Radio Silence

Angelique Strothers
Jan 10, 2012
4 min read

Updated: Feb 12, 2020

The President of the United States enters the room waving and smiling; the audience erupts with thunderous applause and the few who were lucky enough to be seated in the front of the auditorium reach feverishly trying to shake his hand as he heads for the stage. As he approaches the podium, center stage, a hush falls over this entire auditorium of 10,000 people. 10,000 people and not one sound is heard! If a pin dropped the sound would have echoed through the entire auditorium! Everyone in attendance is on the edge of their seat waiting expectantly to hear what the POTUS has to say.

Reverence, awe, respect… so often we misplace these things. We “pay” these things to those to whom they are not “owed”. We idolize celebrities, people in power, popular/gifted people. We idolize shoes, clothes, jewelry, people’s thoughts about us, etc. We idolize these things so much that we become a slave to them. Everything we do is with these people or things in mind.

In Habakkuk 2 God is responding to Habakkuk’s questions about how long evil would prevail in the world (i.e. how long would God allow Judah to remain in captivity to the violent, harsh control of the Babylonians). At the end of this chapter God then addresses the vain worship of idols. He illustrates how foolish idolatry is. Idols are lifeless creations of man, yet we bow down to them just the same. God says that man makes idols that cannot even speak, but we expect them to demonstrate some sort of power. It seems foolish, but we do it all the time. We give people and things so much of our focus that family, friends, work and even GOD become insignificant in comparison. We begin to worship people and things that are lifeless. “But people aren’t lifeless” you might argue… People can’t provide life, only God gives life. So, if God is the only one who can give life, then He’s certainly the only one who can give life any meaning/purpose. So when we are looking to a person to give our lives meaning/purpose, it’s just as foolish as looking to an object to give our lives meaning/purpose.

God says, basically, all you can do is talk at an idol with not even a hope of hearing back from it! Who wants to talk at someone(-thing) that isn’t at some point going to reciprocate?! So essentially, idol worship consists of a person talking and talking and talking (about what they want) and then walking away unchanged, without the expectation of an answer. The problem with us is… we’ve gotten so used to serving idols that we do 1 of 2 things. We either: (1)Treat God like we treat our idols or (2)we think we’re in relationship with God, when actually we’re still serving our idols unaware.

(1)Treating God like we treat our idols: we’ve gotten so used to idolatry that we begin talking at God and then just walking away and we call that our prayer life! In the beginning of Habakkuk chapter 2, Habakkuk has already finished asking his questions at the end of chapter 1 and to open this new chapter he says, “I will stand watch… I will look to see what He will say to me…”- (Hab 2:1-2). Habakkuk asked God his questions; he spoke to God and then he waited for God’s response……… AND GOD SPOKE BACK!!! God says, the time is over when we can just speak at Him and walk away with our ears and hearts closed… unchanged; because we don’t expect to hear anything more from Him than we expect to hear from our idols! He is the true and living God NOT a dead object meant to accept dead worship!

(2)We think we’re in relationship with God when actually we’re still serving our idols unaware: We need to be cognizant during our prayer time. If our prayers read more like a Christmas wish list than a heart-felt conversation, then we should be on SAA (Spiritual Amber Alert)! What are you constantly praying that God would give you/”bless you with”? That just might be your idol. Or worse yet, if you can’t get past what you want then YOU might be your own idol. If you’re not willing to bypass your plans for God’s because “I don’t know what you have for me, God, but I know what I want and how it’ll all work out if you just give me.. xyz…” then FEAR might be your idol. You might think that you are “in relationship” with God because you’re “praying”, but all you’re doing is offering a rotten stench up to God by throwing your idols up in His face.

In verse 20 (Hab. 2:20) God finally says, “But, the LORD is in His holy temple; let all the earth be silent before Him/(in His presence).” God desires RELATIONSHIP not religion. Don’t “pray” three times a day if your “prayers” only consist of your voice. If all you hear during your “prayer time” is your own voice: your wants, your needs, your desires, your frustrations; then you aren’t praying, you’re venting and using God as your own personal garbage disposal. God is in His holy temple, and our natural response out of reverence, awe, respect… AND LOVE should be total silence in expectation of what God has to say to us! “Speak, LORD, your servant is listening” (I Sam. 3:10)……………………