No Escape!

Where can I go from your spirit? Or where can I flee from your presence?
If I ascend to heaven, you are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there.
If I take the wings of the morning, and settle at the farthest limits of the sea,
even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me fast.
If I say, ‘Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light around me become night’,
even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is as bright as the day, for darkness is as light to you.

Psalm 139:7-12

We are used to escaping...
or at least, attempting to escape.

Some of us watch T.V. at night to escape the stresses of the day. Some of us read books.  Some of us go to the movies to forget, for just a short time, the piles of pressures that wait outside the theater doors.

Some of us eat to forget. Some of us drink to forget. Some of us hide in the agendas, schedules, and to-do lists of each day, all so we don't have to face head-on the things we fear.

But this psalm reminds us that in our running, only one thing is truly inescapable: God's presence. "Where can I go from your spirit?" the psalmist cries. "Where can I flee from your presence?"

The answer: nowhere. Even at the farthest limits, even at the end of our rope, even in the deepest darkness, God is there. For "even the darkness is not dark" for God.

May God's light of love continue to shine in your life, and may it be the one thing you have to face head-on every day.

PRAYER:
God of love, open our hearts, our minds, our schedules, and our eyes so that we are able to see you present with us in every detail. Thank you for walking alongside us, when we notice it, and when we don't. Amen.