Hiding Behind a Mask — Morning Devotions

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Transcript

Children love to play a game called ‘Let’s pretend‘, and they love to dress up and pretend to be somebody else. That’s part of growing up. But what happens when we grow into adulthood and still pretend?

I like to call that putting on a mask, but I’m sure we wear masks at some time or another, and we do so for various reasons, and I don’t mean physical masks, but some people put them on for devious reasons, others for more complex personal reasons.

For example – a lack of confidence or self-preservation or the need for acceptance, and, and these reasons may be fueled by things like fear or guilt or confusion about who I really am. What do I want out of life? What can I do?

So we pretend, we hide behind the masks we wear, and it prevents others from knowing who we are.

But I’m afraid over time we ourselves begin to lose touch with who we really are, and that’s never helpful. And eventually we assimilate the role that we play. We slip into this life of pretence and camouflage.

So who wants to live a life of pretence? Do you want to do that? Wouldn’t it be more liberating and joyful to be an authentic person? Do you remember Alice and Tweedledum in Through the Looking Glass, and Tweedledum says to Alice, “You know very well you’re not real.” She says, “Listen, if I wasn’t real, I wouldn’t be able to cry.”

Well, Ralph Waldo Emerson summed up this topic about wearing masks when he said ‘to be yourself in a world that’s constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.’

So it means after fits and starts and some falls, I can be confident. I can walk confidently. I’m free to be myself without a fear, without apology. So I think what we need to do is to strive for authenticity, and one of the realities of life is that people’s opinion of us won’t always be positive.

But that’s not a reason to misrepresent ourselves. You might feel like a tiny rowboat in the big sea of life, and you see the grand ocean liners come by and rock us and as they go past,

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But we must maintain our resolve to live authentically in every circumstance that we find. Now this can be difficult, it’s not easy, it takes time, but hiding behind a mask is really no way to live. So I want to encourage you to throw away that mask and to fill your mind and have beliefs and clothe your life with authenticity.

So what masks do you wear?

What are the circumstances that you put them on? Why do you wear them? Are there things there that you don’t want people to know? It was the psychologist Robin Resnick who said we sometimes wear masks as our shield to protect and conceal ourselves because hiding behind our masks gets us through our day. And we conceal what we really think, feel, and want. Don’t get attached to yours, Robin says. Reveal who you really are.

Well, that’s OK, but the problem is that masks don’t necessarily represent who we really are. They just mask who we are. God made us the way we are with lots of potential. And people can see us as we are.

Halloween is the night, particularly in the USA where it’s acceptable to present yourself as someone else. It’s fun to wear a mask, I guess, but on an ordinary day, do people see you when they look at you, or are you trying to be somebody else? Is that mask that you might be wearing on all the time?

Why do we do this? – There could be fear that we’re not going to measure up to what other people think, or we think, well, there’s something wrong with me. I’ve been rejected.

But let me say what God’s word, 1 John 4:16-18 says, God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in Him. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. So if we follow Jesus Christ, we can live over fear. Love takes off the masks, and we can live knowing that God is with us. So God’s promises are there. I hope that you can find them today.

Let’s Pray

Lord, take that mask away. Let us be authentic as we trust you. Amen.

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