It's been a summer of feeling like we have been in the Refiner's fire.  We've decided to start off the Fall taking a class our church offers on Character Development.  The class is pretty intesnse, running for nine months, meeting every other week for three hour sessions.  The description of the class is:

This in-depth course will challenge you to examine your life and develop a deeper, more mature relationship with Christ and others. It will help you understand God’s design for people, how The Fall affected that design, and how Jesus came to restore us back to wholeness.

The class combines teaching, writing and reading assignments, as well as small group discussions that will give you the opportunity to apply the principles and learn what impacts your motivation and how you relate to people.

Last night was our second class.  We had to prepare an assignment on naming our strengths and weaknesses in some key areas.  I wrote that my strengths and weaknesses were both in the areas of Honesty and Christian Community.  I'm a person who places a high value on the truth, and have made a commitment not to lie...even about little things.  However, I tend to NOT want to be open and share my shortcomings, failings and sin.  It's not that I lie about them...I just don't talk about them.  I even try to avoid thinking about them, and like to pretend they don't exist.  Our church talks about being in Christian community and being fully known and fully loved.  That feels like an oxymoron to me.  If I was fully known, I certainly wouldn't be fully loved.  I try to hide me even from me sometimes. 

Last night after class I had a breakthrough, though.  I realized that the feelings that I have and so many Christians tend to have on this subject are a big lie! I know that when my husband or a close friend shares something with me that he/they are struggling with, it makes me feel closer to that person, and love them more!  One of the reasons we LOVE our church so much is that so many of the people in leadership there aren't afraid to admit their shortcomings, and admit that they still sin, and aren't where they want to be on their faith walk.  But Satan has us believing that if we share our hearts, people will judge us and think poorly of us.  However, in my experience, the OPPOSITE has been true!  When we share our hearts is when relationships GROW and flourish! We have this desire to want people to think certain things about us, and we have this idea that the way to accomplish it is the OPPOSITE of what is actually true!!

I'm not saying it's going to be easy.  But I am committing to sharing more of my heart, being less guarded and caught up in 'appearances'.  I want my relationships with the people in my life to GROW and flourish.  I want to stop believing the BIG LIE!!