Don't Draw so Close to ME

Sometimes the terror of intimacy is more than I can take. I know it says that if I draw close to him, he will draw close to me.

Sometimes I foolishly try to hide who I am. I try to play games.

If He really knew me He wouldn't love me. So I try to keep Him at a distance so I don't have to stand intimately naked before Him. Fully disclosed. Completely uncovered. All my flaws and foolishness revealed.

Of course I know He already knows everything about me and YET he still loves and accepts me. He doesn't applaud everything I do or did. He just loves me.

So, out of love, He pretends to let me withdraw, to hide in the Garden.

He knew where Adam and Eve were when he asked, "where are you?"

He knows where I am, and yet He lets me pretend to hide until I am ready to draw close to Him once more. Then I discover how deep, wide and high his love for me is.

And once more I am safe. And once more I am able to rest in Him. Hiding myself in HIM.

I don't have to pretend any more.

This morning I remembered a sin from when I was 19 years old. For a brief moment it passed across my mind and grieved me. OH, I have sinned a million times since then, but this one was painful for me. It was a sin against HIM. I know I am forgiven. But, sometimes I want to hide.

Where can I hide, where????

Then He says, "Come, Close, I have a place where you can hide from all your pain". I do, and it all seems to insignificant once more.