Don't be fooled by me. Don't be fooled by the face I wear. For I wear a mask, I wear a thousand masks, masks that I am afraid to take off, and none of them are me. Pretending is an art that is second nature with me, but don't be fooled, for God's sake don't be fooled. I give you the impression that I'm secure, that all is sunny and unruffled with me, within me as well as without, that confidence is my name and coolness my game, that the water's calm and I'm in command, and that I need no one. But don't believe me, please.

My surface may seem smooth, but my surface is my mask, my ever-warying ever-concealing mask. Beneath lies no smugness, no complacence. Beneath dwells the real me in confusion, in fear, in aloneness. But I hide this. I don't want anybody to know it. I panic at the thought of my weakness and fear being exposed. That's why I frantically create a mask to hide behind, a nonchalant, sophisticated facade, to help me pretend, to shield me from the glance that knows. But such a glance is precisely my salvation. My only salvation, and I know it. That is if it is followed by acceptance, if it is followed by love. It's the only thing that liberates me, from myself, from my own self-built prison walls, from barriers that I so painstakingly erect.

It's the only thing that will assure me of what I can't assure myself, that I'm really worth something. But I don't tell you this. I don't dare. I'm afraid to. I'm afraid you'll think less of me, that you'll laugh, and your laugh would kill me. I'm afraid that deep down I'm nothing, that I'm just no good, and that you will see this and reject me. So I play the game, my desperate pretending game, with a facade of assurance without, and a trembling child within.

And so begins the parade of masks, and my life becomes a front. I idly chatter to you in the suave tones of surface talk. I tell you everything that is really nothing. And nothing of what is everything, of what is crying within me. So when I'm going through my routine do not be fooled by what I'm saying. Please listen carefully and try to hear what I'm not saying, what I'd like to be able to say, what for survival I need to say, but what I can't say. I dislike hiding. Honestly. I dislike the superficial game I'm playing, the superficial, phony game. I'd really like to be genuine and spontaneous, and me, but you've got to help me.

You've got to hold out your hand even when that's the last thing I seem to want, or need. Only you can wipe away from my eyes the blank stare of the breathing dead. Only you can call me into aliveness. Each time you're kind, and gentle, and encouraging, each time you try to understand because you really care, my heart begins to grow wings, very feeble wings, but wings. With your sensitivity and empathy, and your power to understanding, you can breathe life into me. I want you to know that.

I want you to know how important you are to me, how you can be a co-creator of the person that is me if you choose to. Please choose to. You alone can break down the wall behind which I tremble. You alone can release me from my shadow-world of panic and uncertainty, from my lonely prison. So do no pass me by. It will not be easy for you. A long conviction of worthlessness builds strong walls. The nearer you approach me, the blinder I strike back. I fight against the very thing that I cry out for. But I am told that love is stronger than strong walls, and in this lies my hope ... my only hope.

Please try to beat down those walls with firm hands, but with gentle hands, for a child is very sensitive. Who am I you may wonder? I am someone you know very well. For I am every man and I am every woman you meet.

A man was sleeping at night in his cobin when suddenly his room filled with light, and God appeared.? The Lord told the man he had work for him to do, and showed him a large rock in front of his cobin. The LOrd explained that the man was to push against the rock with all his might. so, this the man did, day after day. For many years he toiled from sun up to sun down, his shoulders set squarely against the cold, massive surface of the unmoving rock, pushing wiht all of his might. Each night the man returned to his cobin sore and worn out, feeling that his whole day had spent in vain. Since the man was showing discouragement, the Advesary (satan) decided to enter the picture by placing thoughts into the weary mind: "You have been pushing against the rock for a long time, and it hasn't moved." Thus, he gave the man the impression that the task was impossible and that he was a failure. These thoughts discouraged and disheartened the man. Satan said, "Why kill yourself over this? JUst put in your time, giving just the minimum effort; and that will be good enough." That's what the weary man planned to do, but decided to make it a matter of prayer and take his troubled thoughts to the Lord." he said, "I have labored long and hard in your service, putting all my stregth to do that which you have asked. Yet, after all this time, I have not even budged that rock by half a millimeter. What is wrong? Why am i failing?"


The Lord responded compassionately, "My friend, When i asked you to serve Me and you accepted, I told you that your task was to push against the rock with all your strength, which you have done. Never once did i mention to you that I expected you to move it. Your task was to push. And now you come to Me with your strength spent, thinking that you have failed. But, is that really so? Look at yourself. Your arms are strong and muscled, your back sinewy and brown; your hands are callused from constant pressure, your legs have become massive and hard. Through opposition you have grown much, and your abilities now surpass that which you used to have. True, you haven't moved the rock. But your calling was to be obedient and to pushand to exercise your faith and trust in my wisdom. That you have done. Now I, my friend, will move the rock." At times, when we hear a word from God, we tend to use our own intellect to decipher what He wants, when actually what God wants is just a simple obedience and faith in Him. By all means, exercise the faith that moves mountains, but know that it is still God who moves mountains. When everything seems to go wrong ...... just P.U.S.H.! When the job gets you down ........ just P.U.S.H.! When people don't react the way you think they should ........ just P.U.S.H.! When money is "gone" and the bills are due ...... just P.U.S.H.! When people just don't understand you .... just P.U.S.H.! P=Pray U=Until S=Something H=Happens.

