For the past week or so I have been working on preparing my house for a much-overdue repainting. The house was built 70 years ago and hasn't been painted in the 9 years I have owned it. Procrastination and other issues have intervened in the last few years after it had reached the point that it needed a new coat of paint.

A house can accumulate a lot of paint in 70 years. Most of my time this past week has been spent scraping - one side of my house. Each time you scrape it smooth, then go to bed and get back up more paint has freed its edges and begs to be freed of its attachment, so another round of scraping and sanding results. I finally was able to put a layer of binding primer on it and then another coat of primer over most of it as I tried to beat the predicted rain for today. Hopefully, I can now move on to the next side of the house.

As we live we have the tendency to accumulate a lot of outer layers as well. Interacting with others in each of our circles of activity, we tend to put on masks that present the person to them that we think they need or want to see. I believe that this is one reason we often find such relief when we go away for vacation to an area where we are removed from these circles - the weight of these masks accumulates as well - slowly, so that we aren't even aware of the addition, the weight of the burdens making our daily lives more difficult.

As I have worked at scraping the house it has revealed all of the colors that it has worn before. This has served to remind me that I need to scrape off the layers of "protection" that I wear as well, that I need to be the same person to all with whom I come into contact. Our true colors tend to sneak out anyway, often at less than opportune times.

Father, reveal to each of us the loose paint that needs to be removed from our lives - the camoflauge we wear to hide the moisture, mildew and damaged wood. Let us realize that without taking the time to properly address the hidden issues in our lives, the new coating we wear on the outside will only fail again. Only you can do a professional job of repainting who we are.

In Him,

Brad