Countdown to Christmas: Day Two

Prepare to receive anew the whole of CHRISTmas.
Imagine with me.

Dead silence for 400 years! What makes us (CHRISTians) different than all other peoples is that our God (the One and Only) seeks a love relationship with us and isn't a distant, ever changing being who promises nothing of himself. God's people had a relationship with their God. He spoke to them and they heard Him. It is what set them apart. They heard God. Then....there was dead silence...for 400 years!

God was giving His people the silent treatment. Why not everything else hadn't got their attention. In fact Amos 2:11-12 says, "I raised up some of your sons as prophets, And some of your young men as Nazirites. Is it not so, O you children of Israel?" Says the Lord. "But you gave the Nazirites wine to drink, And commanded the prophets saying, 'Do not prophesy!' They told God they wanted Him to stop talking. And then there is this in Zech. 7:11-12 "But they refused to heed, shrugged their shoulders, and stopped their ears so that they could not hear. [12] Yes, they made their hearts like flint, refusing to hear the law and the words which the Lord of hosts had sent by His Spirit through the former prophets. Thus great wrath came from the Lord of hosts." When God spoke they would not listen. Silence from God. Silence from the One who delivered you from bondage, defeated your enemies, blessed you with cities, lands, etc. and gave you His words. Silence. Complete and total silence.

What was God's intention in His silence? The famine of hearing Word was to create a hunger again for the Word. As long as His people were full of themselves they would never crave Him. He had to create that emptiness so they would seek to be filled again. I heard it put another way, "He used the withholding of His words to prepare for the revealing of THE WORD! Galatians 4:4 "But when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son..."

I leave with some personal questions to ask yourself. Are you telling God you want Him to stop talking because you don't like what He says? Oh, I know you would never say the words but are you making the time daily to stop and listen to what He says? Have you pushed His Word aside? When you do hear His Word do you do it? Are you listening to what He is saying? Are you stopping long enough to give Him your full and undivided attention? Or are you letting His Words go in one ear and out the other? Maybe, you haven't heard God speak in a long time and find yourself in a time of famine. Is it creating a hunger? Then feast again on His abundance. He has promised that if we seek Him, He will be found. We don't have to live a life of famine and silence of our God.

As I leave today ponder the years and years of silence of their God. Try to imagine the way they felt and what they considered as the days marched on and on without a prophet, without a sign or word. How would you be feeling? What would you be thinking?