BYM ONLINE DESK May 2018 English Emagazine | Page 2

May 2018
Taking off the Mask!
Mr. A. Lionel,
General Overseer, Blessing Youth Mission
We have declared the year 2018 to be the 'Year of
Integrity'. Let us continue to meditate on this subject
so that it becomes a second nature in us. As I was
going through the Bible, I could find that Integrity
was connected with many things like fear of God,
faithfulness, truthfulness, blamelessness,
uprightness, transparency etc., In this article, I want
to bring out the importance of transparency in our
lives.
Our Lord is not only the Omnipotent God (All
doing) but also the Omniscient God (All knowing).
He knows our past, present and the future. In fact,
God knows everything. He knows our weaknesses
and strengths. He knows our going out and coming
in. This was what David was thinking when He said
“Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I
flee from your presence?” (Psa 139:7).
In Psalm 139 we read that the Lord “searches”
our hearts and in I Chronicles 29:17, we read that He
“tests” our hearts. In Proverbs 5:21, we read that He
“ponders” man's path. Again in Proverbs 16:2 we
read that the Lord “weighs” our spirit.
Transparency means not hiding things. Saul,
the first King of Israel was not a transparent man. He
always hid something in his heart. He was never loyal
to Samuel (1 Sam 15:12). He had hidden-agendas.
This was the reason why God rejected the kingship of
Saul. God wants real people. He does not want us to
wear a mask. He wants us as we are. He doesn't want
people with double-standards.
We all know how Jacob deceived his father
Isaac by wearing Esau's garments. Are we putting on
the garments of Esau? Are we putting on masks? Are
we acting?
As we meditate on the life of Jesus Christ and
Apostle Paul, we find that they led transparent lives.
They were very open. They were not afraid.
The Bible itself is a very transparent book. It
does not hide facts. It records the positive as well as
the negative side of individuals. But most of us try to
project our positive side and hide the negative.
There are several benefits of transparency.
Transparency helps people to come closer to us. It
reveals the human side of every person in Christ.
Lack of transparency may build a super-spirituality
image and drive ordinary people away from us.
I want to write about seven areas where we
need to be transparent in our lives.
1. Transparent With God
1Jn 1:7 - “But if we walk in the light, as he is in
the light.”
Darkness and light are contrary to each another.
When we walk in the light, there are no dark spots in
our lives. Our lives would be transparent before God.
Hence, we should not allow anything to come in
between us and God. Adam and Eve, when they
disobeyed God, they realized that they were naked.
The first thing they did was to “hide” themselves
from God (Gen 3:8,9). God created the Heavens and
the earth. How they thought that they could hide from
Him! Not only they wanted to hide from God, but
also to “cover” themselves up. This is what the devil
encourages us to do. We tend to “cover” things up
when something goes wrong. In order to cover our
backsliding, we try to increase the ministerial
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