When You Just Want to Hide

“You died”, Paul wrote, counter-culturally, “And your life is hidden in Christ”. 

What a statement to a people desperate to live…Instructed, told, brainwashed into thinking that their life is “their” journey, “their” destination, is based on “their” choices….

In a world where we purpose to be seen and heard, taught to wake to the fullness of what “our” hopes and “our” dreams are….

Colossians 3:3 challenges the thinking of grandiose living, by calling us to “die”.

I am not a fan of funerals. Not a fan of quietly disappearing, silencing my own convictions, or corralling any personal opinions…

I see hiding, like Eden…the sin over-taking, death like a dark shadow, the hiding a form of covering with leaves, to blanket some kind of evil…

I like the songs and am drawn to the people that call us to rise, walk in life, live radically for some cause or purpose.

I long for that light, the truth, the way, that takes us into wide open places, calls us into greater
purpose, giving us wisdom and clarity…

Yet, even cultural Christianity can tell us to be loud, promise that the more we rally our own cause, the more faith we’ll have…

As if God is somehow blessed by our striving..

Yet, I question, isn’t it in the shrinking where His promises are fulfilled, His heart is known, His purposes become realized…

And I wonder, have we fallen short, too busy throwing off the leaves of shame and doubt, those coverings Adam and Eve so quickly wrapped themselves in after their sinning…

That we forget, we are called to go from one covering to another, one hiding, to the true abiding in the Father.

I mean….

• How many of us run to the Father saying, “Look, even the demons obey me?” (Luke 10:17)
• Boasting, like the disciples, thinking, “Who of us is greater?” (Luke 22:24)
• Find ourselves in petty battles, fighting over the chosen seat, next to our Savior (Matt. 20:21)…

When in fact, He runs to the weary, looks for the meek, longs for the poor in spirit…

He blesses those who are persecuted for His names sake, and hunger and thirst for righteousness? (Matt 5)

What if, the abiding is about shrinking towards his purposes; instead of becoming loud and proud, boasting in our hearts at all that He is doing?

What if the hiding is the revealing, the walking in His shadow is to our benefit, the embracing our weakness is where His power is made perfect?

The lies long for our uncovering. They taunt, provoke, and tell us we are grande, and have to be seen to be useful…

We click our phone, scroll through a thousand messages with man’s faces and people’s opinions…

But yet, isn’t our model, Jesus? And did He come loud, self-promoting, announcing to the world boastfully that He was the long-awaited Savior…

Or did He hide in the Father, carefully listen, and only do what God had instructed?

Shouldn’t we do the same?

• “You are my hiding place and my shield; I wait for Your word.” Psalms 119:14
• “Hide me in the shadow of Your wings..” Psalms 17:8
• “In the secret place of His tent He will hide me; He will lift me up on a rock.” Psalms 27:5
• “You have been a refuge for me, A tower of strength against the enemy.” Psalms 61:3

What do we let hide us? Other people, our own intellectualism, our looks, possessions, some ministry, assets, our children, our husbands? 

Nothing should hide us, but Christ. 

We hide in the light where no darkness can reside. Sin cannot enter. In His presence, flesh cannot dwell…

• We must die. Get rid of and confess our ignorance that somehow we have hope to “help” God in any way…
• We must lay down at His feet, all we are, all we are thinking.
• We must let go our striving, take up our crosses and follow Him.

And…

• In our deficiencies, take up His all Sufficiency.
• In our weakness, take up His strength.
• In our emptiness, become vessels capable of filling…

And we flourish, only there, in the light of Him, covered by His mercies. Living radically for Loves sake….

Not seeing or hearing, a world that touts to us…Come out, be loud and proud, as if we can contribute anything, to God….

He is our refuge, Strong Tower. In the Shadow of His Wing is where true love and His all-consuming power dwells.

The moment you accept Christ, it wasn’t compromised Christianity, lukewarm living, some half-hearted, double-minded journey…

It was, “We died”…“So that our life can be hidden in Christ”.

Have you been walking with God as your covering, hiding in His mercies?