"Ally ally in free!"

The Word for today:
Psalm 27

There sure is a lot of hiding and seeking going on in Psalm 27:

One thing I have desired of the LORD, that will I seek:
That I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life,
To behold the beauty of the LORD,
And to inquire in his temple. (Psalms 27:4)

For in the time of trouble he shall hide me in his pavilion;
In the secret place of his tabernacle he shall hide me. (Psalms 27:5)

When you said, "Seek My face,"
My heart said to you, "Your face, Lord, I will seek." (Psalms 27:8)

Do not hide your face from me;
Do not turn your servant away in anger;
You have been my help;
Do not leave me nor forsake me, O God of my salvation. (Psalms 27:9)

Who is hiding? Who is seeking?

The answer is found on the very first pages of your Bible.  Before sin, God sought out Adam and Eve so often, so regularly, that they were familiar with the sound of his voice:
And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day… (Genesis 3:8a)

But, alas, their sin caused them to hide:
…and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. (Genesis 3:8b)

Carefully note that they were not actually hiding from God. What they were doing was hiding their sin from God:
The LORD God called to the man and said to him, "Where are you?" And he said, "I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself." (Genesis 3:9-10)

In the same way, God is not hiding from man. David, in Psalm 51, knew that God hides not from him, but from man's sin:
Hide your face from my sins… (Psalms 51:9)

God went to great lengths to hide his face from Adam and Eve's sins, skinning an animal to fashion a sin-covering for them. This freed him to seek them again.

That sacrificed animal pointed straight to the cross, where God had to forsake Jesus:
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? (Psalms 22:1)

Jesus was, at first, startled and overtaken by the estrangement. But he was given the answer he'd cried out for:
Yet you are holy… (Psalms 22:3)

God's holiness could not coexist with sin. He is a consuming fire (1) who would have reflexively flashed forth and consumed the sin-bearer on the cross. So he was not actually hiding from Jesus. He was hiding from my sin.

What all of this means is that God never hides--from anybody, ever. He wasn't hiding from Adam, or Eve; or from Jesus; or from you.

He is ever ardently seeking--and hoping to be sought:
When you said, "Seek My face,"
My heart said to You, "Your face, Lord, I will seek." (Psalms 27:8)

I hope your heart talks to God today. I hope you seek his face. If you take your sins to the cross of Jesus Christ, you've got nothing left to hide--and God's got nothing left to hide from.

"Ally ally in free!" (2)

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(1) Deuteronomy 4:24; Hebrews 12:29
(2) "Ally ally in free" is a catchphrase used in such children's games as hide and seek to indicate that players who are hiding can come out into the open without losing the game. It is thought to derive from the phrase "All ye, all ye 'outs' in free;" in other words, all who are "out" may come in without penalty.