Authentic

Sitting alone with the Lord tonight, the word seems almost to taunt me. Authentic.

It's a quality I value. It's a quality I aspire to but when I look myself in the mirror, I have to ask, is it a word that could be used to describe me?

Sometimes I find myself in a room full of people and I can't help but wonder if any of them truly know me at all. I feel misunderstood often, and insecurity is a battle that wages itself against me a lot. It's all tied up together, the sense of not being known or understood and the fear of being judged or rejected. It takes me inside my own head, and I cry out inside, "Am I being real??"

It's a scary question to ask, because if I am being real and it leads to being rejected, what does that say about who I am? Does it speak ill of me or ill of the one who is rejecting me?

I'm very black and white in what I believe. What you believe defines who you are. I am a hard person to sway. Some people might call that being narrow minded, but I consider myself to be a person of conviction. What I hold dear to my heart is the Truth of God's Word, and if you want to change my perspective on something, you have to do it with a biblical argument. If you can't convince me with a biblical argument, you can't convince me at all, and a lot of people wold say that description takes me from narrow minded to judgmental.

I hear myself saying (a lot) "But the Bible says..." and I wonder, is it a copout? Am I not thinking for myself? It's what the world would accuse me of, considering me a lemming. But I don't know how not to filter my decisions through the Word of God. That is who I truly am. I've seen the wisdom of believing God at His word. and as it says in Matthew 11, "...wisdom is proved right by her deeds.” (vs. 19)

My mind is just twisting tonight with concern. I want to be real. I want to be a genuine person. But sometimes, I truly wonder.

All I know is that all any of us can do is our best to live our lives in the Light, open and honest, in both our struggles and our victories. We have to remember that we are all works in process and maybe that is part of the challenge.

Maybe the reason it is so hard to feel authentic is because none of us is yet who we were truly created to be. Hopefully every day if we do our best to seek the Lord with our whole hearts, He, the Author and Finisher of our faith, will mold us a little more into the form of who He has purposed us to be. There is a Master plan for each and every one of us, and no two of us are on the same path, no two of us have the same "blue print," if you will. And not one of us has yet to arrive at the finished product, which interestingly enough for every one of us will be a clear reflection of the Savior who is molding us all along the way.

I want to be real. I want to be genuine. But much like growing into shoes when I was a child, the fit isn't quite right yet, and many days I am more aware of the awkwardness than the progress, but perhaps if I remember on those more uncomfortable days that God is molding and shaping me, I can look forward with anticipation to the completion of authenticity, rather than just wallow in the weirdness of the process. At least I hope so.

When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
1 Corinthians 13:11-12