I remember the fun game of hide and seek as a child. I also remember the spanking and the talking to I received when the game was not so fun for my family.
It was a beautiful day with two “friends” playing outside. When we heard my aunt calling for me, they suggested I hide. I watched from under the porch through the lattice as my aunt went up and down the street calling out my name. I began to feel the mind and body telling me this is not good. But there I stayed to gain the ongoing friendship of my childhood peers.
I felt that feeling more recently, the panic my aunt must have felt when she could not find me. The game of hide and seek remains a fun game through the generations. As I played with my granddaughters in our home, there was one we could not find. The one that prides herself on hiding well. We looked and looked again, in the closets, behind the doors, under the beds, in the toy chest. We checked the doors leading to outside, they were still locked.
Where could she be? Then my mind and body began its process to manage the fear through a rush of hormones and other synapses. Then I called out- “This is not fun anymore, where are you?”
At the playground, I watched as two of my granddaughters, once again, played hide and seek. From my view I watched as one hid, finding much fun in her hiding place. I watched as the other called for her sister in hopes of finding where is she. I yelled to the one seeking, listen for her voice, follow where her voice is coming from. But she kept going further away from the hiding place. I begin to feel her concern of not finding her sister and ended this fun game of hide and seek on that day.
But the honest expression of a child is most reflective when I look back over my life and know the love my family had for me and the necessary discipline to keep me on the right path. When we settled in the car, one sister said to the other, “I was starting to think someone took you and I was scared.” And the other responded, “I’m sorry.”
By the way, that one that prides herself on hiding well. She was under the bed. Her excitement, in letting us know she saw us looking but we didn’t see her, was fun for all of us ( admittedly, fun after the fact).
Are you the hider, the seeker, or the observer?
All these hide and seek experiences reminds me that the Lord, Jesus Christ seeks for us. There is no hiding place that our God does not know. As he sits at the right hand of God, the Father Almighty, may you be blessed in seeking and finding him everyday. Rev.3:19-21
And when your mind and body comes to its senses, may you also seek forgiveness and come out of your hiding place.
Always grateful,
Walking In Your Gifts 