In Times of Silence

Of all the different trials and hardships that I have experienced, silence is by far the thing that has most profoundly tested my faith. Silence is eerie in a dark, lonely room late at night. When I’m home alone it makes me cautiously check to see if the front door is still locked and the blinds are closed. It makes me hyper aware of every little noise and slight movement, but comfort can be found easily in a distraction or in the assurance that the night will soon give way to dawn, and the silence will soon be filled with the business of a full day. However, when God is silent, comfort is not so easy and simple to achieve. God’s silence is terrifying. It shakes us to our core and turns all our certainty into questions and our courage melts into fear. We fear it more than anything else because it speaks nothing and everything to our hearts all at the same time leaving us confused and uncertain. His silence cuts us a thousand times deeper than any harsh words He could possibly utter. A time of silence from God can unravel my faith and leave me cowering in a corner questioning every hope and belief that I have desperately held onto through the most painful trials I have faced in my life. As far as I can see, in these times of silence, all they do is shatter all the confidence I have in God and His love and plans for me…so what is the point? Why on earth does God speak to us constantly throughout one season and then go completely silent in the next? Doesn’t He realize how devastating it is to our faith? Well, perhaps these times of silence are just as important as those when He speaks constantly. What if silence is what our faith sometimes needs to reach full maturity? 

         I just came out of one of  the longest season of not hearing from God I have ever experienced. He spoke to me once during this time that lasted almost two years. Two years is not that much time in the grand scheme of things, but to a person like me in their early twenties it can feel like an eternity. The silence began at the beginning of my sophomore year of college when I started distancing myself from God and walking down a very dark path. Sometimes God is silent during the times that we are rebelling against Him because we are refusing to be open to His guidance and correction. The Apostle Paul addresses this issue in his first letter to the Thessalonian church when he tells them to “not stifle the Holy Spirit” but instead to “hold on to what is good (and) stay away from every kind of evil,” (1 Thessalonians 5: 19 - 22, NLT). Sin can stifle the Holy Spirit in our lives because it hardens our hearts towards God and leads us farther and farther from His will for our lives. I can confidently say that this is the initial reason for the silence that I was experiencing. However, after about a year and a half of fierce rebellion, I returned to my faith and submitted to His perfect will, but the silence continued with one exception of Him speaking to me once during the first week after I returned to Him. The season of silence continued for another four to five months before God finally spoke to me again. It was those last few months of silence that I found particularly difficult to endure and to hold on to my faith in midst of because I didn't understand why God was still silent. I have never longed more desperately to hear his voice as I did during those first few months after I first returned to Him. I was holding on to my faith for dear life as Satan constantly tempted me to give up and return to the sinful lifestyle that I had adopted during my sophomore year of college. I cried out to Him desperately again and again pleading with Him to speak and take all the doubts and questioning away. He remained silent. 

         We can see Abraham and his wife Sarah struggling with similar doubts in the Bible after going 13 years without hearing from God. Abraham is known throughout the scriptures for his incredible faith. In fact, it even says that “God counted him as righteous because of his faith,” (Genesis 15: 6 & Romans 4: 3). The Apostle Paul goes as far as to call him “the spiritual father of those who have faith,” (Romans 4:12). Certainly, Abraham had great faith. However, even his faith was shaken by a prolonged time of silence. God had promised a son to Abraham and because his wife was barren, she had given her maid servant to him so that he could have the promised son through her. At 86 years old, Abraham was finally able to have a son when the maid servant gave birth to Ishmael. Then, God went silent for the next 13 years until God finally appeared to him again to tell him that Ishmael was not the son He had promised him, the son from whom God would bless the entire world. He tells Abraham, who was at this point 99 years old that his elderly wife who had never been able to conceive was going to give him a son and Abraham laughs. Then, three messengers from God appeared to him sometime later and told him that in a year, Sarah would have a son. When she overhears this, Sarah also laughed, (Genesis 12 - 18). It would be easy for us to read this passage and judge Abraham and Sarah for laughing in God’s face. Surely the God of the universe who spoke all of creation into being and raises people from the grave would have no problem enabling a barren woman far beyond normal childbearing years to get pregnant. However, when I think about the times that I have doubted my faith, I begin to see that Abraham most likely understood what God was capable of. He likely didn’t doubt that God could fulfill His promise but rather he found it hard to believe that after being silent for 13 years, God was going to do something so radical for him. 

         I have found, through my own struggles with doubt, that it is usually much more of an internal problem of the heart than an external one of circumstances. When I believe that God loves me and cares about me, I have no problem believing that He will move immovable mountains and do the impossible. It’s when I doubt His heart for me and no matter how much I cry out to Him He remains silent that my faith begins to crumble. It is in the times of silence that even the father of faith begins to doubt. Silence can shake even the most powerful, sincere faith, which brings us back to our original question. If silence is so damaging to our faith, why does God allow it? Why doesn’t He just speak to us continuously through every season? Why does He let our faith be shattered when all He would have to do is speak? Well, trust me when I say that I have wrestled with these questions every single time that God goes completely silent in my life. I by no means have all these questions and doubts figured out. However, even though God’s silence has deeply shaken my faith, I have also found that the times of silence are often exactly what I needed to grow in my faith and go deeper in my intimacy with the God who knows how many hairs there are on my head and calls me by name. He knows exactly what each of us need in every season of our lives and sometimes, even though it is usually the last thing that we wanted and not even close to what we thought we needed, the silence often is exactly what our faith needs to grow to full maturity. It is often in the darkness, most painful trials of life that God grows our faith and draws us nearer to Him. The Apostle James writes about this when he says,

“Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles of any kind come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing,” (James 1: 2 - 4, NLT). 

         Instead of seeing the times of silence as times when God for no apparent reason has decided to break off communication with us, what if we were to see them as Him trying to teach us something; something that can’t be taught through words. I have found that my faith grows more in the times of silence than it does in a season when I am constantly hearing God’s voice. We can find hope in remembering that after Abraham’s long season of silence, God fulfilled His promise to Him and blessed him in ways far beyond what he could ever have imagined. Just like the night must give way to the dawn, the silence must end. God often works in the most powerful, beautiful ways after a long, painful time of silence, but in the meantime, while we are still waiting in anxious anticipation, may we find comfort in knowing that God is at work even when we can’t see or hear Him. 

        If you have any questions or would like to learn more about the C.A.N Sisters’ Ministry, leave a comment below, check out my website, or email me at cansistersministry@gmail.com.