Hiding

I was my mom’s first pregnancy. She never asked the doctor for the gender, but random people told her she was going to have a boy: by the way she stuck out, carried herself, etc. She later had two sons, whom she loves sooo much. But she secretly, at that time, wanted a little girl. At birth, I was that girl. I was that delightful surprise of a little girl. I was wanted. I was delighted in. What a great way to enter the world! What a great story to tuck in my heart!

I was born in Illinois where there are four seasons, and tree leaves change to vibrant colors in the fall and blow to the ground in piles. My mom remembers me at 2 years old picking up a pile of leaves and throwing them up over my head into the air. My arms stayed straight up, fists clenched in excitement, a wide-mouthed grin and wild eyes anticipating the excitement of the leaves falling back down around me. I loved life!

At four, now in San Diego, I sat with a little boy in a tree (it must have been low to the ground!)  outside of our apartment. I only remember one thing from the conversation (I was four!)—he looked at me and said, “you’re ugly.” I remember my cheeks getting hot. I didn’t know what that word meant, but it must have been something really good. Life was good. I was good. I couldn’t wait to ask my mom. Coming in for lunch, I casually asked my mom what ugly meant. “It means ‘not pretty’ . . . why? Did someone say that to you?” My heart stopped. A thousand thoughts at four years old went through my mind. I had a paradigm shift at four! My world, me, as I knew it, had been beautiful, but now, somehow, ugliness had entered. There was ugliness in the world, and in me. I couldn’t believe it. I was filled with so much disappointment at that moment. Shame. “No,” I assured my mom, “no one said that to me.” My counselor later told me that even at that age I wanted to hide the dirty truth (or what I believed was true) deep inside, and I wanted to protect anyone around me, that I loved, from it. But I knew. I knew the truth now. I was ugly.

Unfortunately, and to my great heart-break, I grew up with an emotionally abusive father. And, unfortunately, watched him physically abuse my mother. More paradigm shifts. The world is bad. The world is ugly. There is no safety. I remember hiding under a rug in the bathroom with the door locked. Where could I hide, physically? Where could I go . . . far, far away? I couldn’t. I couldn’t leave physically. Life like this was “normal.” This was life. But, internally, I hid. I hid far, far away, in a world of my own. A world of beauty and excitement and intrigue and imagination and safety. A world I created all in my own mind. I had a lot of control in that world. Control that I didn’t have in the real one.

But, I also had a heart that believed such things existed. There must be goodness. There must be beauty. There must be something worthy of loving and praising and adoring. Christian psychologist and author Dr. John Townsend comments that “if it weren’t for the Fall, there would have been no Problem #1: that is, no sin—no need for our restoration into the image of God. And there would have been no Problem #2: we would have no need to hide” (Hiding From Love, p. 47). He says that “God never intended hiding to be a part of our lives  . . . God had a ‘Plan A’ for us: a life of unbroken connectedness with Him and each other” (p. 47).

And yet, like Adam and Eve, I hide from God. In shame. Before four years old, I felt free to be known. I was open. I was happy. But after that miniscule event, yet with life- changing implications, I was afraid. I no longer wanted to be known. They’re going to find out. They will all find out the truth, and I believe the truth about me is bad. I hide from God. I hide from others.

Why the darkness? Why the suffering? Why me?

Perhaps the darkness was for a reason: “Stars shine brightest in the long dark night of winter” (Streams in the Desert, p. 163). Not dark as in evil darkness, but dark as in not immediately evident to my understanding. Perhaps this deep hiding (and may I say, suffering) was for an unforeseen purpose? Author Sue Monk Kidd notices the power of darkness to our growth: “Whenever new life grows and emerges, darkness is crucial to the process. Whether it’s the caterpillar in the chrysalis, the seed in the ground, the child in the womb . . . there’s always a time of waiting in the dark.” I wonder if I can use that analogy to compare my life, and time of darkness, as a time of womb- growing, soul- searching, and God- depending desperation. Would I give up those dark times? Those intimate times of whispering with God under the rug? I knew He loved me then. I knew He said He had a hope in me. I knew that my adoring heart turned from adoring a beauty in the world, and perhaps even in me, (that I now saw as broken and ugly), to adoring a good and sweet God that drew me in His arms and whispered love to me.

Sometimes that darkness is for a time, as He works all things together for good on earth. But it could be for the whole duration of time on earth-- a way of life.  That’s scary to me. I’ve experienced the pain (or some), and I’ve experienced freedom from it. I don’t want to go back to it!

I lived on the border of Laos and nearby the dark, military dictator-run country Myanmar (Burma) for a year. I met refugees. I heard stories. Suffering was rampant. Mind- blowing and horrifying. For just about anyone in the country, but especially for Christians. Why suffering? Why is this Your way God? Tender- hearted theologian and pastor John Piper in no way implies for us to go be masochists, but he does see the heart of God in suffering: “God really means for the body of Christ, the church, to experience some of the suffering He experienced so that when we proclaim the Cross as the way of life, people will see the marks of the Cross in us and feel the love of the Cross from us” (Desiring God, p. 269-270). The way of suffering sounds crazy, but is it God’s way? “For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it the power of God” (1 Cor. 1:18). Can I let the suffering that happened to me make the Cross and the love of God more attractive to others?

There is healing!

I believe it. I believe God’s heart for me is to be whole! Healed. Complete. Strong. Mature. And to use all of those things for the purpose He has for me. What joy! What confidence! I identify with early 19^th- Century author Anaïs Nin in her quote:  “And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.” No more hiding!

The Sun Sets--

“And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. Then the Lord God called to Adam and said to him, ‘Where are you?’ So he said, ‘I heard Your voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid myself’” (Gen. 3:8-10).

And the Sun Rises on a Day never to End! --

"Therefore, as through one man's [Adam's] offense judgment came to all men, resulting in condemnation, even so through one Man's [Jesus'] righteous act the free gift came to all men, resulting in justification of life" (Rom. 5:18).

“I waited patiently for the Lord; And He inclined to me, And heard my cry. He also brought me up out of a horrible pit, Out of the miry clay, And set my feet upon a rock, And established my steps. He has put a new song in my mouth—praise to our God; Many will see it and fear, And will trust in the Lord” (Ps. 40:1-3).