To be transparent and.... to be ok with it.

Transparent:

1.Having the property of transmitting rays of light through its substance so that bodies situated beyond or behind can be distinctly seen.

2. Admitting the passage of light through interstices.

3. So sheer as to permit light to pass through; diaphanous.

4. Easily seen through, recognized, or detected: transparent excuses.

5. manifest; obvious: a story with a transparent plot.

6. open; frank; candid: the man's transparent earnestness.

7. Obsolete . shining through, as light.

We are called to walk be the blood of the lamb and the word of our testimony.  But do we share only the “pretty” testimonies?  Do we only show those places where we are fully healed and on the other side of victory?

I have been thinking a lot lately about this.   I only hope that I can get it all out of my head before it disappears like mist coming off the ground in the morning.  Happens that way sometimes when I am trying to write.  But that is another blog isn’t it....

Last night I had a dream about this young girl name Dorothy.  And no, we were not in the land of “OZ”, but she was in a place where she needed council and help in her journey.  She was beginning something new and not sure show to get there. Yeah I know, the similarities of this Dorothy and the one in the Land of “OZ” are there, but this Dorothy trying to understand while still in the real world or her own life. She was in a place where she felt she was not fitting in.  Other’s were “going to the prom” and she was not only without a date, but without a dress. She did have a really amazing scarf though....  hmmmm, this dream seems to be more my life than I first thought.  But, if I am to be transparent and do the work of the blog, then I have to keep writing don’t I?   

Here’s the challenge of this blog.  I know I usually wait until the end, but it is my blog after all, and that means I can put it any place I want.  

When you and I are given the opportunity to encourage, support, edify, council, comfort, exhort, challenge in love... you get the idea, do we only use the places in our life where we have victory.  Do we only share our strengths.  Or, are we willing to share those places where we have struggled and failed.  Those places where we got lost along the way and God had to come and find us.  Do we share the times when we were sitting along side the road crying because there was no one for us to talk to.  When, in that moment of tears the love to a great big amazing God showed up because no one else would come near.  

More importantly, are we willing to tell the truth about the places where we are still struggling.  Still in need of the truth spoken in love.  Or, are we unwilling to show those places where we have bumps and brokenness because we don’t want to look smaller in the eyes of others.  I see this all the time... struggle with it in my own heart.  I wonder “what are they doing talking to me?  Seriously, I have so many flaws that still need to be worked out!”  

Religion says, “wear a mask, don’t show your flaws”.  Relationship demands the opposite. Real council that brings transformation to both parties - the one giving and the one receiving - involves not just telling someone what is wrong with them and leaving them to fix it for themselves.  A huge part of the “fixing” for my own heart has come when the one speaking into my life has been real enough with me to share their own struggles with the very same area that I need to work through.  

So... here again is the challenge for the day.  Are we willing to show the bumps?  The places in our body were there is still need for work.  No matter what our position is in the body, are we willing to be completely transparent?  I read once in a Frangipane book that, “the things the enemy throws at us to destroy us, can become the very tool in our arsenal that the Love of God can use to make us stronger”  I think that for a long time, transparency has been a weapon that the enemy has used against the Bride of Christ.  

I think it’s time to let that same transparency become saturated in the love of the Bridegroom.  It’s time we let transparency be a tool of love in our arsenal.  

Jesus is not coming back for a Bride who is hiding behind a tree trying to cover herself so that she is acceptable - and comfortable.  He is coming for one who is willing to show herself in such a way that she is transparent.  And in doing so, all of the radiant light of HIS glory and HIS LOVE will shine through her.