Masks

Thought for the Day, this week from David Wilson.

Nevertheless when anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. Now the Lord is the Spirit. And where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, seeing the glory of the Lord with unveiled faces, as in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory by Spirit of the Lord. (2 Corinthians 3:16-18)
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Something we probably only thought about once a year at Halloween has now become an ever-present in our society. We even go to church and sing and pray wearing our masks. How life has changed!

​For some of us, however, there is nothing unusual about wearing a mask to church. We’ve been doing it for years or even decades. We walk in and meet the greeters at the door with our “No we didn’t just have an argument in the car” masks on. We sit in the pews with our “I’m doing just fine” masks on while we wonder how it all went so wrong. So many different masks worn for so many different reasons, but all with one aim - to protect us, to stop God and the people around us from knowing what we are really like, because if they did, they probably wouldn’t like us any more.

It’s not original. After Adam and Eve sinned, the first thing that they did was make clothes to try and hide their nakedness from God and here we are so many years later still trying to do the same thing. It doesn’t have to be like that.

​In the passage from Corinthians, Paul makes it clear that turning to the Lord requires us to remove the veil(or mask) from our faces and come with complete openness to the Lord. In that state, when we are truly vulnerable to the Spirit, he promises liberty from the shame that clings to us and gazing on His beauty, we find ourselves being transformed into His likeness. 

If we set our hearts and minds to live in that place of vulnerability to God, there will be no need of masks to hide our scarred and twisted visages anymore, as we will be reflecting the perfect glory and beauty of the Lord. Even the smallest part of that reflection will vastly outshine any imperfections of ours.

One of the buzz word around these days is "authenticity". Let us all strive to be authentic before God, and He will be authentic with us.

Dave