Look for Your Geese: Finding the Still, Small Voice in Faith Fatigue
Have you ever felt so worn down by the state of the world that you just wanted to run away? That feeling has a name: faith fatigue. It's the ache of doing your best to follow Jesus and love your neighbor, only to watch injustice keep piling up anyway. This week's reflection, drawn from the prophet Elijah's flight into the wilderness, offers no easy fix for that ache — but it does offer a place to start: rest, a still small voice, and the reminder that none of us are meant to carry this alone.
A Different Kind of Sunday
This sermon comes a little differently than usual. After a week at the Montreat Music and Worship Conference spent listening more than writing, the reflections that follow are offered less as a polished manuscript and more as honest thoughts on wrapping up this first leg of a summer series through 1 and 2 Kings.
One phrase from a sermon heard that week, preached by the Rev. Dr. Brian Blount, president emeritus of Union Presbyterian Seminary, set the tone for everything that follows: faith fatigue. It's that particular exhaustion that comes from trying, in our own imperfect way, to be agents of good in the world — individually and as a church — and watching things not go in a good direction anyway.
Elijah's Flight
Elijah knew this fatigue well. Fresh off his triumphant showdown with the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel — a moment when God showed up in dramatic, undeniable fashion — Elijah found himself running for his life the very next day, chased by Queen Jezebel's death threat. Despondent, he collapsed under a broom tree in the wilderness and prayed for God to simply let him die.
What did God send in response? Not a rebuke. Not a new assignment. An angel with a very practical message.
You need a nap and a snack.
That's it. Rest, a freshly baked cake, and water — provision enough to sustain Elijah for forty days and forty nights on his journey to Mount Horeb. Sometimes the most spiritual thing we can do is admit we need a pity party, a nap, and something to eat.
Not in the Wind, Not in the Fire
At Horeb, Elijah witnessed a great wind, an earthquake, and a fire — but God was not found in any of them. God came instead in a sound of sheer silence, a still small voice, asking a simple question: "What are you doing here?"
That question isn't shame. It's an invitation — the kind of gentle, searching question God asks all of us when we need to pause, reflect, and rejuvenate before returning to the work of justice, humility, and kindness. We are not made for endless striving without rest.
A Relay, Not a Solo Marathon
After Elijah's rest, God gave him new marching orders: go anoint others, including the prophet Elisha, who would come alongside him to share the mantle of leadership. The message underneath that instruction is one worth sitting with:
I called you to do something, but I never called you to do it alone.
The life of faith isn't a solo marathon we're meant to finish by ourselves. It's a relay race — one where we run our leg, rest when we need to, and pass the baton to those who come after us. We are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses who ran before us, and we will hand the baton to those who come next. We may not see the race finished in our lifetime, and that's part of what it means to live by faith.
Look for Your Geese
Sometimes the still, small voice shows up in the most unexpected places. During a loud, frightening thunderstorm, a backyard full of geese — the kind that had become a beloved, if messy, fixture of home — stayed calm and quiet even as the heavens thundered around them. In that stillness was a reminder: God's still, small voice is present right in the middle of the noise and chaos of life, if we're willing to look for it.
Whatever your own "geese" might be — whatever ordinary, unassuming place where you glimpse God's steadiness in the middle of the storm — look for it. Trust it. Let it call you back to where God is calling you to be.
As we close every worship service at Guilford Park, we're reminded: we are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are we free to abandon it. The still, small voice is calling. It's worth listening for.
Questions for Reflection
- When have you felt something like "faith fatigue" — worn down by trying to do good in a world that doesn't seem to be responding? How did you respond to that feeling?
- Elijah's first answer from God wasn't a command, but rest and food. Where in your own life might God be inviting you to simply rest before doing anything else?
- God asked Elijah, "What are you doing here?" If you sat with that same question today, what would your honest answer be?
- Who has been part of your "relay team" in the life of faith — someone who has carried the baton before you, or someone you are helping carry it now?
- What are your "geese" — the ordinary, unexpected places where you've noticed God's still, small voice in the middle of noise or chaos?
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