read. But as I read it, actually I listened to it as an audio book, I was struck by the frustration expressed when God doesn’t answer prayers.

People have struggled with God’s silence since the beginning. I would imagine Adam and Eve would have grieved not hearing the voice of God in the cool of the evening. Jesus struggled in the Garden of Gethsemane with the father’s silence. Pete Grieg struggled with God’s silence when he thought his wife was dying.

Why is God silent? Only God knows. And maybe that’s something we have to bear. I’d like to say it’s all part of God’s plan for us. I’m not sure I believe that but then again I’m a fallible human. Listening for the voice of God like everyone else.

This blog post is part of the Walking the Way Podcast series. All views expressed in this essay are those of the author. This essay is freely available under Creative Commons License with Attribution-ShareAlike, allowing users to share it in other mediums/formats and adapt/translate the content as long as an attribution link, indication of changes, and the same Creative Commons License applies to that material.

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