I was struck with renewed awe of late by a telescopic image of the galaxies, noting a distinct, but tiny orbiting speck of dusk, known as Earth. This is not new information but always brings perspective to those even more miniscule, who call out to the God who created these heavens! If distance was a requirement to be overcome in order for our prayers to be answered, even the loudest of vocal projections would be futile. Volume cannot be a physical factor in answered prayers, though intensity certainly at times seems necessary to express our longings.
God is ever present in time of trouble, hearing our faintest whispers, even when our needs catch us off guard with no time to pray! How can a Being so awesome as to speak all this into existence possibly be aware of our voice, much less, given the cacophony of noise our own mechanical creations have produced?
Noise, heightened volume, and the need for much speaking are perhaps our own illusions of what prayer is supposed to be. My reality has been that the most silent of thoughts are often the moments I can point back to as answered prayers; and though I can truly profess to hearing the audible voice of God, more numerous are His whispers to my heart.
God is beyond finding out, but not beyond being heard. My journey of forty years plus has provided reams of stories of His response to my prayers and the prayers prayed for me.
Not only am I confident of God’s words to me but ever more so, the words spoken to the prophets of old, some still yet to be fulfilled. Just this morning in my study of Jeremiah 33, I might as well have been reading a newspaper, as God continues to deliver on His promises. He seems to protect this tiny Israel against all odds, while maintaining a global presence of Judaism,even represented by Rabbis that I am told descend from the Levites, just as promised.
‘“The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah: “This is what the Lord says: ‘If you can break my covenant with the day and my covenant with the night, so that day and night no longer come at their appointed time, then my covenant with David my servant—and my covenant with the Levites who are priests ministering before me—can be broken and David will no longer have a descendant to reign on his throne. I will make the descendants of David my servant and the Levites who minister before me as countless as the stars in the sky and as measureless as the sand on the seashore.’” 1
“Today, Leviim are believed to be the direct patrilineal descendents of Levi, while Kohanim are Leviim who descend directly, through their fathers, from Aaron. Other Jews are assumed to come from one of the other tribes and are called, simply, Yisraelim. A convert to Judaism takes the status as a Yisrael. The only valid method of being a Levite (or Kohen) is to have an unbroken tradition, passed from generation to generation, stretching back to the time of Moses. In many Jewish communities, meticulous records were kept throughout the generations to ensure that ancestral lines remained clear.”2
The likelihood of any of this seems slim, given the religious and tribal wars the Middle East is so known for; compounded over the last two millennia by this righteous branch from David’s line, fulfilled in Jesus Christ. Still yet love endures and yes advances, even in the midst of hate and religious resistance; of late rousing still another, radical Islam.
Ironically, all their brutal fervor may be the manifestation of evil’s awareness of another promise now unfolding: the promise to Hagar and her child of Abraham, named Ishmael; which means “God has hearkened”. This moment seems to be stirring up all three Abrahamic religions, while God continues to demonstrate His faithfulness to all those to whom He has whispered over the centuries and to those who still dare call out to the “I Am”. He is no respecter of persons.
The God of plural galaxies is now whispering life and love to this tiny religiously plural globe; perhaps another sacred moment in history, much like the days of Moses in Egypt and Mary in Bethlehem; though this Lion of Judah seems more often to roar, when any religion, be it Judaism, Christianity or Islam, attempts to muffle this whispering God.
1 Jeremiah 33:19-22 NIV.