The Hiding Place

What is a hiding place? As children, we play hiding games. I remember playing Kick the Can and Hide and Seek. Finding the spot that was safest and offered the most concealment was crucial. I remember plotting out where to run to before the game began. There was a certain element of pride in a good spot to shelter in. Being found last displayed your talent, your good decision-making, your intelligence.

Even after childhood, I seek to hide. I want to find that safe place to cut me out of the things I don't like. Reading the headlines often becomes overwhelming, and I run for mental shelter. Sometimes I feel afraid of myself. I resist thinking about myself and find trivialities to occupy my mind and my time. I lack so much that I feel a failure. There is no element of success in hiding now. The purely physical act of hiding, meant for enjoyment and limited in duration, is vanished. I now seek failure by hiding, because adulthood is no game. I don't desire failure; I sometimes feel I have already failed. Why try, why look forward, when the past is such a comfortable place to live? Not good, but a known quantity.

I am learning that my method of hiding is hurting me. This isn't exactly new information, but I have a different perspective now. What if hiding isn't actually bad? What if I'm pursuing the wrong kind of hiding? I have tried to hide from my thoughts, my habits, my fears, to control my mind. I can't. I have to face myself; I can't change unless I do.

So, instead of being ashamed of myself and trying to hide, or being unhappy with myself for hiding, I have realized what I'm doing wrong. What I need to shelter and protect is my spirit. Without my spirit, I am nothing. The things that I neglected to feed, those things that I need to thrive, are spiritual. I cannot protect myself, though I may try. But I know a place of protection.

God is that place.

Scripture records multiple instances of seeking or receiving shelter from the Almighty. Jonah, trapped inside the belly of a huge aquatic creature, was not punished, but protected. God knew that Jonah would run, would resist, and create problems for himself and the people he was supposed to preach to. God protected Jonah from himself, by making resistance worthless. Scripture describes the Almighty as a shelter, a fortress, and a bulwark. What if I place my spirit in his care? I have the knowledge that I am safe, and can, with His guidance and protection, face that which I cannot face alone. That is the best and safest place of all.