Do you know one thing I love about this passage? God poses this question to Elijah twice: “What are you doing here?” And both times Elijah gives exactly the same depressed and desperate answer–even though God has profoundly appeared to Elijah in the sound of sheer silence between the first time and the second time God asks the question.

I think that this can be a profound story for people experiencing deep grief and trauma. It is a testament to the fact that God is with us—and that God will be with us in exactly the ways we need to experience the divine in our lives at the moment. For Elijah, in this moment, that experience was not in the wind or earthquake or fire. Elijah already had enough drama in his life. He needed the God of silence. And that is how God showed up for Elijah.

This story, though, also affirms that the presence of God with us does not necessarily mean that we feel any better. Elijah still feels lonely and scared even though God is with him. I think that too often in the church we say—or at least imply—that God’s presence with us fixes things, that it fixes us. Very often it doesn’t.

Which means that our inability to “get over” things, our failure to “perk up,” our abiding fear/anger/resentment/sadness—these are not spiritual shortcomings; these are not signs of God’s absence from our lives. They are signs that we are human and life is hard. When we are in the cave of fear/anger/resentment/sadness, that is exactly where God is in exactly the way we need God to be with us, regardless of how we feel. Thanks be to God.