By AbbyA

My little boy was CAUGHT.  I found empty gold fish bags, smushed caramel popcorn and jelly bean bags all hidden in the corner of my closet.  I am furious.  Although he is just about perfect, he sneaks, hides and covers up FOOD.  What is this all about?  I ask myself.  FLESH.  His little boy flesh wants what he wants and he’s willing to break the rules to get it.  But, the clincher is that he figures that if he’s hiding himself and the remains in my closet, no one really knows what he has been up to.

Aren’t we just like little kids?  We are hiding in our closet with our sin and suffering. We think we are in the dark.  We think no one can see.   It looks like JMathis’ family ignoring the elephant-gone-mental at the family reunion.  It sounds like – “I’m fine.  How are you?”  It feels like Bindu’s shackled prisoner of shame.

I remember my twenty-something outward appearance.  Laid back, content, passing on peace 99.9% of the time.  I don’t think anyone, other than the Lord, knew what was happening or what I fighting for those years.  I set out to crucify premarital sex, fill up the hole that caused me to really want attention from men and figure out who I am in Christ without the desire to achieve or kill myself with perfectionism.   The past can be unkind; unraveling is painful.  Particularly if you trap yourself in a closet.

The truth of the matter is that God knows and God sees.  Despite the fact that you hide in a closet, you are busted by the Lord of Lords.  The worst part of the oddity of isolation is that we really think that God doesn’t feel our pain and shed tears.  I think His tears fall on us when He sees us clinging to the darkness.  He is standing there with you in the darkness.  He’s calling you, rooting for you, inviting you to come into the light.  He wants to wash us with the Word, prune us and make us whole.  Get out of the closet.  If you can’t do it alone, grab on to a trusted friend or counselor and let them help pull you out.

At the moment, my kids think that I have secret powers that allow me to know everthing about them and everything they do.  It is my hope that through my parenting, they’ll eventually see that it’s not me with the power, but it’s our Lord.  Mom can take her own advice now and then.  Jump out of the closet and into the arm’s of God.  Undoubtedly, a risk worth taking.