There are moments I find myself crying out, not because I don’t believe God is near — but because I desperately want to feel Him.

It happened when I was driving home after something had upset me. I was talking to God the way I do when I’m worked up — no script, no filter, just honest. And I said out loud, “Even though I’m alone… I know I’m not alone. I know You’re sitting right here with me.”

But still — I wanted more.
Not more proof, just more presence.

I wanted to feel Him.
I wanted to see Him.
I wanted to hear something from Him — not metaphorically, not spiritually… but tangibly.

And then something struck me:
What I really wanted… was to be able to touch Him.
To smell Him.
To reach for Him like a child does their parent.

That’s when this image came to mind — one I’ve seen a hundred times in my own house.
Me, rocking my baby to sleep…
His tiny hands gently reaching for my face — tracing my lips, my eyelashes, my nose.
Not because he’s trying to calm me…
But because he’s learning me.
Because he wants to know the features of the one who loves him.

And I realized — maybe that’s what God wants from us too.

Maybe He wants us to be so hungry to know Him, so desperate to recognize Him, that we would reach for Him like a child in the dark.
Not to fix anything.
Not to perform anything.
But just to discover.

To trace the lines of His face.
To wonder where His hair falls at the nape of His neck.
To feel the curve of His jaw, the arch of His brow, the kindness in His eyes.
To know: this is my Father.

We often think of God as the one tracing us — counting the hairs on our head, holding our tears in a bottle, never sleeping as He watches over us.

But what if the invitation has always been two-way?

What if He’s not hiding — just waiting?
Waiting for us to draw closer.
Waiting for us to cup His face in our hands — not because we need something from Him… but because we want to know Him.

I want to know the God who knows me like that.

“For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face.
Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.”
1 Corinthians 13:12 (NIV)