I remember the exquisite stillness of The Liberties in April of 2020. I remember the plaintive beauty of birdsong. Gone were the tram and automobile traffic; whining whistle of a car alarm; seagulls yelping overhead; and most of all, human voices through the streets. All we had was glorious, generous, golden warm sun, and quietness.

By the next year, still in the hush mid-pandemic, I really missed the transcendental, ecstatic experience that was a Sunday worship service in my Pentecostal church. Seeking spiritual refreshing, I turned to some favorite worship songs, and found that this intensely emotional music overwhelmed me. I could no longer “connect” to it, and felt fatigued by the constant crescendos on the drum kits building up to crash out another exploding repetition of the refrain.

This expectation of emotional catharsis was what I identified as the “Spirit moving,” or “God’s presence.” How often I would hear the pastor or service leader remark that he or she could feel a special weight in the air, and conclude that there was something hyperspiritual and holy about that moment, as if the fervor of our worship had called down a special dispensation of God’s presence (a concept I have always felt is theologically unhinged, in a word). Stronger emotions both expressed and indicated to others greater spirituality. In church I have fallen on my knees, I have danced, I have jumped up and down with joy, I have fallen on my face and wept loudly.

In 1 Kings 19, the prophet Elijah flees for his life from his enemy, Queen Jezebel. He comes to the wilderness and it is here that he hides himself, praying to God that it would be better if he were dead. Evenetually, he sleeps. He is unexpectedly awakened by an angel two separate times, who brings him food and water and insists that he eat. Following this, Elijah goes forth on the strength of those provisions for forty days, where he encounters the living God on Mount Horeb (that is, Mount Sinai). God asks Elijah why he is hiding—Elijah tells Him he is the very last one who remains that is faithful to Him, exceedingly zealous for Yhwh Sabaoth (Yahweh, God of Hosts), and that Jezebel is pursuing him unto death. God tells him to come to the mouth of his cave, and that He will pass before him.

The ugly side of this is I equated emotionality with spiritual sensitivity, and even understood it to be the voice of God. I felt my prayers were more heartfelt and even more effective if they were accompanied by agonizing tears of pleading. This is what I perceived to be the Holy Spirit—rushing, overwhelming, crashing over my head like waves. I let myself consequently be carried away by every feeling I had, especially painful ones like loneliness, fear, and self-pity, sometimes even spiritualizing this as a nasty attack from the enemy.

First, a hurricane wind blows past Elijah’s face; then a stone-splitting earthquake shakes the mountain; and then, a wildfire rages, roaring past. But Yhwh was not in the wind, nor the earthquake, nor the fire.

It has been six years now since I was regularly attending a Pentecostal church; it has been closer to ten years since I attended a Hillsong-esque church with immersive worship services. For almost a full year I have been attending Divine Liturgy in my local Romanian Orthodox church, and as of this month I have been officially Orthodox for six months. My way of life has changed entirely.

Orthodoxy perfuses daily life and transforms the quotidian into sacred time; it draws from you and reinforces in you habits that follow the day by day. Your life becomes cycles and circles around sacred time. Morning and evening there are prayers to pray; every day there is another saint to be commemorated or a special event to be observed in the life of Christ, and this is echoed in our bodies through repeating seasons of fasting or the celebration of feasts, according to the liturgical calendar. Worship is done while simply standing still, both face and spirit at rest, comfortable, neutral. There is no impassioned swaying. There is rarely crying, and then never openly. Prayers are repeated and repeated and repeated until they are known by heart. And yet, a change is mysteriously effected, the effects of participation in Orthodox life grow imperceptibly stronger.

Whereas before I would be yanked down by the undertow of my emotions, I am instead like the sandy shore whereupon the upwelling waves break, diffuse, and slowly retreat back, leaving only hope and joy. It reminds me of when a little child falls or gets a bit hurt while playing, begins to cry with fear of pain, then suddenly realizes they’re okay. No tears, and back to their playing.

Yhwh was not in the wind, nor in the earthquake, nor in the fire. Following all of these, there is a voice as a faint whisper. The ancient Greek translates this using the word aura, like a light morning breeze—and there was Yhwh. And this I only I experienced for the first time following my baptism as Orthodox, after all external distractions had been quieted, and emotions had been calmed and dispersed. It is just as the Bible describes. It is this exceedingly gentle, sweet presence, soft yet ever-present; easily ignored, yet winsome and healing.