Open Your Bible Before Saying God Is Silent

“Don’t say God is silent when your Bible is closed.”

It’s just ten words but they echo like thunder in the soul of every believer who’s ever wondered where God is in their suffering, silence, or confusion. These words don’t accuse they awaken. They reveal a sobering truth: when we complain that God isn’t speaking, we’re often the ones who’ve gone quiet first.

Scripture tells us repeatedly that God speaks. He has spoken through prophets, through creation, through Christ and now, through His Word. More than 750,000 words across 66 books have been breathed out by the Holy Spirit and preserved through centuries not simply for theological study, but for intimate, daily communion. God’s Word is not a past-tense message. It is a present-tense conversation, waiting for your ears to open.

God's Voice Has Never Been Silent

A.W. Tozer once said, “The Bible is not only a book which was once spoken, but a book which is now speaking.” That statement isn’t poetic sentiment it’s foundational reality. The Scriptures were not written to gather dust or decorate shelves. They are living and active (Hebrews 4:12), confronting us, comforting us, guiding us, and growing us in Christlikeness.

Charles Spurgeon echoed the same truth when he said, “No one ever outgrows the Scriptures. The Book widens and deepens with our years.” Whether you’ve walked with the Lord for three months or three decades, the Word remains inexhaustibly rich. Each reading can be like turning the key in a door you thought you already opened, only to find an entirely new room filled with light and clarity.

Why We Miss His Voice

The problem, then, is not God's silence it’s our closed ears and unopened Bibles.

Think of it this way complaining that God is silent while your Bible stays closed is like blaming your phone for not receiving texts while it’s powered off. We live in a time when nearly every Christian household has multiple Bibles and unlimited access to Scripture online. And yet, according to a 2024 Barna study, only 14% of professing Christians read the Bible daily. With such spiritual famine in the midst of plenty, it’s no wonder we feel so spiritually dry.

Opening the Bible isn’t just about religious duty it’s about reconnecting with the Father’s voice. He’s not shouting over the noise of our distractions; He’s waiting patiently for the volume of our lives to go down, for the clutter of opinions to clear, and for us to open the one book that always speaks truth.

The Sacred Price of the Word

Before we treat the Bible as common or boring, we ought to remember the immense cost of getting Scripture into our hands.

Countless translators, missionaries, and martyrs have suffered and even died so that people across languages and nations might know the voice of God. The Scriptures have not merely survived history they’ve shaped it. Every archeological discovery continues to affirm its historical accuracy. The lives of billions have been radically transformed by the truths found in its pages.

This is not just a book; it is the living testimony of God’s glory revealed in Jesus Christ. As 2 Corinthians 4:6 proclaims, through it we see “the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”

John Piper refers to the Bible as revealing a “peculiar glory.” It’s a glory that doesn’t need defending only beholding. A glory that reorients the heart and renews the mind. And every single verse testifies to this power.

We Don't Live on Sunday Sermons

D.L. Moody once told a man who hoped to get enough from a religious conference to last him a lifetime: “You might as well try to eat enough breakfast at one time to last you a lifetime.” The Christian life requires daily nourishment.

You wouldn’t expect your physical body to survive on a single meal per week. Why, then, should your soul be any different?

Psalm 1 offers us the blueprint:

“But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night… In all that he does, he prospers.” (Psalm 1:2–3)

To be spiritually rooted, bearing fruit in and out of season, we must turn not just to inspirational messages or fleeting moments of emotional worship, but to the unchanging Word of God. It is in the Word that we find the sustaining strength we long for.

Hearing Requires a Heart Ready to Obey

Hearing the voice of God requires more than open ears it demands an open heart.

That’s why Jesus repeats the phrase “He who has ears to hear, let him hear” multiple times in the Gospels, and again throughout Revelation. In Luke 8:15, He describes the good soil as “those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patience.” This is what we’re called to: not passive listening, but active holding, treasuring, and obeying.

Colossians 3:16 urges us to “let the word of Christ dwell in you richly.” Not visit. Not occasionally drop by. Dwell. Make its home in us.

When the Word dwells richly, it becomes the soundtrack of our thinking, the filter of our feelings, and the foundation of our decisions.

God Is Not Far

Maybe you’ve felt abandoned. Maybe the silence feels like rejection. But hear this: “He is not far from each one of us” (Acts 17:27). He has given us His voice preserved in ink and paper, glowing on screens, echoing from pulpits. He speaks, not only with clarity, but with compassion. Not with condemnation, but with invitation.

The question isn’t, “Is God speaking?”

The question is, will you open your Bible and listen?

If your heart is dry, if your hope is waning, if your spirit feels lost. His Word is the well. Drink deeply.

Don’t say God is silent with your Bible closed.

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