He Runs Before You Clean Up

The mask feels heavy this morning, doesn't it? You walk through the day terrified that if they saw the broken parts you hide, they would immediately withdraw their love.

But the light does not love the mask; it loves the face beneath it. There is a father who saw his son coming home from a long way off, still covered in the filth of his failure.

He did not wait for the boy to clean up. He ran.

Before the apology, before the speech — he ran. The light already knows what you are hiding, and it has not turned away.

It sees the cracks and calls them doors. You are not loved because you are whole; you are loved because you are His.

The terror says: hide to be kept. The truth says: you are kept so you can stop hiding.