The Photo-shopped Family - Image Control

We all camoflage the not so perfect areas in our lives the same way we try to photoshop the imperfections in our family pictures. We wait to fight with our spouse until we are in the privacy of our own home. We try to get our kids in the car before they self-destruct in public. We tell others that everything is "great" when our lives are falling apart.

It is human nature to try to cover up the flaws in ourselves and our lives. It was the first thing Adam and Eve did after they gained knowledge by eating the forbidden fruit: they immediately hid from God and covered their bodies.

All the energy we put into projecting a life that is perfect however, is a waste of time and effort that brings no resolution to the problems we are hiding. If we were less concerned about what strangers and people who don't care about us think, we would have a lot more freedom to deal with the less than perfect aspects of our lives and perhaps actually come to a place of peace or discern a way to deal with those issues.

God wants us to live a life of authenticity. How can we show how God has saved us from ourselves and worked in our lives if we pretend that everything is perfect all the time? How can we expect others to allow us to minister to them if we pretend that we have no problems? I know that I don't want to share my problems with someone who seems to have none....

No one is perfect. All of our lives are filled with brokeness and sin because we are broken and sinful people. None of us can do it perfectly.

What would our Church and world look like if we were brave enough to drop the facade of perfection that we mask ourselves in and had authenitic, life changing relationships with God and those around us?

I think this world would be a much better place.

CS

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
- Ephesians 2:8-9