11 The Lord said, “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.”

Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. 12 After the earthquake came a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. 13 When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.

Then a voice said to him, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”

14 He replied, “I have been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, torn down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too.”

15 The Lord said to him, “Go back the way you came, and go to the Desert of Damascus. When you get there, anoint Hazael king over Aram. 16 Also, anoint Jehu son of Nimshi king over Israel, and anoint Elisha son of Shaphat from Abel Meholah to succeed you as prophet. 17 Jehu will put to death any who escape the sword of Hazael, and Elisha will put to death any who escape the sword of Jehu. 18 Yet I reserve seven thousand in Israel—all whose knees have not bowed down to Baal and whose mouths have not kissed him.”

What you should notice about the things that transpired on the holy mountain, Horeb being the same as Mt. Sinai, is the phrase ‘but God was not in the wind, not in the earthquake not in the fire’.  This is the direct opposite of how pagans viewed the world.  They attributed all sorts of natural occurrences like these to the gods, and different gods had different domains, for example if you were to read the Odyssey like I am doing now, you would discover that Poseidon the god of the sea  was hostile toward Odysseus and was keeping him from going home by using wind and waves and currents to prevent it.  In 1 Kings 19, to discern God’s will one had to listen to God’s Word, to his revelation, not scrutinize natural occurences.   A careful reading of Gen. 1 will show that God set up natural occurences to happen once something has been created.  Here we have the reaffirmation ‘God was not in the wind…’ etc.  Both OT and NT religion again and again affirm that to discern God’s specific will for humans must listen to and pay attention to God’s Word, his revelation.

Someone should tell the insurance companies to stop calling natural disasters like tornados or hurricanes ‘acts of God’.  Though God can at times use his creation to reveal himself, the most fundamental and ongoing truth is that one must hear and obey the revelation, the Word of God to really know God and his will.