Is there anyplace I can go to avoid your Spirit? To be out of your sight? (MSG)
The answer is no...
Margaret Wise Brown wrote a book in 1942 called 'The Runaway Bunny'. One day the bunny got angry with his mother and decided to run away. His mother said to him, 'If you run away, I will run after you. For you are my little bunny.'
Well, the little bunny came up with all sorts of scenarios of where he could run to, where he thought his mother couldn't find him - he could be a fish in a stream or a crocus in a hidden garden or a rock on a mountain, or climb a tree. She constantly assured him that she would always look for him.
My grandchildren have yet to announce any plans to run away and I know if they ever make that decision, my daughters will find them.
But running away can also mean running away from God, from our responsibilities in life or even from ourselves. As we struggle with issues and decisions or get angry and frustrated with ourselves, we have to remember that we can never hide from God. He goes with us - always and everywhere, beginning and end.
I've run to the ocean at different times thinking I'd find solace and peace there, but it never happened. Actually being there only made things worse and I learned I can't run away from God or from me.
The rest of Psalm 139:8-12 says this: If I climb to the sky, you're there! If I go underground, you're there!, If I flew on morning's wings, to the far western horizon, you'd find me in a minute--you're already there waiting! Then I said to myself, "Oh, he even sees me in the dark! At night I'm immersed in the light." It's a fact: darkness isn't dark to you; night and day, darkness and light, they're all the same to you. (MSG)
God is with us and will never leave us. Like mother bunny said, 'if you run away, I will run after you, for you are my little bunny.' We could say the same thing of God in these words - if you run away, I will be with you on the way and at the other end, for you are my child.
Nancy
