coffee mug…
This is my favourite coffee mug, it may seem a bit strange to have a favourite mug, but there you go I have one!
The thing is, up until the new year this mug would have exposed a terrible habit I have. Though I enjoy drinking coffee from this mug I would often leave it on my desk waiting to be discovered a few days later. The problem was when I discovered the mug, outwardly it would continue to reveal its pristine white exterior, however on the inside it would be a different story. Inside one would discover a brown sludgy potentially mouldy mess!
The outside, what you could immediately see looked great but the inside told a different story. But I’m talking about my coffee mug aren’t I?
I wonder whether sometimes, if I’m not careful, there is a danger I can be more like my coffee mug than I would like to admit. I wonder whether we can all be? I wonder whether we can find, that the public appearance of who we are can sometimes tell a different story to the one our lives are telling on the inside, in our home, amongst certain groups of people or internally in what we are thinking and feeling?
I watched the BBC four dramatisation of Enid Blyton recently, as I watched it I couldn’t help be in awe of her prolific writing ability and gifting to capture children’s attention. However as the drama unfolded I became more and more struck by the way who Enid was in public was vastly different to her she was in private. Probably the most striking portrayal of this was through the relationship she enjoyed with the nations children who read her books and her two daughters. To the nations children she was a dream Mum who could transport them to magical worlds and fill their lives with joy an laughter, however her own Children really experince none of this and were limited to seeing Enid for an hour a day. This uncomfortable reality was best expressed through a scene where Enid entertains a number of children who have won afternoon tea with her in own home. Enid send her own daughters away so she can entertain the other children. The daughters and listen in enviously to thye fun being had…
Though it was uncomfortable viewing I found myself wondering how am I like Enid in respect to how I live my life?
Perhaps you and I can be more like Enid or my coffee mug than we would like to admit?
Maybe to admit this is a starting point!
Jesus confronted this inconsistency in living when he walked the earth. Stating, we can look like white washed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead peoples bones. He then gave a simple and direct remedy, make sure that you are clean on the inside and outside.
There is a need to ensure that who we are on the outside in public is who we are on the inside in private.
Sometimes its hard to admit who we can be in private, however until we do we can never become who we want to be!
Since the start of 2010 I have resolved to not leave my mug on my desk but rather to ensure that it is clean inside and out.
The start of a new year presents an opportunity to not allow there to be a difference between who we are publically and who we are privately. An opportunity to be clean inside as well outside, to live a life of transparency! An opportunity to start a journey of admiting who you are in order to become who you want to be.
