I spent the week of July 15 serving at Wolverine Christian Service Camp as a family leader and workshop leader during Senior High Week. The theme for the week was ?Audacious Authenticity, ? and the phrase of the week was ?lowering your waterline. ? The waterline refers to an iceberg, which has only a small fraction of its total mass showing above the water. We examined the reality that most of us show only a fraction of who we are, hiding our true selves, our dreams, desires, fears, and sins so that nobody can know them, for good or bad reasons.
We talked about how we often hide our true selves behind masks. Masks cover up what we don ?t want others to know and display what we want others to see, whether it is true or not. The challenge was to be ?real ? with yourself, God, and others; that is, we encouraged the students to examine themselves and identify who they really are, who they want to be, and who God wants them to be.
The problem with masks is they are based on distrust, which doesn ?t allow us to have healthy relationships, with God or other people. If we constantly hide our sins and struggles, we don ?t trust God to deliver us from them, and we don ?t trust others to love us despite them.
James 5:16 encourages us to bridge the gap by being transparent with each other: ?Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. ? If we can be real with ourselves, we know what lurks below the waterline. If we are transparent with God, who knows it all anyhow, and with other Christians, we can eliminate the distrust, fear, anger, and regret that keeps us from growing as individuals and as a church.
[As a side note, I want everyone to know that we have a great group of senior high students. Even though I preach in the 11:00 service, I didn ?t take the time to get to know them prior to camp. I regret that I didn ?t get to know all of our students at camp either. Be encouraged that many are growing as strong spiritual leaders, and we can look forward to their continued growth and work within the church.]