Devotional: The Hiding Place

When I woke up on June 18, 2015 the television was on. The local news channel that we watch was reporting news that the Emmanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina was the scene of the murder of nine church members that had gathered for bible study. Among these nine persons killed was the pastor Rev. Clementa Pickney who was also a state senator. The suspect was a twenty-one year old Caucasian male identified as Dylann Roof.

As I watched and listened for details of what had occurred I was intrigued by the questions that people were asking: How could this happen in the church? If this can happen in the church, is any place safe? Almost immediately I remembered that years earlier a church in my hometown of Columbia, Tennessee was one of several Black churches that had been burned in the South. The newsperson was interviewing one woman in particular. My nursing experience caused me to sense that this woman was speaking out of here grief and loss. Her question came from the first two stages of grief; “Shock and Disbelief” and “Denial.”

The words of a song that we sang as kids when we played church came to mind.

There’s no hiding place down here,

There’s no hiding place down here.

O! I went to the rocks to hide my face,

The rocks cried out no hiding place.

There’s no hiding place down here.

As I rehearsed the words to this song, I remembered Psalm 46.The psalmist said “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear...” (vv. 1-2). The psalmist goes on to describe events that caused the people to fear. He describes earthquakes and tornados. He mentions the conflicts between nations. In Charleston nine people were dead because a young man misguided in his thinking thought that he had justifiable reasons to take their lives. At the same time people were in danger of losing their lives by fire in western states. The rains, storms, and tornados were a threat to people in the middle states and up the eastern coast. I thanked God that up to this point these devastating events had not taken place here in Nashville, Tennessee. The weather forecast made it evident that we too were in danger of suffering just as other people were suffering.

The psalmist does not promise us that God will stop the events that threaten our lives. He does not tell us that these events will not cause us to fear. Rather, the psalmist tells us that God is our safe place. God is our security. Regardless of what happens in our lives, we are in a safe and secure place when God is with us. The people in Charleston were strengthened by their faith in God. By their faith they knew that their friends and loved ones were gone from their presence, but they were in a safe place with full security because they were with their God. Their faith in God erased their fears and gave them hope for the future. They know that God is the hiding place.