John David and Natalie Mangrum are two of my favorite people on this earth. John David pastors Origins church here in Greenville, SC, where my youngest daughter Frances has had the privilege of serving as Worship Leader for the last couple of years. They are the real deal ya’ll. Will and I have come to love them as family, and you will enjoy his wise words in this post. Thanks JD!

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I loved playing hide-and-seek as a kid. We’d hide in our secret place, and once we were spotted we’d evade and avoid in hopes of getting to “home” or “base” without being tagged. The challenge of finding the spot where the seeker couldn’t possibly spot us. The rush of evading and racing to base. The thrill of arriving home without being captured. Loved it. Sadly, I find that most of our experiences of community are not much more than a big game of hide-and-seek. And unfortunately, when we get “home” without being captured in meaningful relationship, we all lose. 

The truth is, we all hide. Amazingly each of us is a work in progress, beautiful mosaics of fears, hopes, disappointments, joys, and a million other facts and emotions that make up the story of “me.” Yet even more amazingly, like the kid hiding to not be found, we do our best to make sure most people never see us. Like kids hiding behind trees or furniture, we hide behind shallow conversations about college football, recent weather patterns, and the latest “breaking news” from our favorite news source. We add to it by camouflaging behind social media posts and photos of our “perfect” family, meal, day, vacation spot, or whatever else. Hiding. Never engaging in much meaningful.

Then when spotted, we evade. Life can be falling apart or we feel like we are drowning, and all we do is evade. My go-to is self-deprecating humor. I pastor folks who change the subject, drag up and stay victimized by the distant past, minimize by making jokes, or just stop showing up all-together. We duck, we dodge, we do all we can to make sure no one pins us down because deep down we know we don’t have it all together; and most of us fear that our friends, family, and those we are in community with do have it all together. “What would they think of me if they found out that I’m not perfect?”  

The problem with playing this relational game of hide-and-seek is that all the hiding and evading leads us to a “home base” of isolation. A two-dimensional “perfect” life on Facebook or Instagram or in a church directory or year book is no life at all. The admiration of peers because we look “ideal” is hollow and empty and fleeting. We were made for community, to know and be known. We were made for more than, “How about Clemson?…or that heat?…or that flag in Columbia?” And we were made for more than #perfectday and #ilovemyfamily and #tooblessed. We were made to cry together. To laugh together. To sit in silence sometimes, just letting the gravity of a moment or question hang over us. That’s why the Bible is so full of “one another” commands: love, pray for, encourage, challenge, rejoice with, grieve with one another. We weren’t made to play hide-and-seek. When we play that game as adults, we all lose. We were made to be present and engaged in all seasons of life, even the dark and lonely ones we wish weren’t reality — that we all go through at some time or another.

So here is my prayer. May we find that we can be or are accepted by the God of the universe, welcomed joyfully into his family. From the place of acceptance and freedom, may we each become convicted every time we hide behind shallow talking points. May sports or politics or family become the ice breakers for — not hindrances to — deeper conversations about life and faith and meaning and profound things. May we stop evading with awkward laughter, obvious transitions in the subject of our conversation, and just not being present. May we realize that imperfections, brokenness, honest doubts, fears, and failures become places where God’s glory and grace are on full display. May we accept that — as wiser men and women than me have told me often — its okay not to be okay, but its not okay to stay that way. And may we realize that in community, in meaningful relationship and conversation, much of our “not okay” begins to be put together and made whole. Finally, may we stop playing the childhood game of hide-and-seek with the people God has put into our lives so that we can move on to fiercely loving one another, encouraging one another, praying for one another, knowing one another, celebrating and grieving with one another — in any and every season of life.