“The Lord said, ‘Go out and stand at the mountain before the Lord. The Lord is passing by.’ A very strong wind tore through the mountains and broke apart the stones before the Lord. But the Lord wasn’t in the wind. After the wind, there was an earthquake. But the Lord wasn’t in the earthquake. After the earthquake, there was a fire. But the Lord wasn’t in the fire. After the fire, there was a sound. Thin. Quiet. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his coat. He went out and stood at the cave’s entrance. A voice came to him and said, ‘Why are you here, Elijah?’” 1 Kings 19:11-13
I firmly believe that people are searching for God. The reasons may be different – some are searching for peace while others are searching for healing, others may simply be looking for the first semblance of direction in their lives – but people are constantly seeking out God. This very well may be the reason why when a natural disaster occurs, there are those who are quick to give God the credit for “punishing those sinners” while nonbelievers are asking the question, “Where was God when that earthquake / hurricane / fire happened?” Even nonbelievers jump to that question of where God is because maybe (just maybe) there is a part of them that still hasn’t given up that search for a higher being, even when their search has landed them in skepticism and doubt.
Then there are those moments in our lives where we can’t help but to feel that we are lost and in need of God’s presence, so we seek God out. We’ll go on retreats or begin serving in the church - not so much to be the hands and feet of Christ so much as just wanting to experience God in a more tangible way. We even get it into our heads that, “And in this way I will experience God!” And sometimes we do recognize God in the midst of storms in our lives – but if we are really paying attention, we will recognize that God is indeed in the midst of the storms, but not the storms themselves.
In the Scripture passage above, Elijah is on the run. God’s other prophets have been killed and he was next. He was the sole survivor of God’s prophets because of the Baal worship that had taken over in the Promised Land. He felt abandoned and alone. Then God spoke to him and informed him to go outside of the cave he was hiding in, for the presence of the Lord was about to pass by that place. “Trust me, Elijah, you’re not going to want to miss this!” Then this destructive wind came along, followed by an earthquake, followed by fire, and you can just see Elijah out there, experiencing these storms and the destruction they undoubtedly caused, begging to see God’s presence in the storms – likely expecting that God was the storm! Yet even though Elijah was looking in all the places that he was certain God would be in, God wasn’t there.
Then Elijah heard it… a thin, quiet voice… asking this question for the second time, “Why are you here?” Maybe we can rephrase the question: “Why are you looking for me in the storms? Did you think I was the storm?” I really want to know which was more surprising to Elijah in that moment: the fact that God’s display wasn’t the massive, awe-inspiring power of nature that he just witnessed on display, or that the most powerful being in the cosmos was in this small, still voice…
A fellow pastor in my area recently returned from his second trip to Israel. He had been there about 20 years ago, and during his touring and seeing all of these holy places, he was convinced that he would experience God in these Christian landmarks – and he returned disappointed. On this second trip, he had been thinking that maybe it was a maturity thing and, over the past few decades, he has matured and grown closer to God. After his return, aside from baptizing in the Jordan River, again he returned without really clearly feeling the presence of God like he had imagined in these historic Christian landmarks. If anything, he has felt God more clearly in our small town in southern Indiana.
I think there is a profound truth behind this experience of my friend’s. We often times expect that we will experience God as a result of God always doing something to us. All too rarely do we at large consider that maybe, just maybe, we experience God’s presence as a result of God doing something with us. Those moments that really drive us as Christians are those moments that we realize that we are doing something as the hands and feet of Christ. We feel the presence of God when are praying with brothers and sisters, as we are working together in collecting food for the hungry, or helping those in our community with bills that they otherwise would not be able to cover just to keep the lights on for their family. Sometimes, those actions are so seemingly small and minuscule that it’s all too easy to overlook, yet it is in these acts of love that God is found.
This isn’t to say that God can never be found in an earthquake or massive fire… it just doesn’t seem to be God’s modus operandi. After all, we’re talking about a God that, in order to restore a relationship with us, came to earth in the least flashy way: as a baby to poor folk, promptly became a refugee, then grew up in a small town called Nazareth upon returning to Israel. We weren’t saved by a warrior on a white steed but by a teacher of peace riding a donkey – pretty low-key in comparison to what the Jewish people were expecting a savior to look like. So sometimes, God’s miraculous healings come through doctors and nurses at the hospital, and the way in which your marriage was saved was a neighbor who was more than happy to watch your kids allowing you to go to counseling or reconnect during date night.
Certainly, God is present in our lives – but rather than being the storms or showing up in the most grandiose of ways, may we recognize that God walks with us through the storms.
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