During the time of Elijah, Israel was suffering serious spiritual decline under the rule of Ahab, and Jezebel. God raised up the prophet Elijah to be a voice and an instrument of spiritual awakening and revival. In 1 Kings 17, after declaring to Ahab that the rain would stop, and there would be a famine in the land, God taught Elijah how to trust Him for the supernatural. As Elijah hid himself by the brook, Cherith God sent ravens to bring meat and bread to Elijah in the mornings and in the evenings. After a while, the brook dried up because there had been no rain, and God sent Elijah to a city called Zarephath where a widow would provide for him. Every day they would eat bread from the bowl of flour and a jar of all, and it never ran out. Towards the end of his stay with the widow, God used him to raise her son from the dead. God then instructed Elijah to leave Zarephath and to go to Mount Carmel, where God would expose the prophets of Baal and demonstrate His own power and glory by extraordinary miracles at the hand of Elijah. Elijah assumed that all the people, including Ahab and Jezebel, would repent, and revival would come. To his shock, Ahab and especially Jezebel remained defiant, and she threatened Elijah’s life. Even though Elijah had witnessed God perform so many miracles in the last 3 ½ years of his life, the discouragement of revival not happening the way he thought it would caused him to run for his life and eventually found himself in a cave at Mount Horeb. In his discouragement and despair, Elijah complained to the Lord about Israel’s condition and declared that he was the only prophet left and that Jezebel was seeking his life. When it seemed to Elijah that all was lost and that the culture was doomed, God told him to stand before Him. A great and strong wind that was so powerful it broke rocks into pieces blew, but the Lord was not in the wind. Then an earthquake occurred, but the Lord was not in the earthquake, and after the earthquake, there was a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire and then finally there was the sound of a gentle blowing, and when Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle, and went out and stood in the entrance of the cave, and a voice came to him and said, “What are you doing here Elijah?” (The Hebrew phrase “gentle blowing” literally means “the voice of silence thin.”)
Elijah once again complained to the Lord that all the prophets had been killed, and he was the only one left, and Jezebel was seeking his life. At that point, God began to reveal to Elijah that not only was he not alone, but there were 7000 other prophets in Israel that had not bowed to Baal.
Sometimes God is in “The voice of silence thin.” When it seems that God is most silent is often when He is most active. God’s power was working all along, upholding all things and working his purposes just as potently in the invisible and silence as in the profound and the dramatic. This truth is so applicable in our own personal lives during those times when it seems that God is silent. It is also uniquely true in our culture today, where it appears that evil is triumphant and God is silent. Here’s what we can know during those times of “The voice of silence thin;” God knows what he is doing, and when He seems removed, He is most present. When He seems most silent, He is often at His most powerful. Jesus said in John 5:17, “My Father is working even until now, and I Myself and working.” If you are in a place of discouragement because of something going on in your personal life or because of what’s going on in the culture around us than the Lord wants to say to you “What are you doing here?” We are called believers for reason and he wants us to trust Him. The size of the enemies apparent triumph is a good indicator of the size of God’s victory to be revealed. He’s got the enemy right where He wants him.