The Call

Everything on The Consider Podcast and website has to do with the call for all men and women to repent. Such is an offer of mercy for those willing to follow Jesus by hating their life and picking up their cross. After all, even the demons believe in God, but they are terrified. You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that–and shudder. James 2:19

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When God Is Silent

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Text When God Is Silent

“Whom have you so dreaded and feared that you have been false to me and have neither remembered me nor pondered this in your hearts? Is it not because I have long been silent that you do not fear me? (Isaiah 57:11)

When God turns silent we should become very worried and concerned. How sad that many people do not even fear the silence because their hearts are cold and dead. The only time that Jesus felt cut off from the voice of the Father was when He was crucified on the cross. When Jesus cried, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” our sins, which He had taken upon Himself, caused something to happen that Jesus had never experienced before. God became silent. The fear of God’s silence caused David to pray the below Psalm because he knew that if God remained silent, he would “be like those who have gone down to the pit.”

Of David. To you I call, O Lord my Rock; do not turn a deaf ear to me. For if you remain silent, I will be like those who have gone down to the pit. (Psalms 28:1)

Those who do not believe God talks to His children are already doomed because of unbelief. For us, however, who know a living God, realize that when He turns His face from us, we are being disciplined. True lovers of God long for the voice of their beloved and when the voice becomes silent, nothing else matters. And I do mean nothing else!

The temptation is to try and find another voice to fill the void. Most people begin to mock to themselves the voice of God that they heard before. For this reason, we see failure and sins within the church today. Men take the voice they heard once, refuse to repent when God becomes silent and fill the emptiness with their own voices or the voices of other men. Many do not even realize that God no longer talks to them, but it is the voice of the evil one, masquerading as an angel of light.

Fellowship was broken when our father Adam sinned in the Garden of Eden. God used to come to Adam in the cool of the day to fellowship with him. Jesus Christ came and died so that we might be filled with the righteousness of God and once again begin to fellowship and hear his voice. For this reason, the writer of Hebrews reminds us that Jesus is the only source of salvation for those who obey.

. . . and, once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him (Hebrews 5:9)

Without more holiness, by faith and grace, God cannot and will not talk to us. We must grow into a deeper maturity of holiness. You cannot tell a child things that concern adulthood but you must wait until the child matures. If, however, the child, when thirty years old, still cannot comprehend adult concepts, something is terribly wrong. This is why Paul declares in 1 Corinthians 3:2, “I gave you milk, not solid food, for you were not yet ready for it. Indeed, you are still not ready.” The writer of Hebrews knew one must wait upon God before moving into new areas of holiness.

God’s will is that we go from strength to strength,5 growing ever closer in our fellowship with Him until we enter heaven. God only remains silent because we have sinned or because of sinful immaturity. When we act badly and sin, God puts us in the corner to see if we will repent. When He needs to purify us more, God becomes silent to see if our hearts will seek Him and Him alone. One example is found in 2 Chronicles, when God left King Hezekiah all alone to “know everything that was in his heart.”

But when envoys were sent by the rulers of Babylon to ask him about the miraculous sign that had occurred in the land, God left him to test him and to know everything that was in his heart. (2 Chronicles 32:31)

Now, you might think that God already knows our hearts and that is true. Just as God asked Adam, “Where are you?”6 when He certainly knew where Adam hid. Sin separates us from God and we need to ask ourselves these questions. “What is wrong with me? How have I sinned?” In Adam’s case, he ate what he should not have and in King Hezekiah’s case, pride and not piety had caused him to boast sinfully.

When God becomes silent in your life, it is the time to slow way down, to become very quiet and to wait as long as it takes for God to speak again. The temptation, however, is to find comfort in something else. It may be a movement of God, a good Christian book, or even in doing something for Him, but if God is not in it then you labor in vain.8 Do as Isaiah proclaims, wait on the Lord and when He does speak again, accept all that He has to say.

I will wait for the Lord, who is hiding his face from the house of Jacob. I will put my trust in him. (Isaiah 8:17)

Jesus had the Spirit without limit and fellowshipped continually with God. We, on the other hand, at best, stumble10 in many ways and must undergo painful discipline11 to have our relationship restored as we mature.

Discipline is not always for punishment for something done wrong, but also for the purpose of growth. The more we grow in righteousness, the deeper our fellowship with God becomes. As a child grows in wisdom and knowledge, the fellowship between parent and child also grows. We see how God attempted to mature the Israelites as they came out of Egypt through the miracles He performed. The warning for us is that they never learned from their lessons. In between the miracles God performed were moments of relative silence. During these silent times, God wanted the Israelites to think about what sins He had revealed to them and for their faith to grow. In other words, God wanted to show them something wicked about themselves so that they could repent and gain a closer fellowship with Him. But, alas, they never did learn but whined, moaned, and grumbled to the point it cost them the Promised Land. We, too, forfeit many promises of God because we do not learn our lessons. In fact, many forfeit Jesus because they remain unwilling to be taught by God. When the Israelites first came out of Egypt, God performed His miracles quickly and closely together. For example, they doubted God would provide water, and without a single rebuke, he gave them water. However, when similar situations arose, their faith did not increase, therefore, God began to bring them under judgment.

The same is true for us. Most who come to God at first hear God’s voice quickly and powerfully. Like He did with the Israelites, God demonstrates that He can be counted on and trusted. However, since we still have so much sin and immaturity, God walks us through the desert to humble us. He grows more quiet and takes longer to perform miracles and to speak to us. During these brief silent times, the testing of our hearts occurs.

Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way in the desert these forty years, to humble you and to test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands. (Deuteronomy 8:2)

God, during times of silence seeks to humble us and to show us our hearts. Also, during times when God seems far away, although He is always right there, He looks for true faith that trusts in Jesus in spite of feelings or circumstances. It reveals those who follow Jesus because they love Him and those who selfishly follow Jesus because of the food, rest, peace, and salvation He offers.14 If we want ears that can hear we must overcome the flesh that seeks a god who blesses our wide gate and wide road.

Chapter 13: When God is silent

• Why does God grow silent at times?
• Have you experienced the silence of God before? How did you feel during this time?
• How can you make the most of God’s silence?

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Ears to Hear: Chapter 14 | [Continue to Next Chapter →]

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The Consider Podcast
Examining Today’s Wisdom, Folly and Madness
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Former Salt Shaker Bookstore

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The Salt Shaker Christian bookstore, because of persecution by Washington State Authorities, was destroyed and ran out of the town of Enumclaw. Just part of the proof that Sound Doctrine Church was walking the narrow road with Jesus.

For you, brothers became imitators of God’s churches in Judea, which are in Christ Jesus: You suffered from your own countrymen the same things those churches suffered from the Jews, who killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and also drove us out. They displease God and are hostile to all men. 1 Thessalonians 2:14-15

It was a beautiful store. A result of the hard work of Sound Doctrine Church. In the store was a free rack because, as Jesus said, “Freely you received, freely give.” The following track is a small reproduction of the love that burned in our hearts to give freely.

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