Sounds in Silence

Job 4:15-17  Then a spirit passed before my face; The hair of my flesh stood up. It stood still, but I could not discern the appearance thereof; A form was before mine eyes: There was silence, and I heard a voice …….

I am not sure how it’s possible to have read this scripture as many times as I have over the years and never heard what it was saying? That within itself is a mystery because I tend to dissect every word when I read. Because I am a picture person, I try to get into the picture of the subject rather than just the knowledge of it. At least I thought I did … but apparently that’s not always the case.

I have said for years that we know when we are in the presence of the Lord even though we do not see Him. We can also hear God’s voice even though there is no sound. I would even go so far as to say that the subject of the sounds in silence is a frontier that is yet to be discovered.

Our text says, “There was silence and I heard a voice ...” That is a paradox … if there was silence then how could you hear a voice? The reason one can hear a voice is because it is not natural, it is supernatural. That means there is a mystery in silence … and that mystery is sounds.

Before my wife and I got married we went to a Coney Island Hot dog Restaurant for lunch, (I agree, it wasn’t the most romantic place in the world, but we liked it). We were enjoying our day and conversation but after we ordered our hot dogs and sat down something strange happened. We felt like a cloud came over both of us and we were frozen in time. We totally lost our appetites for food and drink and as strange as it may seem, we no longer felt a part of this world.  The only thing we could do for the next hour was sit there and look at each other. The waiters and the other folks probably thought we were mannequins.

I am still not sure what all happened that day at the Coney Island Restaurant but one thing I am sure of, it was all supernatural. It was as though God had taken us to the third heaven and spiritually made us into one person with one thought. When there is one thought, then there is one spirit and that does not require a mouth to ear communication but a spirit to spirit.

Perhaps the cloud I felt that day was what Job was talking about when he said, … “a spirit passed before my face … I could not discern the appearance thereof … there was silence, and I heard a voice …”

Father,

Thank you so much for giving us the ability to communicate with words, looks and actions. We love all the natural communication, but we want to communicate more in the spiritual realm through prayer and kind deeds. We want spiritual ears that are keen enough to listen to the sounds in silence.

Amen