Remove the Mask!
Being raised in church all of my life, I have seen the positives and negatives of church life. From a young person until present, I have always been fascinated with how people live and react to daily life.
Once I accepted the skills that God has given me, one being the ability to see behind the mask of others and touch the spirit of those God places in my path, I now have a desire to see others succeed both spiritually as well as naturally. I am of the opinion that we have to learn how to balance the spiritual man and the natural man. We are not solely spiritual nor natural. Therefore we must strike a balance between the two. It has always disturbed me to see the unhappiness that many saints of God live with. We are afraid of ourselves: our feelings, pains, uncertainties, and failures. We choose to put on a mask instead of revealing our true selves.
What is the mask that we wear? Let me start by saying we all wear a social mask. Social masks are appropriate to a degree. We don't want to know all of your business just because we say, "Praise the Lord" or "How are you doing?" Most of the time we just want to hear a cordial "Praise the Lord. I'm fine."
The mask that is deceptive is the one you wear when life is really going bad and you still exclaim "I'M FINE!" Why can't we say, "Today is not the best, but I'm moving forward?" It is my belief that we fear rejection and judgment. One author says, "Falsehood is invariably the child of fear in one form or another." The amazing thing is that we all have had a bad day; so why do we choose to judge others negatively when they do? Is it because when we see others sad it makes us reflect on the real issues that are troubling us? If we could learn how to embrace each other and stop being afraid of loving each other we could help to take the masks off.
The scariest aspect of wearing a mask is that the longer you wear it the harder it is to take it off. Some people have crazy-glued their mask on and they even wear it at home AND in the mirror. We do ourselves an injustice not to know ourselves intimately. God has created us all with huge potential and greatness. A lot of us had our potentials trampled in childhood. Yet as adults, we have to consciously reject the negativity and find the potential that God has given us.
We must remember that when we received salvation, God made us into a new creature. We have to begin to let God re-nurture and raise us into our potential. The first step we must take is to begin to believe we deserve it and our worthy of God's greatness. We have to believe that God does not want our potential to die. He has afforded us the chance to discover the wounds and issues of the past, dig them up, and replace them with positive-ness and love. We choose the lives we live. We choose how we respond to each and every situation.
We choose to live mediocre lives and just go through the motions. We choose to merely exist, instead of LIVE. As adults, we are 100 percent accountable for the condition of our lives, our relationship with God and others. If we choose to continue to look through the clouded glasses of our issues instead of the clear view that God gives us, then it is no wonder why we continue to be unfulfilled. Like an outlet plug it cannot be plugged into if stucco or debris is in the way. The same with the Lord, He cannot get plugged into hearts that are full of debris. Have you allowed God to get plugged into your heart? Our hearts should be like an outlet plug." Push OUT the old man, the pain, hurt, disappointment, etc. and LET the love of God penetrate every fiber of your being and light up your life.
When I say push out the old man, I am not suggesting that we sweep it under a carpet or deny the impact that pain causes us. I want us to search our hearts, feel the discomforts, make a conscious effort to release and heal it, and then move past the experience with clarity, knowledge and growth. We must stop seeing negatives negatively and start seeing them as potentials for growth and greatness. We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us! He is acquainted with our broken hearts and potentials. He really does understand. We are not poor saints because we have issues. We are simply human beings that God has chosen to save in spite of our issues. No one lives this life uninjured by the chaos of sin, be it a saint or sinner, male or female.
We are still in this world, just not of it. Let's begin to show the world how to be true over-comers: over-comers of sin, depression, sadness, pain, anger, and mediocrity. For God has not given us the Spirit of fear, but of power, love and of a sound mind!