Hiding in plain view

I’m looking my best, colors matching, accents are in place and I’ve got my strut just right. If you ask me how are you doing? I’ll say I’m blessed and highly favored while twisting my face into my well practice holy look. I can quote scripture line and verse at will and as soon as the musician hits a few cords I can dance like I’ve been called home, but the truth is I’m hiding.

You see, I’m on the praise team, and I’m chairperson of the missionary board, a trustee member, on the gospel choir, and I work with the youth team, but I’m hiding. I’m a prayer warrior for others, and I’m first at the Altar when pastor calls, but I leave the same way I came because I’m still hiding.

I’m busy doing God’s work for others, making a sacrifice of myself because I’m called to serve and this is why when it comes to my prayer time I’m just so tired that I fall asleep in the middle of the prayer or I hurry and hop up as soon as I’m done. It’s pretty much the same when I read my word and I don’t have time to meditate on what I’ve read or fall on my knees or face to worship God in His Holiness because I’m hiding.

You see I’ve got some things that I’m not sure I want to let go of yet because I might be able to change them, that’s why I pick them back up from the Altar before I leave. Maybe it’s the hurt that was caused to me that makes me feel like have the right to hate because of the wrong that was done. Could be the only thing I’ve known so it seems comfortable to me even though it will eventually kill me. Then there is the past, my past that will slam what’s left of me to the ground if I get into full worship. In the presence of God I’ll seem so filthy that life will once again be worth ending and I’m just afraid for God to look at what I really am, so I’ll continue to hide here in plain view.

The truth is, God already knows you and He’s been with you every step of the way and reason you’ve survived to this point is because He kept you because He loves you. Now He waits for you to join Him in the secret place of the Tabernacle of the Most High (Ps. 91) where He can love you and keep you. Going into the Holy of Holies takes on new meaning because it is where sanctification takes place.

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, high and exalted, seated on a throne; and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him were seraphim, each with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. And they were calling to one another:

   “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD Almighty;
   the whole earth is full of his glory.”

 At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke.

 “Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty.”

Then one of the seraphim flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. ⁷ With it he touched my mouth and said, “See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.”

Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?”

And I said, “Here am I. Send me!” Isaiah 6:1-8

The time for hiding has come to an end for our God is able to keep us and remove that which has held us back, we need not be afraid of being in His presence. It is there that life saving changes come about and we may gain true freedom. Time to shout “I’m free!”

“Go out and feed some sheep today!”