Hide and seek is a game we learn as tiny children. Even before we become mobile enough to run behind a chair, we cover our eyes and think that this makes us invisible to those around us. We hide until “peek-a-boo” gives us sight once more and we giggle in delight of being seen and loved.
As we grow, we believe we are too mature for such childish games, and yet, we find ourselves hiding all the same. We hide from people we believe might disapprove of us, presenting only the most polished versions of ourselves. And we hide from God, covering our eyes, shielding our faces from His gaze, certain that if we look to Him we will see disapproval and judgment in His eyes. We hide out of fear that the love we so desperately want will be withheld from us. So rather than find our fears to be true, we run from that pain and cling to lesser loves in the hopes they will satisfy the deep desires of our hearts.
We see this pattern as early as the garden of Eden where God once roamed in the cool of the day side by side with Adam and Eve. Can you imagine their conversations? The loving glances, the laughter rippling through the flower-laden paradise. God delighted in them as dearly loved children.
Then one day, everything changed. Eve decided to listen to another voice besides her Creator Friend. She believed a lie that there was more for her beyond what God gave. She grasped for satisfaction in things and ideas that were not meant for her to explore. Things God had cautioned her against for her own safety and happiness.
That night, when Eve heard God’s voice calling for her, she didn’t run to Him in joy as she had done every day before. She hid. She turned her face away, believing He would no longer love her as He once had. She was wrong about many things that day, but above all, she was wrong about the motives she ascribed to God.
A missionary friend shared with me an understanding of God many people in Africa adhere to as they have for centuries. They believe that a supreme being once was so near to man that if you reached out to him you could touch him. And then one day a woman preparing a meal reached over her head with a pestle and hit the supreme being, making him angry and causing him to withdraw from humanity. Now, in order to communicate with god, they must go through ancestors or lesser gods and goddesses.
It stuck me how this mythology resembles the early chapters of Genesis, but from a human perspective. The pattern continues today. I disobey God, or injure Him if you will. I feel shame and believe that God must want nothing more to do with me so I hide to protect myself and only approach Him through an intermediary like doing good things to earn His approval. But this isn’t the nature of God at all according to Scripture.
“But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?”And he said, “I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.” He said, “Who told you that you were naked?”
Genesis 3:9-11
Genesis shows us a God who knew Adam and Eve had sinned and drew near to them anyway. He called to them, drawing them with kindness, coaxing them to confess. When they admitted their shame, He didn’t condemn them. He asked them who had influenced their thinking. This desire to hide hadn’t come from anything He had said. It had come from the one who seeks to kill, steal, and destroy. The Enemy of truth and love.
The rules were never meant to earn the favor of God. Adam and Eve had favor already. The rules were meant to protect them from a harm—a lesser life than God’s perfect best for them. Moses tried to explain the same thing to the Israelite people centuries later.
“See, I have taught you statutes and rules, as the Lord my God commanded me, that you should do them in the land that you are entering to take possession of it. Keep them and do them, for that will be your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples, who, when they hear all these statutes, will say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.’ For what great nation is there that has a god so near to it as the Lord our God is to us, whenever we call upon him? And what great nation is there, that has statutes and rules so righteous as all this law that I set before you today?”
Deuteronomy 4:5-8
By living a holy and pure life that looks drastically different from the culture we live in, we draw people’s attention to God. The commandments weren’t given to restrict, but to lead Israel and all those they encountered into freedom and abundance.
Several weeks ago I listened as a woman shared her reaction to the idea of God looking at her. She turned her face away and held up her hand as if to shield herself from attack. The idea she has of God being angry and disapproving of her is one planted in her mind from the father of lies, not the Lover of her soul. If she gathered the courage to withdraw her hand and truly look at the Father without the mental walls she hides behind, she would be overcome with the love she sees in His eyes. God loves her so much that His own son died so they would have nothing between them ever again. But in her fear of being naked and exposed before God, she quickly covers herself with leaves and keeps her eyes fixed on the ground at her feet. My heart breaks for the love she’s missing out on and the peace that comes from seeing God smiling in adoration as you toddle toward Him with faltering, imperfect steps.
God understands the brokenness of the planet we inhabit and the damage sin has done to our hearts—sin that we have chosen and sin we have been the victims of by the hands of others. We are a battered and bruised people, but our God is the Great Physician. He is the balm for our weary souls. When we hide from Him our wounds go untended.
If you can, gather the courage to sit in silence for a few moments and ask God to show you what He really thinks of you. I did this several years ago full of fear that I would see the glaring disappointment and rejection I had come to believe was my lot in life. In my mind, I knew all the theology of love, but the Enemy had used painful circumstances to convince me I was a failure who could never be good enough or worthy enough to be fully loved by God. He might put up with me because of Jesus, but there would always be a mountain of improvements I’d need to make to get on His good side. I was wrong.
When I prayed, eyes closed and face lifted to the winter sun, all I could think of was a warm and twinkling smile. It was as if God whispered in my spirit that He not only loved me more than I could imagine, but that He really liked me too. In fact, He delighted in me and loved that I had come to Him to spend those quiet moments with Him. It made me cry.
My tattered heart began to heal that day. Slowly and gently God has continued to root out my faulty beliefs about His nature and replace them with the truth of His loving kindness toward me and the friendship He desires to have with me just as He had with Adam and Eve before sin and death arrived. I still struggle—some days more than others. But when I do, I’m able to go to Him and ask Him to show me what is true. I’m never disappointed.
Friend, I know it’s hard and scary to ask God to show you the truth. You may have heard from parents or spiritual leaders or friends all the ways that you fall short in their eyes, but God is different. When Jesus died, He painted over that list of wrongs with His blood. Submitting yourself to Him washes your heart as clean and bright as a summer sky after the rain. When God looks at you, He sees His daughter, glowing with the radiance made possible on the cross. You may have a hard time seeing it in the mirror, but if you ask God to show you, I promise He will.
May you have the courage to lift your head and look into the eyes of the God who loves you and is near to you today and always.