Hide Me In You
on refuge and learning to live
This is how we do it. On the floor. Low, get low. I want to burrow down, get even further to a depth that feels right, safe, where I belong. I burrow deep within my heart, God’s heart, and I stay here, my breath (I am almost holding my breath) shallow and small. And then the tears come. Familiar, warm, not sad.
I tuck in within what feels like myself — but not myself — eyes closed, feeling like a child beneath sofa pillows arranged end to end to make walls and a ceiling — with green carpet beneath my knees.
I hide.
I am happy to hide.
And not because I am fearful, though I am, but because it is where I — hiding, tucked in — know I belong.
Hello, Papa.
This morning, I walk the paths near our house, in sunlight warm and bright, and consider the effort it takes to have trust, live surrendered, calm, when the world feels dangerous, turbulent, loud. As I move toward downtown, the sidewalks fill with children running and couples walking with dogs. And when I go through the park, the one hidden behind the paved road and filled with the most perfect, flowing creek where I clocked hours with my three kids when they were young, the play structures entertain dozens of children, and picnic tables are swathed in birthday party decor. Around the creek bed, parents meticulously arrange balloons, ice-cream-themed tablecloths, “Three Scoops for You!” cupcake plates, and ping-pong paddles for games. How beautiful, all these moments becoming memories — this living through play and courage, the resolution to seek connection, community, joy.
Back at home, I search up “healthy bread” on my favorite recipe site and scoop flour into a stoneware mixing bowl, adding yeast, water, cooked quinoa — and eventually kneading, leaning over the wooden table, wrists pushing, arms taut. Scraping the dough, finally, from beneath my fingers, I cover the soft mound with a cloth, place it beneath the warmth of the open window, and head outside.
There is an orchestra serenading the large salvia, the fuchsia flowers trembling from both breeze and bee. It’s located on the path to the orange tree, and I try not to disturb the raucous pollen party as I lug the orchard ladder on my hip and set it up under the thick leaves. Due to my intermittent orange-picking pace this winter, the tree currently holds both blossom and fruit. A feast. As I stretch up into the tree, my shirt getting caught on the stiff branches, my right hand grasps and twists, one by one, the ripe fruit, and then pivots down to place, ever carefully, into the metal bucket, with its thin handle hanging on the ladder’s edge. Precarious. Holy. Intoxicating. I consume it all — the bloom’s perfume, the bee’s music, the bright jeweled arms holding me in green sky.
Later that week, when Justin and I visit my parents, the two of us bookending them on their cozy chairs ala Goldilocks and the Three Bears, they talk about stories that have moved them — What feels true? What feels real? — as well as how visits to the doctor hold so much power. How am I? Will you tell me? And will I still believe I am okay, no matter what you say? Our bodies, so beautifully made, are tipping toward the eternal — each pain, each ache, each weakening of strength a quiet testifying to the glory of God’s creative power. Everything God touches — everything created by his breath and hand and filled with His eternal glory — will always live.
At dinner with friends — a table of five couples — we share updates on the unique word each of us heard God whisper three months ago, personal guideposts for the year ahead. I tell them I am curious about my desire for refuge — my desire for delicious retreat when there is nothing immediately wrong, nothing immediately pressing — except things that aren’t wrong feel wrong, things that aren’t pressing feel pressing. “Live,” is the word I heard, Holy Spirit’s whisper, feeling familiar and true. I joke with them that my favorite weekends lately have been “beautifully boring” — hours in the garden, digging tiny holes for sweet pea seeds and preparing the dahlia and vegetable beds for early summer blooms.
On the drive home, I share with Justin how I am both dreaming of the future and present in the moment, anticipating what is to come. I do that as I bend and push and stretch — hands in the dirt, hands in the dough, hands in the tree — and wonder about my participation in these beautiful, temporal, fragile moments — this moment and this moment gone before we can even think of the meaning of the word.
The seeds I plant this spring will be flowers that will fill the garden with whimsical color, the fragrance beautiful and fresh and wild. Beauty will blanket us, just as we long to be in it, inhabit it, have it fill every space. And then the flowers’ petals, gently, quietly, will age and fall, drifting to the garden floor in a breeze. I feel it already, how nothing and everything will last.
What does it mean to live? Hide me in You, Papa. I burrow down. Hands open. Hide me in You.
Communion (After It)
Into the sea the cup is thrown
over our shoulders, rubber-band tight like
a spring, strung out, ready to snap,
snap like twigs beneath our feet
(let me collect those berries,
red, plump, ready for your mouth)
and the waves cover the brim,
the handle bobbing for a moment
still, the swooshing of waves
galloping onto shore, breaking
sand in rivulets where we
stand, toes submerged
looking for berries with our
tongues, mouths empty of words
until the waves crescendo
over the brim of us, the longing
for sweetness–berries fully
red and ripe, and we
enter the water,
the cup still bobbing in the surf,
reaching for it together,
our hands plunging, fingers
splayed and open, the salt stinging
our wrists, our shared union, the
lines, the jagged red.
Jennifer Camp wrote “Being Home, Be-ing with God.”
Cristina Baker wrote “Prayers of Hope For Peace Over Your Thoughts.”
Sample ➼ “Experience Jesus. Really” by John Eldredge
Sample ➼ “One Thousand Gifts” by Ann Voskamp
Encounter ➼ “A Life of Flourishing”
Audio Experience ➼ “A Roadmap for Your Best Days”
Rapt’s Feelings Wheel ➼ Discover your Inner Life
We updated Rapt’s ‘Best of’ lists this week. Lots of new stuff!
Rick Hamlin is the author of multiple books. He was executive director of Guideposts and has written for The New York Times and The Washington Post.
Alyson Pryor is an author and marriage & family therapist. She is also a staff spiritual director and adjunct faculty member at Biola University.
Mark DeYmaz is an author, church planter, co-founder of the Mosaix Global Network, and principal initiator behind the Multiethnic Church Movement.
Willow Weston is an author, speaker, podcast host, conference curator and the founder and director of Collide, a nonprofit ministry impacting women.
Tiffany Stein is an author, ordained minister, previously serving as a women’s pastor at Irving Bible Church in Dallas, and is currently a fourth-grade teacher.
P.S. Who should we interview next? Click here to let us know. And what new question would you like us to ask them? Click here to submit your suggestion.
“Look around and be distressed. Look within and be depressed. Look at Jesus and be at rest.” —Corrie ten Boom
I invite you to identify one moment today where you can intentionally shift your gaze from the world’s noise to the Father’s quiet presence. Whether you are digging in the dirt or simply catching your breath on the floor, practice “burrowing down” into the safety of being fully known and deeply loved. As you emerge from that refuge, may you find the courage to live fully present, trusting that the hands holding you in the secret place are the very same hands holding your future.
With so much hope,
Editor-at-Large, Rapt Interviews
Creator of Loop for Women
Co-executive Director, Gather Ministries
This was delightful, a deep draught for my soul…for me, it was a mid afternoon walk in the sun…