The Silence of God

“Teach us, O Lord, the disciplines of patience, for to wait is often harder than to work.” (Peter Marshall)

A few years ago, Shusako Endo’s novel Silence was made into a film starring Liam Neeson. It’s a riveting story of Portuguese priests who are serving in Japan during a time of terrible persecution. The narrator of the epistolary, a priest named Sebastian, recounts the horror of witnessing the murder of two Japanese Christians, Mokichi and Ichizo. He struggles not with the suffering of man, because that is seen in Christ, but with God’s silence. He states, “I knew well, of course, that the greatest sin against God was despair; but the silence of God was something I could not fathom... surely he should speak but a word for the Christians” (72). So much of suffering is wrapped up in waiting on God to speak. We expect difficulties, but what do we do when our difficulties are coupled with God’s silence?

This theme of waiting is unfortunately a recurrent and painful theme in the Bible and in life. Why is this so hard? It's hard because the lie that always threatens to overcome believers hovers right below the surface of the situations that require waiting. Despite what unbelievers may think, the question is very rarely “Does God really exist?” The question is so much more fundamental than that and directly connected to our hearts.

The question is, “Does God really love me?” In those moments when the way doesn't seem clear and there doesn't seem to be any hope or way to redeem the situation, that's when our biggest fear surfaces—the one that tells us that we are alone. This fear whispers that God really doesn't have our best interests in mind. And, it snidely comments that this was what we’ve always thought deep down inside: God doesn't care.

I've come to believe that this is the truest test of our faith. We need to decide in our hearts whether or not to believe God—to trust Him against all odds and especially when it seems impossible. I believe in the end that when we stand before God to give an accounting, it will be less about what we did and more about whom we trusted. And, of course, this all started in the garden. When God placed Adam and Eve in a place of paradise, He gave them only one rule. He even told them why they should follow it (because if you eat of the tree, you will die die—according to the Hebrew). For a while, things go well, they enjoy a charmed life free from sickness and pain, and they have sweet fellowship with God.

Then Satan comes on the scene. He addresses Eve and begins by asking a simple question (my paraphrase): "Did God really say you should not eat from any tree in the garden?" Eve corrects him: "Not at all! We are allowed to eat from any tree, but we are forbidden to eat or touch this one or we will die." She adds a rule here that wasn't communicated earlier. The focus is now on the forbidden. Satan outright contradicts God next by saying, "You will not die. God doesn't want you to eat of this tree because He knows that if you do, you will be like Him." In other words, God doesn't truly want the best for you. He's holding out on you. His love is limited.

This poisonous arrow hit its mark, and it wasn't much of a leap for Eve to go from this idea that God doesn't truly love her to disobedience that had consequences far beyond her reckoning. The offer here was wisdom—the knowledge of good and evil.

The clincher is that, if Eve had resisted the temptation (and continued to resist it every day), she would have learned wisdom and the knowledge of good and evil—not by giving in to evil, but by fighting it. The wisdom was always within her reach, but instead of doing it God's way and waiting on His timing, she took the shortcut and ruined it all. Fortunately, God excels in taking our failed attempts and redeeming them.

So, what about us? Right now, we are all in the midst of the same temptation that Eve faced. We are constantly in places where we need to wait for God to do or reveal His work. Whether that place is literally waiting on God to open doors, change hearts, or redeem difficult situations, or whether it's the more abstract understanding of being faithful doing good even when it seems useless, we are all waiting. Creation itself waits for its redemption and groans (Rom. 10:18–25). Like Eve, we have a choice.

1. We can reject His plan and make our own way with its own consequences (Gen. 16) .

2. We can wait on God, but be worried and miserable the whole time (Prov. 15:15).

3. We can wait on God with confidence so that our hope will be our witness to the world (1 Peter 3:15).

Even if we wait in silence, we can choose who we will be, and we can choose to trust Him.