Hiding Place

Last Sunday we sang an older worship song called "You Are My Hiding Place". Now it's easy for us to think of playing "Hide and Seek" as kids, but really the song (as well as the Bible verses it's based on) is talking about where we go when we're stressed.

People often think about a favorite place when they're stressed. If they can just get there, they can unwind, they can relax. Sometimes it's a vacation spot, or maybe a favorite spot to go on the weekends, or maybe it's a comfortable chair at home. "If I can get there, I can leave my problems behind." Sometimes it's an activity that we use to 'escape' - like shopping at an expesnive mall, fishing, playing a video game, or watching an action/adventure or romance movie (they're called "escapist" movies). If we can just get there, and 'ensconce' ourselves (this means to be totally surrounded by comfort), THEN we can find peace and leave the disturbing things and the fears and the stresses behind.

But as I was fasting and praying on Wednesday, I was thinking:

There is no perfect place. Development, crime, bad weather, and unexpected accidents all conspire to ensure this. However, if that "secret place" we can go to is simply to be in God's presence, with Him - then we have a perfect place. A spiritual "hiding place" that is sure, and that will refresh us.

See, this is yet another advantage believers in Jesus have over other people. They have no sure retreat. Their comfortable diversions won't satisfy them - not for long.

So non-believers fight (like wild cats) to protect earthly things (including their vacation spots and their backyards) that make them comfortable, even those things are temporary and someone else will get them when they die (See Luke 12:13-21). As Bob Dylan sings: "Funny, how the things you have the hardest time parting with/ Are the things you need the least".

The biggest danger of becoming wealthy is anxiety. Will your little kingdom crumble?

Yet, David sang of his confidence in God at those times he had nothing and was running away from evil kings with big armies hunting for him. (See Psalm 16.)

Those who know their God have no need to fear. He is their hiding place.

(By the way, the picture at the top is from Cappadocia, a place where Christians hid from Roman emperors who were killing Christians. It's in central Turkey.)