A man found a cocoon of a butterfly. One day a small opening appeared. He sat and watched the butterfly for several hours as it struggled to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had gotten as far as it could, and it could go no further.

So the man decided to help the butterfly. He took a pair of scissors and snipped off the remaining bit of the cocoon.

The butterfly then emerged easily. But it had a swollen body and small, shriveled wings.

The man continued to watch the butterfly because he expected that, at any moment, the wings would enlarge and expand to be able to support the body, which would contract in time.

Neither happened! In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling around with a swollen body and shriveled wings. It never was able to fly.

What the man, in his kindness and haste, did not understand was that the restricting cocoon and the struggle required for the butterfly to get through the tiny opening were God's way of forcing fluid from the body of the butterfly into its wings so that it would be ready for flight once it achieved its freedom from the cocoon.

Sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our lives. If God allowed us to go through our lives without any obstacles, it would cripple us.

We would not be as strong as what we could have been. We could never fly!

I asked for Strength.........
And God gave me Difficulties to make me strong.

I asked for Wisdom.........
And God gave me Problems to solve.

I asked for Prosperity.........
And God gave me Brain and Brawn to work.

I asked for Courage.........
And God gave me Danger to overcome.

I asked for Love.........
And God gave me Troubled people to help.

I asked for Favors.........
And God gave me Opportunities.

I received nothing I wanted ........
I received everything I needed!

This is an excerpt from a special book entitled, "The Dialogue" written by David Paul on "I, me, and myself" - the neutral ground?


godself: you're just bubbling up preacher! you just don't know what you're telling to the people..

i've been studying those things for years, and i pity on you for spreading those lies, unsubstantiated, unproven, non-sense, and fictional things about christ and foolish salvation!


servant: pity on me?.. you must be joking my friend... you indeed, speak like god of yourself...

godself: and where's that puppet god you're talkin about? you're hallucinating! yep! yep! yep!

servant:
you can never find GOD by relying on your own understanding, proud-intelligence and self-conceit! no matter how many diplomas and certificates you hold from your masteral and doctoral studies... you can't find HIM!

you presume to know everything... but shallow..

godself: shit! watch your mouth for you can't prove your point

servant: you can never place GOD inside your head, my friend..

nor you can fathom GOD by your own way of thinking!

and your pride and self-conceit deprive you to see the TRUTH!

the only thing you see is yourself--the "i, me, and myself" which is the trademark of satan!....

now you are god of yourself.. and you trust and believe no one... except yourself! but still... you're under the darkness!

godself: lol. you're trying too hard. you speak again of insensible things. just thought you should know but empty. yep!yep

servant: there's no other TRUTH that we should know my friend.... that we shall die soon..and we can't save ourselves!

your intelligence and pride cannot help you escape from death!

and one thing for sure.. yourself and the devil cannot give you hope!

godself: non-sense! there's no devil nor god! yep! yep!

servant: there is... and you speak with the devil's tongue!

and i tell you..there's no neutral ground in the battle between GOD and evil... and if you only believe in yourself then you belong to the darkness!

FATHER GOD has promised us the VICTORY through CHRIST! and when GOD made a promise... HE SHALL FULFILL IT.. for our RIGHTEOUS, JUST, HOLY GOD cannot lie!

joining in the darkness is a sure loser!

but to join in the army of CHRIST leads us to a sure victory and conquest! (Revelation 19:14-21)

Some atheists have a problem with evil.

they will say they don't believe in God

because there's so much evil in the world.

But anyone who says there's evil in the

the world has to wrestle with where the

ability to make moral judgements comes from.



If everything that exist is merely the

result of meaningless chaos and evolution,

then there is no good or evil, right or

wrong; there's only pain, discomfort, and

death---all teasing us temporary painlessness,

ease, and fleeting breath.



Actually, given the power and creativity

of people, the great marvel is not that there

is evil but that there is goodness.

Why isn't life more horrible and joyless

than it is? Why doesn't society collapse

into violent competition and constant warfare

the way predatory animals and their prey do?

Why dont people just scratch and claw for

every personal advantage? Why do some people

sacrifice?



Well, the truth is that death, pain, and evil

compel every one of us---confessing atheist

or not--to believe that something is horribly

wrong with the world. In the depth of our

soul something rebels against evil. Professing

atheists have to understand that they can't

have such a moral view of "the way things

should be" unless they have also grant

that there is a God.



George MacDonald once commented, "If one

doesn't believe in the good person he can see,

how will he ever believe in a good God he can't see?"

That's the reason Christians strive

to be loving and good: It gives atheists

a healthy doubt about their beliefs.

And we pray that it leads them on to embrace

the God who built within them a sense of rigth

and wrong---and a hounting desire for goodness.




They show that the requirements of the law
are written on their hearts.- Romans 2:15(Luke 6:27-38)

Taken from the Devotional book of our Daily Jouney