Isn't that true, before we leave the bathroom after putting on our make up, blow-drying our hair and getting dressed we put on a mask. A ceramic mask that conveniently covers our true face and therefore our true feelings. It doesn't matter if we've been crying and our cheeks are stained with tear drops, we pull out the mask and no one sees them, just a plastic smile that almost looks genuine. Laughter flows off our lips, though you alone know its as hollow as a tree eaten from the core out by a disease we might as well call bitterness or grief. Our sighs of secret pain could easily be mistaken for a sigh of contentment with our masks squarely in place. We put on all these disguises, masks and facades that might fool the onlookers peering in but can not fool our heart peering out from within. We can try, as many of us do, to deceive our selves to even believe the mask we're wearing; but at the end of the day after all the amusements and mirth, though the feeling of grief and sorrow seemed to have been laughed away, they slip right back up. Like a fresh cut, you dab a cloth on it to stop the bleeding for awhile, but when you take it off to peer at your wound the the blood slowly starts to slip out of the cut. So you rap it up again ever so tightly in the cloth to make it stop bleeding, stop hurting.
As Beth Moore aptly put it. "Life's way of reacting to a crushed heart is to wrap tough sinews of flesh around it and promise we'll never let ourselves get hurt again. But in keeping love from going out, we keep love from coming in. We risk becoming captives in our own self-made fortresses."
Yes, its hard. Yes, it hurts. God doesn't minimize the pain, but He does ask us to grow through the sorrow and grief. That we wouldn't ignore it and refuse to 'feel' through the hard times. To not be fake about anything but be real in all things. Even if it be only to Him. Just as His word says.
" Pour out your heart like water before the face of the Lord. Lift your hands towards Him..."
(Lamentations 2:19)
" I called on Your name, O Lord, from the lowest pit. You have heard my voice: 'Do not hide Your ear from my sighing, from my cry for help.' You drew near on the day I called You, and said, 'Do not fear!" (Lamentations 3:55-57)
