| Cross Words: Keeping It Real |
Richard Prow ~ rpcrosswords@gmail.com
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At the risk of sounding like Andy Rooney on “60 Minutes,” I really don’t like those Christmas cards/letters people have started sending out over the last few years. You know the ones I mean. They give a somewhat condensed (sometimes not enough) version of all that has happened in that family’s life over the past year. They always seem to imply that life couldn’t get any better for them. One of their sons just graduated from college with a 4.0. The other is taking a year off from school to serve as a missionary in Uganda. They vacationed in Europe for 4 weeks over the summer. Their daughter became engaged to a young energetic pastor. You know the drill.
It’s not that I’m against good news or that I don’t wish the best for my friends and family but I wonder sometimes if everything is as picture perfect as the background on the card they send. Don’t they live in the real world like the rest of us?
What if everyone told the whole truth in their yearly updates? Like, my grandson is in rehab for a drug problem. My daughter is living with someone and they’re not married. Our prayer life is not what it used to be and we’ve been struggling in our marriage. Our family has stopped going to church because we became bitter over the latest church controversy. It wouldn’t make Hallmark’s top ten, but at least it would be real.
Often times we make the mistake of trying to keep up a pristine image. When someone asks us how things are we respond with a quick, “It couldn’t be better” retort. We force un-felt smiles on our faces when entering our sanctuaries and Sunday School classrooms. Heaven forbid we should let someone into our own little troubled world.
James said, “Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed (5:16). In other words, let it all hang out. We cannot find help and comfort if we appear as if we don’t need any. And, if others around us think our lives are so perfect they won’t come to us for assistance and prayer for fear that we could never understand the troubles they are enduring. So before your send out that next family update, or someone asks you how it’s going, don’t forget to keep it real, for your sake as well as everyone elses.
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