How Faint the Whisper

It is easy to think of people in my life who have far more reason to protest difficulty in slowing down to hear God than I do. I have no husband or children. I only work part time, and I have a semi-subconscious but tenacious tendency to avoid any solid commitments to activities beyond work and church. I have all sorts of time on my hands, and a lot of it is spent alone. As I recite to myself these reasons that listening should be easy and natural, my other, more defensive self (which for the sake of simplicity we'll say is looking out at me from the mirror), points at her head and protests, "Do you know how loud it is in here?" Since I'm talking to myself, I'm inclined to agree with her. And then I remember that it's probably loud in there for everybody,  kids or no kids, full time or part time or unemployed, married or single, old or young. 

How I wish it were easier to hear Him. To know that He is speaking. I happened across this phrase, "How faint the whisper we hear of him," while I was reading. It's from the book of Job (26:14), and it has a context and all kinds of other considerations that automatically complicate the meaning of the actual phrase. I can't just yank it out of its place in the text and make it say what I want it to say. Nevertheless, I'm not trying to write an expository paper here. Feel free to look at the context yourself and see what you can make of it. Suffice it to say that this phrase is preceded by a stunning passage about God's power. God's power in the big things, like the stretching out of the heavens and the stirring of the oceans. And these big things, Job says, are just the fringes, just hints of what He can really do. The reversal that comes next is what means something to me: "how faint the whisper we hear of him!" In light of all this, what a paradox that it is so hard for us to hear Him! I can see how Job, deprived of every good thing in his life, surrounded by self-righteous friends who spoke extremely ill-timed truths, lamented the faintness of what we can hear of God. I can't really understand Job's pain, because his story is an extreme one. I don't think it can be used as a parallel to a life like mine in which I've been given a great deal more than I've lost. The thing is, though, that God's silence perplexes everyone at one time or another. I think if anyone says it doesn't, they must be lying. I could be wrong about that, but it's what I think. 

This is a bit of a rambling post. These are my thoughts this Christmas Eve (well, it's Christmas Day by now). I'm learning some things about God which are hard to reconcile with a lot of my lifelong assumptions. God doesn't play by my rules. He values freedom. He's not concerned with making me comfortable (please note that I love being comfortable). Did I mention He does what He wants? And before you say, "No duh, Em," understand what I mean by "learning." I don't mean "reading in a book that lists a bunch of God's characteristics." I also don't mean "affirming as consistent with what I read in the Bible." I mean learning as in "Hey, God is an actual person, not an idea, and He isn't just what I want him to be." It's uncomfortable stuff, in the "letting go of your security blanket" kind of way. Or, if you're a Narnia fan, rather like Trumpkin the dwarf's first meeting with Aslan. 

Anyway, my mind is buzzing with so many other ideas and thoughts that I'd love to talk about. I think this is as far as I can constructively go tonight. Something in me is really desperate to get this posted, so I'm not doing half as much editing as I normally do. Hope you'll all forgive me. I encourage you to spend some time this Christmas letting the Incarnation regain its sheer astonishment for you. If you have a copy of Reaching for the Invisible God handy (it's by Philip Yancey), try reading the 11th chapter. Ok, signing off now.

The Passing of Dorian Gray

No, not Oscar Wilde's Dorian Gray. My Dorian Gray. Some of you knew him, some of you didn't. Dorian Gray was the lovely little blue betta who has been my companion these two years and a few odd months. Ever at war with the image of himself. Yes, the name was a semi-obscure literary reference, but it made me chuckle. Anyway, I'm rambling a bit. I woke up this morning to find that Dorian had...crossed the bar (another semi-obscure literary reference). In short, Dorian Gray is dead. I would be lying if I said that I wept or that I'm devastated. But the title of this blog is Small Happenings, because I think the things that happen every day resonate with deeper meaning. The simple fact is that this morning I discovered with shock and the faintest note of horror that the little creature I'd greeted every morning for over two years was just suddenly not alive anymore. I knew they didn't live much longer than two years anyway, so I thought I was expecting it. Apparently I wasn't, because I dropped what I was holding, gasped, and reflexively stepped away from the tank. I covered the tank back up and walked out the door to leave for work, telling myself I'd take care of him when I got home. On the drive, I kept thinking of an idea that one of my favorite college professers would often talk about. I'll try my best to paraphrase. It went something like this: People say eternal life doesn't make sense, but the truth is just the opposite. We aren't shocked by people living. It's natural and normal to be alive. We're shocked by death. It feels deeply wrong and out of place. Death is the thing that doesn't make any sense. 

Anyway, that's a little heavy for a post about my dead fish. A little on the lighter side, I'm fairly convinced Dorian heard me talking to people on the phone about my cat's imminent arrival and decided that a graceful belly-up death was greatly preferable to being eaten by a feline.

I never was able to take a picture of him that satisfied me. This one will have to do.