I mentioned in other posts that I’m trying to get to know myself a wee bit better.
Emotions; passions; the hidden bits and pieces that we human folks work so hard to keep locked up.
I don’t know why this has become something of a necessary project with me.
Perhaps, the effort of keeping the beasties at bay is just becoming to tiring for me.
We all do it.
It’s nothing new.
Bill Shakespeare wrote in the play As You Like It, “All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players…”
If we’re honest with ourselves, we KNOW that’s absolutely true.
The ancient Greeks used masks in their dramas to indicate, not only who the character was, but also what kind of character it was.
We still do this today.
As I sat this morning in prayer, I talked to Yahweh about this. I said, “This is me.” Then, quoting the great sage Popeye, I told God, “I am what I am, and that’s all that I am.”
Then, I told God, “It’s Yours. All the darkness and the beasties that are within.”
Now, such confession is well-known in Churchy circles. Folks beat their breasts and cry out to the Void, “O, Lord! I am a Sinner! Please forgive me and take my life for Your Glory!”
Or, something like that.
These folks then get to make some new masks.
Masks of piety and righteousness.
Masks that allow them to communicate spiritual-sounding platitudes while concealing the reality.
The Beasties still live.
But, the masks allow us to appear as something we really aren’t.
We can say, “It’s not about the money at all. It’s about the Ministry!“
Or, “God gave me this book so that He can use it for His Glory!”
(Whatever that really means.)
I could go on and on and on, ad nauseum. But, I’m sure that you get the point.
We are, for the most part, False.
Let that sink in for a moment.
In virtually all of our social dealings, we put on personas that we think will fool those around us and portray as as ‘good’ and ‘virtuous.’
Hell, no one want to appear in negative light! It’s human nature!
And, it keeps the peace and allows us to actually interact with one another without strangling each other.
So, masks do serve a social purpose, I guess.
Where the real rub lies, though, is when we actually start to believe that what the masks portray is the true reality.
I’m not a selfish S.O.B.! Look, I deny my own needs every single day! I am “Altruistic Man”! Yippee!
Not only do we delude ourselves, we try to delude God.
(Spoiler Alert: God’s not fooled.)
Yet, we continue to think that if God just gives us an injection of Holy Spirit we will, in fact, become that other person. We believe that somewhere deep down inside there really is a Divine spark that will transform us into a person saturated with and dripping with Godly virtue.
Not happening, is it?
I mean, when we take off the mask we’re still ourselves. Aren’t we?
We’re still selfish and carnal and angry and, and, and…
We are not going to become anything that we have not always been.
Human.
And, that’s OK!
God never asked us to become “Virtue Person,” or “Spiritual Person.”
We are asked to be honest.
With ourselves. With others. With God.
Because, God loves us as we are. Dirt under our fingernails and everything.
We have no reason to hide. No need to be anything other than who we are.
Period.
Maybe, we should all just sit back and get to know ourselves. To accept and love ourselves.
God does.
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