During the summertime, I would take walks, at least once a week, in JMU’s Arboretum. I left my phone in the car, and I carried a journal, and a pen. I’d walk through the winding trails to clear my mind and pray. One day, I found an unkempt, aroma filled trail. There were herbs everywhere- so many types of basil, lavender, mint, lemon balm (my favorite), and many others. The thin stems of each intertwined with one another, as if to suggest a recipe imagined by the earth itself. I still have leaves of lemon balm and stems of lavender snuggled between the pages of my summer journal.
Most days I’d walk a familiar trail and find a hidden bench to sit, journal, and listen to the swishing of leaves above my head. In one of those moments of searching for a tucked away bench (with no spiders!), I heard God whisper about a “secret place.” This whisper from God was so clear-- it did not have the flavor of my own thoughts-- but it didn’t make sense.
I let the whisper sit, until being reminded of God’s powerful whisper while reading First Kings 19.
In First Kings 19, Elijah, the prophet, is fleeing the Israelites who want to kill him. He would rather die than face the angry Israelites. But, God asks Elijah to stand on a mountain while the Lord passes by. On the mountain, Elijah witnesses a powerful wind, an earthquake, and a fire. God is not found in any of those loud, attention-grabbing elements. Elijah, now windblown, unsteady, and flushed, hears a gentle whisper and immediately prepares to face God. Elijah receives specific and timely directions for his, and Israel’s, immediate future-- Elijah still has a lot of life to live.
While I have not received specific directions, my hunt to understand the “secret place” has been timely. With a simple search on Bible Hub, the phrase “secret place” appears in 15 different passages of Scripture. This phrase is used both negatively (Psalm 18:11) and positively (Song of Solomon 2:14), as a place of God (Psalm 91:1) and a place of man (Psalm 51:6). The most applicable passage is Psalm 51:6, “Yet you desired faithfulness even in the womb; you taught me wisdom in that secret place.”
Wisdom. God desires wisdom in our most vulnerable, intimate places-- in our hearts, in conversations with loved ones, in our inmost thoughts. This is hard. God’s whisper for wisdom in the secret place is a lot more revealing than a powerful wind.
I have noticed my need for wisdom as I’ve read and learned so much in the last three months. This month, To Change the World: The Irony, Tragedy, and Possibility of Christianity in the Late Modern World by James Hunter, especially rocked my world. He confirmed many of my thoughts on Christianity and culture, and he gave me a vocabulary to speak about a humbler, more winsome way of engaging the world as a Christian. However, I need to be wise and winsome to even talk about being wise and winsome!
This realization of my need for wisdom has been overwhelming, but sweet. God has answered my call quickly with resources and space to process all these ideas. The other Fellows and I just had a book discussion on Old Testament Wisdom Literature by Craig Bartholomew and Ryan O’Dowd. I will tell you more about that in my next newsletter. For now, I will get quiet, listen, and anticipate the birth of Christ. As it says in Ecclesiastes 3, “there is a time to be silent, and a time to speak.”
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