Hide and Seek

Most of us can probably remember playing Hide-and-Seek when we were young children, and maybe you've even played it with your own kids recently. What most of us fail to realize is that we sometimes still try to hide ourselves from God or from those closest to us.

Have you ever found yourself running and hiding from God? Jonah did. Genesis 3 says, "The word of the Lord came to Jonah son of Amittai: 'Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before me.'"

The next verse is the pinnacle of the story:  

                             "But Jonah ran away from the Lord...."   

People have been running away from God since the Garden of Eden. Adam and Eve were ashamed of disobeying God, and so they hid. The Bible is full of stories about God's children hiding from Him, and we can usually trace the reasons to two different things.

Some people hide from God or others because they are ashamed of a sin and don't want to face the disappointment or hurt they have caused. Maybe they aren't ready to stop sinning, or they think that they can actually hide it from an all-knowing God. Adam and Eve didn't want God to find out about their sin of eating from the forbidden tree. They were ashamed, and so they hid themselves from the Lord.

Another common reason we hide is because God is asking us to do something we either don't want to do or think we can't do. This was Jonah's reason for hiding himself. God had asked him to go and preach to people whom Jonah was afraid of and didn't respect. He decided that he knew better than God, and so he went the opposite way.

But, guess what! God always finds us. He will always pursue us. He wants our obedience and our devotion, and He will give us several chances to get it right. It's important to remember that God will never let anyone or anything other than Him be our Savior.

God used a huge, wild storm to get Jonah's attention. He then used a giant fish to drive the point home even more. Jonah eventually realized that God meant business and that he better obey if he wanted to remain in close relationship with God.

I recently heard the story of Jonah told with a new and refreshing slant to it. Jonah being thrown into the sea and swallowed by a giant fish and then coughed up onto the beach was used to symbolize the act of baptism. In baptism, a person is dunked under water to signify dying to themselves and then lifted up, illustrating becoming alive in Christ. The burial of the old and the resurrection of the new. Isn't this what happened to Jonah? He had to give up his own ideas and plans and then choose to follow God's.

Have you found yourself hiding from something or someone? Is God calling you to something you don't think you can do, or maybe something you don't want to do? Do you have sin in your life that makes you ashamed? Maybe you aren't yet ready to give up that sinful habit.

I know that when I'm hiding from God I feel antsy, unsettled, easily worn down and somewhat depressed. This is God's way of convicting me and pursuing me, and sometimes it takes me a while to recognize it for what it is.

No matter what your reason for hiding, freedom and joy can only come through repentance, obedience and following Christ. Until you make that hard decision to come out into the open, no matter what the cost, you will always feel like you are playing Hide-and-Seek.  It's not a fun game, however, when the stakes are life and death.