It's quiet right now as I write. After a busy morning my husband has decided a morning nap is in order and evidently our 5 month old and all three puppies agree with him as everyone, but myself appears to be napping right now. The silence is good though today. It's given God the opportunity to give me His own Valentine's Day message.
One of my favorite stories to go to when I need to remind myself to protect my whitespace moments is the account of Elijah in the period after his moment of triumph over the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel. You would think that God's provision of rain in response to Elijah's plea as opposed to the complete and utter silence that followed the begging of the servants of Baal would put one on a fairly high note. You would expect a certain calmness, confidence and poise to follow this success, wouldn't you?
That's not exactly what happens though. After a powerful answer to his prayer, the next thing we see Elijah doing is running for his life from the kingdom's ultimate bully, Queen Jezebel. His was a God who brought fire to consume an offering (that had been saturated in water by the way), but in that moment his God wasn't a God that could handle the threats of a woman.
The truth is I've been struggling for a few weeks now. Difficult decisions have become necessary for our family to make over the last month especially and to be honest I'm not really happy about them. In my more positive moments I see them for what they are, necessary changes because we live in an extremely broken world. However, it doesn't mean I like uprooting pieces of the life I was hoping to resume to start over parts of my life somewhere completely new.
I'm an introvert so I tend to invest in relationships and I'm not really eager at the need to start the cycle over again. I have moments that to be honest I get frustrated and even anger for a brief period at the fact that I have to move on while others are allowed to stay in the place I was comfortable at one time. Of course then I realize that I really haven't "belonged" in that place for nearly a year now.
I think those moments are the ones that make me come back to Elijah's story. Today, evidently my constant reference to this particular part of Elijah's life has made my husband decide to read it because as I opened the Bible app on our shared iPad intending to look for some comfort in Psalms I instead find it opens to the part of Elijah's journey following his success at Mount Carmel. I found myself rather than moving on to Psalms as intended reading Elijah's struggle and in that I found my Valentine's message.
This time I saw in the story the weariness that had suddenly consumed Elijah. It very much feels like where I am right now. Rather than just let me die, I actually said last night that I want to be able to settle for less. I'm so tired and exhausted with this part of my journey right now. I also noticed this time though that God provided rest and nourishment for him. He sleeps, he's fed, he sleeps again and he's fed again and then strengthened by this he's able to journey on to the next whitespace moment God has for him.
I think that the most impactful part of Elijah's experience though came in the part that I have spent weeks quoting. I've spent a lot of time thinking about how the importance of spiritual whitespace is so aptly portrayed in this story as God does not speak through the wind, the earthquake or the fire, but he speaks in the gentle whisper that comes in the silence after all of the chaos. What stood out to me this time was that the whisper only came after Elijah poured his heart out to God being real and vulnerable in his isolation.
"...and now they are trying to kill me..."
~1 Kings 19:10b
As I read that I found myself sharing with God that is exactly how I've felt for a while now. Not that anyone is trying to physically kill me, but often times unintentionally those around me have tried to kill my heart. It comes in ways that many times people don't even realize what they are doing. It comes when I'm pressured to accept someone else's reality as my own when how I experience the events can't really be changed. It just is what it is and that is my experience. It comes when vulnerability is met with rejection. It comes when isolation is magnified because people feel uncomfortable with what they can't fix.
"Yet I reserve seven thousand...."
~1 Kings 19:18a
My dad was the first person to really bring this part of God's reply to Elijah to my attention over a decade ago. I think though somehow I've always interpreted it as a reprimand from God for Elijah's lack of faith. Today, however, it was my Valentine as His Beloved. Rather than hearing it in this "stupid human, don't you know I've got more people than you over here on the sidelines" tone, I heard it today more like this:
"You're not alone. I'm here, but I also have so many more kindreds that I want to share your journey. If I leave you where your heart feels threatened you will only focus on the perceived danger. That's not where you will do your greatest work. Come and let me surround you with the ones you need for the experiences I have waiting for you. You're My beloved and I take care of what is Mine,"
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