The phone went silent. No more ringing, text message alerts, facebook notifications, or e-mail tones. All I could hear was the even sound of my husband’s breathing and the squeak of the nurses shoes as they roamed the tiled hallway outside Junior’s room. I squirmed in the chair as Junior’s IV of medicine clicked and pumped. My eyes squinted in the dimness of the pre-dawn lit room. I suddenly was gripped with fear. I felt alone. The silence of the hospital room was more deafening than the roar of the crash.
Where was He? Where was the God who so sweetly carried me on angel’s wings as I was thrown from the car? Where was my Friend whose arms shielded me from the shattered glass and held me as I lay on the highway? Had He performed His miracle to prove Himself mighty to the world and forgotten about me? Why had silence fallen with no one coming to tell me I was a living miracle anymore? Had I done something wrong? Or was I just being used as a display of God’s power?
Boy, how the devil waits for those vulnerable moments of quiet to weasel his way into questioning God. That’s his oldest, dirtiest trick ~ But it works and that’s why he keeps using it. You see, there was no way I was going to hear his whispers of deceit over the grace and mercy screaming God’s goodness during the accident. No. He waited for the quiet. The darkness before dawn. The solitude. Unfortunately for him, my God is in the small stuff.
Let me use another’s story to illustrate. Elijah, one of the greatest men of God to ever live (he actually never died but that’s a different story…), I think gets a pretty bad rap sometimes when people tell his story of running away from Queen Jezebel. Maybe it’s just me, but I totally get him. God had just used him to call down fire from heaven. He made the prophets of Baal look like the followers of the fake god they truly were. He did it alone. No one in Israel stood with him and God. Elijah waited for hours as 450 men mocked him and called out to Baal. The people fell on their faces after the LORD showed Himself mighty through Elijah. Then Elijah prayed and it rained in Israel. He must’ve been exhausted, emotionally drained… completely spent.
The first news that reached his ears was that the queen was grateful for the rain he prayed back to Israel… NOPE. Or that she wanted to thank him for bringing back the power, favor, and worship of the one true God… definitely NOT. Actually, she was not going to rest until she hunted him down and killed him. So Elijah ran and this is where he just threw up his hands and said that’s enough for me. He probably thought: “Where is He? Where is the God that strongly defeated my enemies? Has He performed His miracle just to win back the fickle heart of Israel and forgotten about me?” About this time, Elijah sunk beneath a juniper tree and asked to die.
God didn’t listen to his request. He said no. Instead, He sent an angel & fed him. Twice. The second time was such good nourishment, Elijah lived 40 days off of it. Elijah still felt the need to hide which he did inside a cave. So God decided to ask Elijah what he was doing. Elijah explained that he had stuck up for Him all alone and now his life was threatened. He felt forsaken. That’s when God decided to pass by. When He did, it created a strong wind so mighty in power that it caused a rock slide down the mountains. But the LORD wasn’t IN the wind. God sent an earthquake that about shook Elijah out of his hiding place. Still Elijah didn’t budge. The LORD wasn’t IN the earthquake. Then came fire from the LORD – just as Elijah had called down to defeat Baal. Even the familiar miracle didn’t calm Elijah’s fear for the LORD wasn’t IN the fire.
Wait! What was that?!? A Voice?!? Elijah strained his ears and leaned closer to the mouth of the cave. There it was again! The Voice didn’t thunder. It wasn’t fiery with anger. It was still. It was small. But the LORD was IN the Voice. And that made all the difference. Instantaneously, Elijah’s fear was gone! He felt love, confidence, grace, mercy, inspiration, and great awe. The Voice brought him out of his cave of fear, depression, loneliness, and questioning. Only because the LORD was IN it.
Now back to a hospital room in Indiana where I was looking for a cave to hide in. Hide from the fear of having to cancel our meetings, the mounting medical bills, ~ from all the things looking to kill my joy. To Hide with my new best friends: self-pity, despair, and loneliness. Then I heard it. A Voice. I know that Voice! It’s the SAME One I heard in the thunder and quaking of the crash, only now it was still ~ bringing assurance & confidence. It was small. Small enough to wrap around my heart or hold my little hand. Just what I needed now that the miracles had been performed.
God loves being in the small stuff. He lives with me in the nitty gritty details of daily living. Just like He fed Elijah, He will care for my needs. I’m not just a pawn in His quest for glory (although He would be worthy to be used up for) ~ that is not Who He is. He gives us miracles as signs and wonders to keep our wandering hearts close to Him or to point lost souls to Him, but He loves the small stuff. We never give Him credit for the non-flashy stuff. We were made, not to hold the staff to part Red Seas, but to walk with Him. Talk with Him. The simple stuff. We think if its not fire from heaven or earth splitting quakes, then the Almighty God of the universe must not be in it. Yet, this is the God that instead of coming to rule and reign over His creation, came as a lowly Jewish carpenter and DIED a horrible, cruel death to save it. The small stuff…
Now when the devil starts to whisper that God doesn’t care, there comes a Voice. It doesn’t bellow or rage. It just speaks. And the Presence IN that Voice stops the devil in his tracks, makes him choke on his ugly words, and causes him to flee.
I can’t wait for the day when I actually hear that Voice. I hear Him speak the words, “I love you” with my ears. But truthfully, I hear it every day. In the verses I read in my devotions, the meals He always provides, the friends that He puts in my life, the secret requests only He knows about and answers, the roses He sends me… there are so many ways, if only I wasn’t listening for the sound of a rushing mighty wind, or the roar of a fire. If only I was tuned into the Voice. I just need to be still and pay attention to the small stuff…
He’s IN that.
~ Jessica
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