Three Good Reasons to “Hide”

My two year old niece, Scarlett, was playing hide-and-seek with her mom recently. She and her sister Marci ran down the long hallway and disappeared. Kate finished counting to one hundred and then called out as she walked through the house (in a sing-song tone)  “Girls, where are you??”    To which Scarlett answered in her sweet toddler voice, “We’re in the closet!”

Playing hide-and-seek as a child is fun.  But sometimes we want to hide when we’re adults. On my windowsill this month I discovered a delightful example of some good reasons to hide.  I am not a gardener, but last summer my Impatiens plants bloomed  gloriously. When I knew that a frost was coming, I took some clippings from one of the plants and put them on my windowsill in a glass of water.  The leafy pieces stayed alive and thrived there, but last week they burst forth with bright pink blossoms! I took this picture when the temperature was below zero degrees outside and over a foot of snow had fallen.

Amy Carmichael calls the lessons we see in the smallest things of nature “figures of the True.” The Lord taught me three sweet Truths  through those blossoms.

1. It can be right to run and hide from the harsh elements of life. It just depends on where we’re hiding . I knew that a freeze would hurt my flowers, so I rescued them and gave them the warmth and sunshine of our little kitchen.  God wants us to hide in Him.
 
You are my hiding place; you will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance. Selah.   Psalm 32:6-8

2. When reading some of the deepest writings of our Christian brothers and sisters from centuries ago, we find that they speak often of our “inner life.”  Our thoughts, our heart, our soul…these can find their home in the Lord.  So you are really not living “in a difficult marriage”, you are IN CHRIST.  You are not “in a depression,” you are IN CHRIST.   I was feeling trapped in a situation recently until the Lord spoke that word to me.  If I am IN CHRIST then I am protected, held, provided for.  All I need is there. And there is no need to fear.

But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus …  1 Corinthians 1:30

 Him we live and move and have our being…  Acts 17:28

3. Hiding in Him, blessed by what Henry Suso (1295-1365) calls “the fair sunshine of His Comfort”, will soon mean a display of fragrant, beautiful blossoms.  Even though the weather of your circumstance is harsh, the world will see a soul that is a Gift to others. Your life will bloom with the color of His Hope. And how this world needs hope!