Walking With Christ

(Part 5 of 7)

⚓Floatie:  When Heaven Goes Quiet

Psalm 22:1–2  (1)My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?  Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning?  (2)O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer, and by night, but I find no rest.(ESV)

There is a silence so heavy that even breathing feels like confession.  A silence so absolute that it makes you question whether you ever heard God to begin with.  A silence that does not wound the mind or the body — but the soul.

The silence began the night the thread of identity snapped.  And it did not lift for five years.

We talk about the wilderness as if it is a season.  We talk about silence as if it is a teaching moment.  We talk about hardship as if it is a lesson.

I learned that sometimes the wilderness is not a metaphor.  The silence is not a teaching aid.  And the hardship is not a chapter.

Sometimes, silence is the scalpel God uses to separate the false self from the real one.

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✒️ Forge:  The Dark Night of Identity

Isaiah 45:15  Truly, you are a God who hides himself, O God of Israel, the Savior.(ESV)

Amos 8:11  “Behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord God, “when I will send a famine on the land — not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord.(ESV)

Silence is not the absence of God.  Silence is the absence of reference points.

When God stopped speaking, I lost more than comfort.  I lost my compass.  I lost my emotional architecture.  I lost the sense that life had a center.

But silence does not mean God has moved away.  Silence means God has moved differently.

The believer misinterprets silence because we assume God speaks to:

• affirm.
• comfort.
• guide.

Scripture teaches something else:  God also speaks by not speaking.

Silent seasons:

• expose dependence,
• reveal false identity layers,
• starve emotional identity,
• suffocate role identity,
• remove the illusion of control,
• and force the soul to confront what it actually trusts.

Silence is not God turning His back.  Silence is God holding your face so you cannot look anywhere else.

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⚒️ Anvil:  The Lies the Enemy Whispers into God’s Silence

Psalm 13:1–2  (1)How long, O Lord?  Will you forget me forever?  How long will you hide your face from me?  (2)How long shall I take counsel in my soul and have sorrow in my heart all the day?  How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?(ESV)

When God is silent, the enemy is not.  Hell is loudest in the absence of heaven’s voice.

The enemy speaks three categories of lies in silence:

1. Lies about God

• “He abandoned you.”
• “He’s punishing you.”
• “You disappointed Him.”
• “You broke something in your faith.”

2. Lies about identity

• “You were never His in the first place.”
• “You’re too broken to restore.”
• “You lost your chance.”
• “Your identity was fake.”

3. Lies about meaning

• “Nothing matters now.”
• “The past is gone.”
• “The future is impossible.”
• “You are the sum of the silence.”

Silence is not the danger.  Interpretation is the danger.

The enemy cannot create identity.  But he can interpret your silence in a way that feels like meaning.

This is how souls fracture:  Not because God stops speaking, but because the enemy fills the vacuum.

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🔥 Ember:  The Prayer I Couldn’t Pray

Psalm 77:7–9  (7)“Will the Lord spurn forever, and never again be favorable?  (8)Has his steadfast love forever ceased?  Are his promises at an end for all time?  (9)Has God forgotten to be gracious?  Has he in anger shut up his compassion?”  Selah(ESV)

Here is the ember — the smallest spark in the darkest hour:  I could not pray.
Not truly.  I could speak words.  I could recite Scripture.  I could attend church.  I could bow my head.  But prayer requires relational continuity, and my identity break destroyed every continuity I knew.

How do you pray to the God you remember when you do not remember the self He loved?

How do you pray when the voice you once recognized feels like a dream you can no longer prove happened?

How do you pray when silence lasts so long that hope forgets what it feels like?

There is a point where the soul cannot pray for deliverance.  It can only pray for endurance.  This is what held me:  “God, don’t let me fall farther than Your hand can reach.”

That was the only prayer I could manage for years.  It was enough.

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🌿 Covenant Triumph:  The God Who Holds When We Cannot Hear

Deuteronomy 31:8  It is the Lord who goes before you.  He will be with you; he will not leave you or forsake you.  Do not fear or be dismayed.”(ESV)

Psalm 121:4–5  (4)Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.  (5)The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade on your right hand.(ESV)

Silence did not mean abandonment.  Silence meant God was doing work too deep to narrate.

Had God spoken during those years, I would have clung to His voice and never discovered what He preserved in my spirit when my mind was gone.

The triumph is not that God finally spoke again.  The triumph is that He never stopped holding me.

I thought I was surviving without Him.  I was surviving because of Him.

The silence was the furnace.  The silence was the scalpel.  The silence was the threshing floor.

And the silence was the proof:  Identity rooted in God does not require constant reassurance.  It only requires His presence — and He never left.

The Practice of Obedience:  Learning to Hear God in the Quiet

This obedience confronts the fear of silence directly.

1. Physical Act:  Sit in Silence for Five Minutes Without Speaking

Not praying.  Not asking.  Not performing.  Just sitting.

Let the fear surface.  Let the noise inside quiet.  Say only:  “Lord, I am here.”

2. Relational Act:  Tell Someone About a Silent Season You Never Admitted

Say:  “There was a time I felt abandoned by God, and I’ve never said it out loud.”  Owning silence breaks shame.

3. Spiritual Act:  Read Psalm 22 Aloud

Not as David’s lament.  As your own.  The Spirit uses Scripture to teach the soul how to lament without losing faith.  God meets the believer in honest silence before He meets them in answered prayer.

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[⚓ Floatie] [✒️ Forge] [⚒️ Anvil] [🔥 Ember] [🌿 Covenant Triumph]
This post follows the Forge Baseline Rule—layered truth for the discerning remnant.