Hidey Hole

Seeking Jesus in heaven the ultimate hiding place

05/10/2018

John 16:16-20 Jesus said to his disciples: "A little while and you will no longer see me, and again a little while later and you will see me." So some of his disciples said to one another, "What does this mean that he is saying to us, 'A little while and you will not see me, and again a little while and you will see me,' and 'Because I am going to the Father'?" So they said, "What is this 'little while' of which he speaks? We do not know what he means." Jesus knew that they wanted to ask him, so he said to them, "Are you discussing with one another what I said, 'A little while and you will not see me, and again a little while and you will see me'? Amen, amen, I say to you, you will weep and mourn, while the world rejoices; you will grieve, but your grief will become joy."

One of my favorite games growing up was hide and seek. Everyone knows how to play it, but let me rapidly review the rules. One person is designated as the seeker – he or she is “it” – while everyone else hides. And by the way, I hate to seek but always wanted to hide – that’s more fun! I sometimes use that skill today to hide from some parishioners! The person who seek must close their eyes and count to a certain number. For instance, they count to one hundred by increments of five: five, ten, fifteen, twenty, twenty-five, thirty, etc. When I was “it” and had to seek others, I would zip through the numbers like machine gun fire: five, ten, fifteen, etc. barely enunciating each number, so I could catch the kids before they could find their clandestine hidey hole. I love this game so much, I still play it when I visit families in their home, but I can’t get into good hidey holes like I used to, or if I do, I can’t get out!

In the gospel of John, Jesus seems to invite his apostles to a game of hide and seek. He says cryptically: “A little while and you will no longer see me, and again a little while later and you will see me.” Clearly the apostles never played hide and seek because they are unnecessarily mystified by their Messiah’s meaning. But Jesus explains that like the game hide and seek, where one person is hidden out of sight momentarily but then found again, so too, Jesus’ death and resurrection will require him to be hidden in a tomb for three days and then be seen again. The apostles would have to seek and Jesus would get the fun part of hiding. In this case, the apostles would have to count for three days before they could find their Lord. On Resurrection Sunday, Jesus would let them find him.

But Jesus enjoyed playing this game so much, that would not be his final occasion. He played again at his Ascension into heaven – which we would normally celebrate today on “Ascension Thursday,” but the feast is transferred to Sunday. At the Ascension, Jesus finds the best “hidey hole” of all, namely, heaven. And this time the apostles must count for several years before they could find Jesus again. Could this be one reason why the apostles were unafraid and even anxious to die for Jesus, and the sooner the better? They knew Jesus’ hidey hole was heaven and martyrdom was the fastest way to find him there! In a sense, they were counting their remaining years fast, like I used to speed through the numbers when I had to do the seeking. Jesus’ Ascension reveals that the best hidey hole is heaven.

The longer I am a priest and the more people I meet, the more I discover how many people have lost a family member (even children) or a close friend prematurely, they died too early in life. Often the intentions for our Masses are offered for those deceased loved ones. I don’t want to sound uncaring or insensitive, but would it help a little to see their loss more like a game of hide and seek? Again, I don’t want to underestimate the pain of such loss, I’ve felt it too since my nephew died, but it gives me a little comfort and consolation to think he is hiding heaven (or purgatory) and I’ll see him again. The temptation, though, is to rush through the counting and try to see them again before they have had enough time to get into their hidey hole of heaven. Sometimes we refuse to let them hide by inordinately holding on to them.

But I’ve found that we don’t need to count fast at all; the years fly by like leaves in the wind (or maybe more like leaves in a tornado), and we soon come to the end of our own life. That’s the moment in which we too get to hide (that’s the fun part) and others have to seek us. Our whole Christian faith and our whole Christian life can be seen through the lens of the children’s game of hide and seek. Again we see why Jesus insisted: “Amen, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.”

Praised be Jesus Christ!