I love good small talk and banter, it is a legitimate language of love as far as I’m concerned, and deep conversation enriches our lives. But the pinnacle— after we’ve retold stories, exchanged inside jokes, caught up and shared our hearts— is when we take a deep sigh and sit in a full, knowing silence. A peaceful place of contented quietness, knowing we don’t need to fill space with sound just for the sake of it.
We are confident in our connection— confident enough to breathe, take in the moment, reflect and simply enjoy the other’s company. There, we know we don’t have to perform, strive or entertain the other person to keep them around. Sometimes the reward of friendship is resting and knowing you’re loved, in finding a silence that conveys more than affirming words can. We are meant to have that with the Lord. There’s a stillness where we are delighted in and where we delight in Him, a Spirit-to-spirit connection.
I wonder if that was part of what God was getting at when He told Elijah He would meet him on a mountain in 1 Kings 19. Elijah waited as a mighty wind billowed through, a rattling earthquake shook the ground, and a blazing fire rose, but God wasn’t in any of them.
Instead He was found in the whisper that came after all the noise.
How do you find His whisper in your fast-paced day? How do you quiet yourself to listen? How do you sit and soak in contented peace, in being known by God?
It’s as easy as carving out the time to wait and listen. God will always take the opportunity to speak to you. There’s a deeper relationship with Him that moves beyond just seeking Him for answers, religious duty or a divine checklist, but instead to know His voice, His presence, His face.
There’s something special about music that creates that space for encounter with God’s presence.
Music helps us wait; it tunes our senses, keeps us engaged, helps us wait on Him.
There His peace meets you, His joy runs through you, His love rests and calms all anxiety and busyness. There’s so much more to Him than what could be contained in mere words. He is beyond the culmination of our every attempt to describe, quantify, express or explain Him. Music has a way of conveying when words fall short.
We are certainly not the first ones to think this way. God created by the sound of His voice, the timbre and tone of His words spoken into the void. The resonance of His voice still creates new realities in us. David played his harp for Saul whose mind was sick and tormented by a spirit, and the resonance of the harp brought relief to an oppressed king. Instruments still prophesy, music still heals.
The Psalmists makes a profound statement and then calls for a “selah,” a moment of silence to let the truth sink deep. Some moments still call for selahs. God’s not limited by language. The spoken word is not His only native tongue.
His pedagogy transcends convention. He speaks— but the very Word that became flesh is not confined to pen and paper, black and white, print and re-print. He speaks inside and outside of convention and punctuation. What He shares is Himself. He may be known in word and speech— and rhythm, rhyme, shade, scale, song, crescendo, contrast and color. Spirit-to-spirit we enter in as deep cries to deep. Face-to-face we experience the contentment, peace, joy, truth and love found in His presence. We come to know Him in friendship, with words and without.
For further reflection: spend some time soaking in His presence with our instrumental worship album, “Without Words: Synesthesia.” Here’s the song, “Ever Be” by Kalley Heiligenthal.
Amen.
amazing and beautifully written.
Beautiful! My heart and my soul needed this today! ❤️
Really good.
Sing THE WORD OF GOD is just as beautiful when read! Our worship to our Father of Love
yes! “God’s not limited by language. The spoken word is not His only native tongue.”
well said… maybe for Elijah on that mountain, maybe for us when we trip into the ‘Selah’ pause in our worship… maybe it’s a test to see how close to Him we are?? Are we so close to Him that we don’t feel we have to perform or entertain or gab? Are we so close to Him that SILENCE and being with Him is totally comfortable, just like some old married couple who 48 years in, can be totally connected and together and can actually kinda know what the other would say?? That’s how I want to be with my ABBA…
That was so well said Kalley. I worship daily with your music but this revelation gave me new insight. Thank you.
I saw a few people running. I was behind them as they ran.
Beautifully written.
Amen, so beautiful
Writing Songs about an Imaginary being, what a waste of energy!
Thank you Kalley, so beautifully written! Yes, I think many of us need to understand ‘soaking in His presence’ the way you put it! It was refreshing!
Kalley, you have blessed me so deeply with this. Such an amazingly beautifully written and authentic description of what I have been trying to explain to a fellowship that meets weekly in our house. I am going to read your words to them and give you and your ministry full credit. My son and I journeyed from Dubai to Redding earlier this month to Bethel’s Healing & Impartation conference and we have been so blessed by our experience and those we met along the way. May God bless you all and continuously increase your hunger and thirst for Him and His righteousness. I pray that He will give you deeper revelations of Himself and encounters of Him and that your family will be covered and sealed under the blood of the Lamb of God.