Mask

All the worlds a stage, and all the men and women merely players; they have their exists and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts. William Shakespeare.

I was at a party the other night with some friends, and casually but sincerely asked a friend of mine how they were doing. This person responded like most of us respond when asked that question
"I'm doin' great, thanks".
"That's awesome." I said.
As I turned away, I faintly heard them softly say, "That's a lie."
Not sure I heard correctly, I asked this person "I'm sorry what did you say?"
"What I just told you was a lie" they said, "I'm not doing great at all."
At that moment I was impressed by this person's frailty, honesty and openness. It's something that is rarely seen.
A reader the other day made a great comment on how we tend to wear different masks around different groups of people; as if our lives consist of playing one role after another. We wear one mask for the boss, another mask at home, another at church, and still another among friends. Most of our lives are spent trying to impress other people; a life long struggle to get people to like us, make ourselves look good, and to hear the applause. (this is what I have struggled with for most of my life)
Jesus' spent most of his ministry life just a few miles from one of the largest cities in the Roman empire; Sepphoris. Now, Sepphoris’ main attraction was a 30 thousand seat theatre that would entertain audiences with talented actors and extravagant Greek plays. The Greek name for a stage actor was Hypocrite. Sound familiar? Jesus uses this word over and over again when describing the religious leaders of his day. Listen to the words of Jesus in the book of Matthew (6) "When you pray, do not be like the Hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men… And when you fast do not look somber as the hypocrites do for they disfigure and exaggerate their faces so that people will admire them." In Jesus’ day some actors would use masks to effectively show the emotion of a character, while other actors would simply "exaggerate" the muscles in their faces so to be seen by a large audience.
It is believed that Jesus is the first person in recorded history to use the word Hypocrite in this way. It's as if Jesus is saying, “Don’t let their actions fool you, they’re only pretending, they’re only playing a part, they’re simply acting to impress an audience.” Can you see why Jesus was hated by the religious leaders of his day? The ones who claimed to have it all together were now de-masked by the words of Jesus. They were finally found out for who they were; imperfect people just like you and me. Jesus is essentially saying we don’t need to try to impress anyone. We don’t have to play a part or jump through religious hoops to be loved by God. As crazy as it sounds, we are unconditionally loved and accepted for who we are.