Reverend Marco Ste-Marie

Let’s be clear from the start: if you’re treating prayer like a backup plan, a last resort, or a tool to get what you want—then you’re missing the point.

Prayer is not a transaction. It’s not a performance. And it’s certainly not a spiritual vending machine.

Prayer is the conversation that changes everything. Everything.

It’s not optional. It’s essential—just like breathing. And yet, many of us have settled for something far less than what God intended.

We say a few words before meals or in crisis. We mumble through a bedtime prayer.

But are we actually listening?

Are we showing up in that sacred space ready to meet God, or are we just checking a box and moving on?

If you had a friend who only called when they needed money or help moving, you’d feel used.

Eventually, you’d stop picking up the phone.

So ask yourself: Is that how you’ve been treating God? If so, it’s time to stop.

PRAYER IS A TWO-WAY CONVERSATION

Prayer is not one-sided. It’s not just our words—it’s listening for His.

And God does speak.

Not always in dramatic signs, but in stillness. In silence. In the deep stirrings of your soul.

This truth is powerfully illustrated in 1 Kings 19:11–12. Elijah, the prophet, had just come from the greatest public victory of his ministry—the showdown on Mount Carmel where the prophets of Baal were defeated.

He had expected that this visible triumph would turn the nation back to God.

Instead, Queen Jezebel threatened to kill him. Discouraged, frightened, and feeling like a failure, Elijah fled to Mount Horeb—also known as Mount Sinai, the same mountain where Moses encountered God and received the covenant.

God told Elijah, “Go out and stand on the mountain… for the Lord is about to pass by.” The words “pass by” in Hebrew (ʿābar) are a classic theophany phrase—it’s the same verb used when God’s presence passed before Moses in Exodus 33. In other words, Elijah was about to encounter God Himself.

Then came a great wind, so strong it tore through the mountains. But God was not in the wind.

Then an earthquake shook the ground—but God was not in the earthquake.

Then a fire blazed—but God was not in the fire.

For ancient Israel, these natural forces often symbolized divine power, echoing the Sinai theophany of Exodus 19. But here, the text deliberately subverts expectation:

After the fire came “a sound of sheer silence” (Hebrew: qôl demāmāh daqqāh, literally “the voice of thin silence”). This paradoxical phrase suggests not merely a quiet whisper, but a presence so real that it speaks without sound. And that’s where God was.

The lesson?

God’s decisive presence is not always revealed through dramatic events, political victories, or loud displays of power.

Often, it comes in stillness. This should shake us in our noisy, production-driven culture: IF OUR LIVES ARE TOO NOISY TO HEAR GOD’S WHISPER, THEN THEY ARE TOO NOISY—PERIOD.

Prayer, then, is our way of entering that stillness. It’s not about filling the air with our words, but making space to hear God’s.

And just as Elijah learned, God may be speaking in ways that don’t match our expectations.