Whispers of Truth

Recently, the ladies I meet with weekly have been working their way through the scriptures of The Gospel According to Mark. It is the shortest of the gospels, but offers details that enable the reader to feel like he/she was there. Reading it makes the disciples’ struggles to follow and understand Jesus very real, and, as usual, Peter’s struggles reach out and grab onto me because I can relate only too well. At the end of Chapter 14, the point in the gospel where Peter denies Jesus three times after His arrest after insisting vehemently that he would die before denying Jesus, stops me in my tracks each time I read it. In Peter’s mind, he was dedicated, but Jesus knew his deceitful heart. He knew his telling weakness. He knew his paralyzing fear. Peter hadn’t truly listened or believed when Jesus told the disciples that He would be struck down and that all of them would be scattered before He was killed and raised back to life (Mark 14:27-28). Peter hadn’t stayed awake to pray

Neither delusions of grandeur nor avoidance is the answer. Uninvited reality checks sometimes bring depression when the brutal mirror is turned upon me unexpectedly; nevertheless, burying my head in the sand can only happen for so long before coming up for air becomes a necessity.   How I handle the uninvited, perceived truth when it slaps me upside the head really is the question.   When I fail to see what others see in me, do I blindly accept it as my truth? What if the criticism comes from the ones I love the most? What if I don’t like what they see? I have found (and am finding) that neither receiving the arrows of criticism into the deepest places of my heart nor putting up a shield that prevents their penetration is the answer. The truth lies somewhere in between—most of the time. Recently I have had to face some hard things about myself in light of my husband’s call to the ministry. One of those things is my selfishness. I have to say I was sitting pretty comforta