Costumes and Masks

Things we put on that make us fake.

Last week we talked about those things that go bump in the night; those things that scare us and make us afraid; our fears. I went over with you the three types of responses our bodies can have when we experience that fear. Our physiological response is the way that our actual bodies respond when we experience fear. When our hearts pound, our breathing becomes quicker; we sweat and we get ready for the flight or the fight that's about to take place. ..:NAMESPACE PREFIX = O />

Our behavioral responses which is our action responses to our fear; when we avoid certain places, people and experiences to keep from experiencing that fear or we develop habits or reliance's on medication to control our fears.

Our cognitive responses which is our thinking responses because of the fear. We can become obsessed by our fears; they can become all consuming…we begin to think that everything and everyone is out to get us. We can become paranoid and change who we are on the inside. In that we begin to wear masks and costumes around those we come into contact with.

This is what I'd like to talk to you about.

Out of our fears we can begin to change into people that we truly aren't on the inside.

We can develop into a fake or phony person and we ourselves can lose sight of who we really are. A few years ago I read the book Posers, Fakers, and Wannabes by Brennan Manning and Jim Hancock and it opened my eyes to the fact that there are a lot of us out there who are wearing masks and costumes instead of being who we truly are in our hearts.

A.W. Tozer wrote that – "what comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us."

The book states that people tend to project their opinions about God onto the world and then we project onto God our worst attitudes and feelings about ourselves.

There is a story in the book about a young boy named Ruller trying to catch a wild turkey. The story portrays our experience with God; how we feel generous when God's been generous with us; and how God is just waiting all the time to take back those good things from us when we screw up.

Sometimes in life we think of God as a bookkeeper –keeping track of all our debits and credits and counting our every misstep and screw up that we make in life and that he holds them all against us. In our minds we begin to see Him as a grudge holder who desires to get back at us by snatching those things that we love and desire out of our hands. When we lose something in our lives; like Ruller who loses his turkey -we can think of God as an unpredictable bad tempered unfair man in the sky. But also on top of all that: we also think; "that God thinks we're a mess –we think; of course He does, and why wouldn't He; who can blame God – look at me, I AM a mess."

There is a famous quote by Blaise Pascal; "God made us in His own image and we have more than returned the compliment."

If we feel hatred for ourselves then it makes sense in our minds that God must hate us too.  If we view ourselves as failures then God must also view us as a failure.

But that's not how God thinks of us.

He loves us and His love is amazing, steady and unchanging.

God's love is not dependant on how much we please Him with our actions. He loves us just because He loves us.

Think about it in this way; do you love your parents because they take care of you – because they feed you and clothe you? If they quit doing that would your love stop for them? No, of course not; you would still love them. True love is not dependant on what we get from someone; we love them because we simply love them.

But yet with God we feel that we have to act in a certain way to get His love.

We think that God couldn't possibly help us out in our lives because we aren't good enough to receive His help. Our own inadequacies strangle us. We become afraid.

There is a story in the book where a man asks his young son – "Daniel, when you see Jesus looking at you; what do you see in His eyes?"

And after a long pause the boy replied, "His eyes are filled with tears, Dad."

The father asked, "Why is that, Dan?"

And the son quietly whispers – "because He is sad."

The dad then finally asks, "But why is He so sad?"

The son stares for a long time looking at the floor and then finally looks up at his dad with tears in his eyes and says, "Because I'm afraid."

That's the problem….It NOT supposed to be like that!

God never meant for us to be afraid. It breaks His heart that we are afraid of Him, that we are afraid of life, afraid of each other and afraid of ourselves.

He created woman from man so that he would have community – a close life together and with God Himself. But when the enemy successfully deceived Adam – it led to a path that led also to shame and caused him to try to hide his nakedness with fig leaves and trying to take cover among the trees.

It breaks God's heart that we run from Him instead of to Him when we fail in our lives.

We need to quit wearing masks and costumes and we need to get real with the God who created us. We don't like to be seen for what we truly are. It's so much easier to continue to pretend to be something we aren't.

Simon Tugwell wrote: We hide what we know or feel about ourselves to be (which we assume to be unacceptable and unlovable) behind some kind of appearance which we hope will be more pleasing. We hide behind pretty faces which we put on for the benefit of our public. And in time we many even come to forget what we are hiding and begin to think that our assumed face is what we really look like.

The saddest things are when we think we aren't good enough to be loved by God or when we think that He is fooled by our pretty masks and costumes.

Now don't want be confused- God does accept sin - but He also does not withhold His love for us when we do sin.

The truth is that God didn't save us so that He could love us. He saved us because He loved us.

 Why then do we try to hide behind masks and wear costumes?

We pretend we don't need Him in our lives and out of our fear we don't draw close to God because we don't want the true diagnosis of what we actually have wrong with us.

It's just like when people refuse to go to the Dr. because they're afraid of bad news; sometimes people also run from the God who heals because they're afraid that He will point out not just that one thing but also the other things that are wrong with us.

A lot of people cannot stand to be alone with who they really are inside. It's so much easier to continue being who they are instead of changing. That's why we have so many people consumed with busyness; they just keep busy doing and accomplishing and try not to think about who they really are. Others choose to just check out by sleeping away all their time. Some get involved with alcohol or drugs. Others live off the approval of others and they go around overachieving in everything because it's how they feel good about themselves. Some turn to food and some self abuse like cutting or even punishing their bodies by bulimia or anorexia and some others of course turn to sex.

Henri Nouwen wrote:  I have come to realize that the greatest trap in our life is not success, popularity or power, but self rejection. Success, popularity and power can present a great temptation, but their seductive quality often comes from the way they are part of the much larger temptation of self rejection. When we have come to believe in the voices that call us worthless and unlovable, then success, popularity, and power are easily perceived as attractive solutions. The real trap however is self rejection…self rejection is the greatest enemy of the spiritual life because it contradicts the sacred voice that calls us beloved.

Maybe Franklin Delano Roosevelt said it best:

"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."

We cannot afford to keep wearing these masks and costumes in our lives.

1 Peter 5:5 tells us to clothe ourselves with humility. For God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble.  It takes true humility to take off our masks and stand before God.

Some of us are just one moment away from our greatest encounter with God but it will not come unless we are willing to GET REAL!

We cannot change what we don't admit needs changing. Whatever we don't admit needs changing will never be healed and…God cannot heal what we continue to conceal with our masks and costumes.

Our biggest concern in this life should not be whether we're liked by the people in this world but instead that we are pleasing to the God who created and loves us.

What you are really afraid of reveals what's in your heart.

Ask God to look inside of it; invite Him in and then be willing to work on your flaws. He won't be surprised that you have them. He knows they're there; He's just waiting for you to get real with Him.