The Underside

There are times like tonight, today, this weekend, when I am faced with the underbelly of myself, my faith, my relationships. Times when I am so grateful for God's grace in the face of my pride, my jealousy, my greed and myfear. Times when my rationalizations refuse to rescue me, mocking instead at the edges of my mind, leaving me alone to face the roar of truths I refuse to face.

It was this side, raw and bleeding, cursing and crazy, that Jesus kissed with his life, redeemed with his blood. It quivers still, this bloated ugliness with jagged stitches and crisscrossed scars. I have another skin, a mask of new flesh, smooth like a mango, that I stretch over the other. A smoothness that eases the anxiety of others when I pass and causes them to pull out the chair for me at gilded tables full of Pharisees and other confused people. I sit, glad to have a place to ease my feet of wandering.

Or so I think.

The chair is made of thumbtacks and the oatmeal runny with deceit. My mask melts in the heat of their inspection revealing the truth of my imperfection, my weakness, my desire. I wait, knowing that soon my place will be taken from the table, my chair overturned . . .

Instead, I hear the snap of cords as they pull filmy distractions tight over the bellies of their own lies. "Sit," they tell me, spooning yeast into tasteless dough. "Sit, and tell us a story."