The stories of my faith tell of many men and women who stood before the "face of God". Not just in front of Jesus, who, being truly human would normally just appear human, but before the Father himself, maybe even the entire trinity. Elijah, Moses, the disciples to whom Jesus revealed his true self during the transfiguration, all of these stood face to face with God himself. And we often think that if we could have such an experience, then maybe our faith wouldn't be so hard. It would be so much easier to believe in God if he were standing (or floating or whatever) right there, right?
This is a challenging time in my life. After losing my job and my home at the same time, my family and I have moved into the home of a gracious and generous family in our church. The house is plenty big enough for both of our families--would we choose to use the back door instead of the front we would never even have to see them. But we do use the front door and for various other reasons (for instance we do not have an oven of our own or even all of our dishes), we share both of our spaces to a limited extent.
For the most part, this setup is working just fine. But one of the main areas of tension always brewing just under the surface is over cleanliness. Now, I have never thought of my family as being dirty. We have four small children and tend to leave a lot of clutter around, we never take the time to organize toys that are just going to be dumped out and stirred up again the next day and often just getting out the door is much more important to us than making sure the last of the peanut butter and jelly is removed from the table (or couch or wherever it was smeared). Our host family, on the other hand is amazingly tidy and clean. It is almost to the point where there is rarely any evidence that they live upstairs at all if they are not actually present. They make dinner without a mess. They eat dinner without a mess. They free play all over the house without a mess. They too have small children. They are never messy. I have decided to just leave the dirt on my two year old's face just so people will recognize him because it is rarely not there. Their children sometimes have frizzy hair.
I am continually in awe of this. And, because in my new life situation I am now the stay-at-home parent, I am seriously intimidated. The other day, my host found a roach in their area of the house. The same plea was repeated. "Please please watch the food and be careful". Now I know that roaches are just a fact of life and do not necessarily indicate filth. Honestly I don't even know if it was a roach at all (as an outdoor education instructor for fifteen years, you must earn a certain level of respect from me before I believe you saw anything in particular beyond the standard pets). But the shame hit me hard. I remembered that they had walked through our area earlier that day as I napped on the couch, the table littered with the sticky remains of the PB&J my children had just slaughtered and consumed. How lazy and disgusting must I have appeared?
It gets worse though. Because in my attempt to relieve my shame, I begin thinking of all the ways our family is in fact superior to theirs. And then I realized that not only am I a slob, but I am also a judgemental, arrogant (and let's be honest a little lazy) slob. And I just want to crawl into a hole.
Which brings me back to my original (and somewhat aprupt) introduction. If this is how I feel in the presence of someone who clearly has (at least part of) their life together far more than me, how would I feel before the face of God, the creator of said life? Those stories also speak of men falling down on their faces in the dirt, begging God to go away. People who got too close to him, too familiar, and would just drop dead. How can we not feel some level of fear before a God who is so Good, so Loving, we cannot stand it?
Maybe it is a great mercy that God hides himself from us. That we only experience him in measured doses: the kindness of a stranger or even worse, a friend; the beauty of a sunrise; the giggle of a little girl. I can barely stand it when my daughter smiles at me. My heart would surely explode were I to see the smile of God.
I have spent much of my life seeking after God. Desiring to know him more and more fully. But I have not spent nearly enough time working on my own self, practicing the kinds of things that would make me slightly less ashamed to stand before him. I know he loves me. But I think I am becoming more thankful that he reveals that love in measured doses. I do not think I could handle much more than I am getting right now. There is just too much peanut butter smeared into my beard.