When we encounter the prophet Elijah in our reading from the first book of Kings, he’s in quite a predicament. He’s fleeing for his life, knowing that King Ahab and Queen Jezebel are out to kill him. Elijah has seen the people of Israel break their covenant with God to worship the foreign god of Baal. Distraught, Elijah flees into the wilderness in haste, wishing for death to come to him peacefully. The word of God comes to Elijah, telling him to stand on the mountaintop to see the Lord pass before him. A great wind, a strong earthquake, and a tremendous fire all pass by Elijah as he looks out the entrance of the cave where he’s hiding. Elijah is very surprised that the Lord is not in any of those strong, powerful acts of nature, since that is often how God manifests himself to the prophets. Yet, after seeing that the Lord was not in those grand acts of nature, the Lord comes to Elijah in a sublime, quiet whisper.
We might be looking for God in certain things, we might be expecting God to speak to us in a certain way, but God can be present to us in some very surprising ways. When I first arrived on my missionary assignment in the jungles of Ecuador, the pastor of our mission site asked me if I would accompany him to a remote village deep in the rainforest where we would have mass. The pastor had not been to this village for over a year since it was very far from our home base and since our mission site was over-loaded with over 100 villages under our care. After a 4-hour canoe ride, we rode horses for another two hours. I’ll never forget that horse ride, since I was mounted on a wooden saddle, which was incredibly uncomfortable. You can imagine how exhausted and dehydrated I was when we arrived at that village. But the worst part was yet to come. We had to cross this large ditch about 15 or 20 feet deep in order to get to the church; the only way across the ditch was by crossing a large log that was stretched across the ditch. As I saw the villagers hurrying across the ditch effortlessly, I looked at the pastor and said: “Oh no, you’ve got to be kidding me. I am petrified of heights. There is no way I am crossing that ditch on that log” He told me that I had no choice, that it was the only way across. I summoned the courage to try to cross that ditch. I tried to take my time to inch across slowly. As I started across, inch by inch, I actually made it to the half-way point on this huge log. But when I started thinking about what I was actually doing, I panicked and I came to a standstill, frozen in my tracks. I just knew I was going to fall. I remember looking across the other side where it seemed like half the village was watching me, quite amused and fascinated by the ordeal I was making out of this. I made eye contact with this little old man – he couldn’t have been more than 5 feet tall, and he looked like he was about 100 years old. Out of everyone in the crowd, he seemed to be the least equipped to help me, yet before I knew it, this little man ran to me on the middle of log, literally picking me up in a bear hug and carried me across to safety, literally running across the log the whole way. I was in shock, but I realized I had made it to safety. I was so grateful to this man, who was like a guardian angel to me that afternoon, reaching out to me in his kindness and compassion.
Yes, God can come to us in very expected ways in the different situations we are confronted with in life. Perhaps we’re expecting God to come to us in this huge earth-shattering event in our lives. But, more often than not, God comes to us in the quiet moments, in those ordinary, everyday events that make up the majority of our days here on earth. Maybe we’re looking for a specific way for God to speak to us, so much so that we miss the way he is already present. Elijah had the wisdom to recognize God’s voice in a whisper. He then covered his face with his cloak out of respect, knowing that he was in the presence of God. Here Elijah was trying to run away from all his problems, wishing that the Lord would let his life out of his mercy, but God found him and opened his heart to his presence.
In our Gospel for today, the disciples also don’t see God in all the signs he has given them. They had just seen the miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and the fish, yet in the midst of a fearful storm out at sea, when Jesus is walking towards them to offer them help and comfort, they don’t even recognize him - they think it is a ghost. The goal of our faith is not to experience a miracle. Our goal is not to be able to walk on water, or to see God in a powerful, miraculous event. Rather, the goal of our faith is to grow in our relationship with God each day, to see Christ’s presence in our lives in whatever form it presents itself, whether it be in our joys or in our sufferings, in a moment of silence or in our interactions with our family and friends and co-workers. We are to experience God’s abiding love for us in the many different moments he is present to us. In other words, God is there for us in so many ways. It is up to us to see him as he makes his presence known to us.
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