We’re so used to instant search results on Google; we complain if the wait to see our GP is longer than a week; we can access our bank accounts, emails and our best friends 24/7 on our smart phones. Even people who don't like us have an instant access to us through social media. Communication is constant. And noisy. And cluttered.

Typically, when we ask God for direction, we listen out for him as we would listen for a return phone call from our kid's school, or the financial advisor, or the doctor's receptionist. He'll call or text or send some obvious message like everything, and everyone else does.

And we wonder why we can’t hear him?

We often pray like we're placing calls, we petition like we're writing a letter to our local government official, we apply for miracles with our faith and good deeds like we would a bank loan. We do our bit, and God does his bit, right? We wait for him to answer, respond or reply… But mostly, he doesn't.

In his book, “Wishful Thinking,” Frederick Buechner said,

“In Hebrew and Greek, the Latin word spiritus originally meant “breath” (as in expire, respiratory, and so on), and breath is what you have when you're alive and don't have when you're dead. Thus spirit = breath = life, the aliveness and power of your life, and to speak of your spirit (or soul) is to speak of the power of life that is in you… God also has a spirit — is Spirit, says the Apostle John (4:24). Thus God is the power of the power of life itself, has breathed and continues to breathe life into his creation. Inspires it.“

Before God exists in loud declarations, he exists in silence. He exists in the empty space. In the breath. The breathing in and out of inexpressible words. Words more felt than heard. Present. Constant. Eternal.