Welcome to the Real World

For some reason I believe the lie that my life has not yet started. I live as if in some sort of trial run - the points don’t really count, the clock isn’t really ticking. It’s the mentality reflected in the classic college reference to life after graduation as “the real world” and therefore at least for this stage of life, it's a show or a production where actions don’t have consequences or really affect anything. This thinking has spilled past caps and gowns, into Act II, Scene I and somehow I find myself in a drama I don’t think I like very much. Aspirations I built of the “real world” don’t play out quite as I directed them in my mind, the characters don’t keep their script, the emotions are way less exciting (though sometimes more dramatic), and the color isn’t quite as vivid.

This train of thought fuels my desire to hide from others, to not be honestly known by others, or at least to control what others know of me. So long as I keep playing my part, I can manipulate the scene and write the ending. The reality is, this “show” of my life actually IS my life. The habits and patterns, choices and decisions, yes’s and no’s, are real and have consequences – whether bad or good. I am choosing how I live in the decisions that I make, forming my character in the small moments of life. It will not magically start next year as if this is just a staging area, it has been happening. 

My life is not the ideals or the plans in my mind, it’s not what I write or plan for my life, but how I actually live.   It’s what I buy, not what my excel spreadsheet says my budget is. It's who I actually meet up with, not just who I want to or plan to meet up with. It’s how many times I hit the snooze button and how often I don’t read my Bible, not the reading plan I wrote for my quiet times. It’s who I actually pray for, not how many people I tell that I will pray for and then forget. It’s how often I check e-mail and facebook during the work day and rush through my actual work, not the productivity my co-workers assume I accomplish due to the sound of frantic key strokes (that are actually the dialogue of a g-chat). 

There is much I can convince people I do, a character I can act and even convince myself that I am. But there is no dress-rehearsal, and there is actually One who does see. There is One who cannot be tricked or fooled or manipulated or deceived by a “show." Those times when I relish the fact that no one actually knows what I am thinking or planning or loving, someone actually does know, and knows even more than I do, because I can deceive myself, but not Him.

“O Lord, you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O Lord.” - Psalm 139:1-4

And this One who sees, His opinion actually matters. Funny (pathetic/sad actually) that I am so concerned about what people see, and not at all concerned about the opinion of the One who DOES see and whose judgment of my life DOES matter. But, this One who sees me fully, correctly, honestly, is also the One who loves me completely, fiercely, dearly. He knows not only what I do, but when, how and why I do it. The One who sees me, loves me.

 “The Lord will fulfill his purpose for me; your love, O Lord, endures forever – do not abandon the works of your hands.” - Psalm 138:8

I am the work of His hands, not the production of a life that I get to create. Rather than spending time rehearsing a life where I am in control, I need to trust in the sovereignty of the One who created and sustains the real world. God is really in control, and God is really good. And I am seen, known, and loved by Him. In the words of Relient K: He's the only one who knows me yet still loves completely." That is real.