1 Kings 19:12 And after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice. I. WHEN GOD COMES TO REPROVE MEN FOR THEIR SINS, HE USUALLY MANIFESTS HIMSELF TO THEM, or addresses them, not by His works, either of creation or providence, but by a "still small voice." Thus it was in the instance before us. You have all known something of the force of the winds; you have felt your habitations tremble before the fury of the blast. And not a few of you have witnessed more terrible proofs of its power on the ocean. You have seen the billows raised into mountains, and lashed into foam. You have felt the labouring vessel reel under you, while tossed by a tempest which seemed sufficient to rend the mountains, and break in pieces the rocks; and you have seen the tempest become a calm. But, as it respected you, God was not in the wind, nor in the calm which succeeded. You saw His hand, you heard His voice in neither. If you then heard Him in anything, it was in a "still small voice" within you. Further, the globe which we inhabit, though not this particular part of it, has often been convulsed by the most terrible and desolating earthquakes. Even some parts of New England have been agitated in a degree sufficient to excite distressing apprehensions. But have the nations thus visited found God in the earthquake? Did our fathers find Him there as an instructor and reprover? Far from it. Never have the survivors been reformed by such events. The earthquakes in New England did, indeed, occasion a kind of religious panic. A writer, who was then one of the ministers of Boston, informs us, that immediately after the great earthquake, as it was called, a great number of his flock came and expressed a wish to unite themselves with the church. But on conversing with them he could find no evidence of improvement in their religious views or feelings, no convictions of their own sinfulness; nothing, in short, but a kind of superstitious fear, occasioned by a belief that the end of the world was at hand. All their replies proved that they had not found God in the earthquake. The same may be said of other means. Ministers may give voice and utterance to the Bible, which is the Word of God. Like James and John, they may be "sons of thunder" to impenitent sinners. They may pour forth a tempest of impassioned, eloquent declamation. Nothing effectual can be done unless God be there, unless He speaks with His "still small voice." II. THAT WHEN GOD SPEAKS TO MEN WITH THIS VOICE, HE SPEAKS TO THEM PERSONALLY, or does, as it were, call them by name. This He did in the case before us. He addressed the prophet by his name, Elijah. III. THAT, WHEN GOD SPEAKS TO MEN IN THIS "STILL SMALL VOICE," HE USUALLY BEGINS BY TURNING THEIR ATTENTION UPON THEMSELVES, THEIR CONDUCT, AND SITUATION. He said to the prophet, "What doest thou here, Elijah?" a question which was most admirably adapted to convince, reprove, and humble him. (E. Payson, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: And after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice. |
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