When God is Silent

2022-04-20

God can be silent. You think you know what is supposed to be, but the exact opposite is your reality.

Consider two men: David and Saul. David was anointed king by the late prophet Samuel. However, the current king Saul had chased him from the land to live in Ziklag of the Philistines. The son of Jesse had two chances to take out the paranoid and relentless king, “but I would not stretch forth mine hand against the LORD’S anointed” (1 Samuel 26:23). He could have taken the shortcut, but he did what was right and left it in the Lord’s hands. (Except for maybe his conquests on the side and deceiving the king of Gath concerning them? That’s another story.)

King Saul, on the other hand, was afraid by the approaching Philistine army, and the Lord would not answer him in any way. However, the king went to a woman with a familiar spirit, something that was extremely wicked, to try to get answer. Such a woman performed seances and necromancy to speak with the dead. Saul wanted to bring up the prophet Samuel, and that was what she attempted to do. Your first major red flag was when the woman said, “I saw gods ascending out of the earth” (1 Samuel 28:13). The passage leaves us with more questions than answers, but Saul was essentially told that he and his sons were going to die in battle. The Lord had already spoken to Saul while Samuel was yet alive, but he would not have it: “...for the LORD hath rent the kingdom out of thine hand...” (1 Samuel 28:17).

The better choice is to wait on the Lord. To trust in Him is to remain in the foreign land of Ziklag until He leads you elsewhere. Maybe you are exactly where you were supposed to be? “Then Achish gave him Ziklag that day: wherefore Ziklag pertaineth unto the kings of Judah unto this day” (1 Samuel 27:6). Maybe God’s silence is the answer? Or maybe God has spoken, but you will not accept it? “Because thou obeyedst not the voice of the LORD... therefore hath the LORD done this thing unto thee this day” (1 Samuel 28:18).