Get Real

"I can never escape Your Spirit! I can never get away from Your presence! If I go up to heaven, You are there; if I go down to the grave you are there. If I ride on the wings of the morning, if I dwell by the farthest oceans, even there Your hand will guide me, and Your strength will support me. I could ask the darkness to hide me and the light around me to become night-- but even in darkness I cannot hide from You. To You the night shines as bright as day. Darkness and light are the same to you."
Psalm 139:7-12

Today this verse came to my mind (thank You, Holy Spirit).
I have always known I was adaptable to most situations, but the way I do this gives "flexible" a whole new meaning. I have this longing to find out what a person wants or expects in another person, and then mold myself to TRY to be that person. I do this out of a need to be safe and protect who I really am. I do this to escape what I view as certain rejection if a person knew who I truly was: the things I love, hate, stand for, believe to my core, will fight for, and won't fight for. The things I deem as funny, enjoyable, delightful, or stupid. I feel like if they knew who I truly was, they would be disappointed in what they knew or saw. 
I don't know when I started this, but it has become more of a problem as who I really am keeps surfacing, demanding attention. It is hard to repress yourself. You become oppressed by others expectations of who they think you should be, and who you have pretended to be for however long. It becomes difficult to sort out what part to keep in check with which person; it is stressful, and a constant source of anxiety. Second-guessing reigns supreme in my life! There are really only a small, small handful of people who I am really myself around. I mean small. Truly, in the last couple of weeks, I have wondered if that is only my mom and my pastor. They know me so well, and see through BS so well that I have no option but to be completely myself with them. But even then... 
You know, when you try to be the person you think others expect you to be, you lose touch with who you really are. You become this person who knows a little about everything, but not much about some things. You become a person who is never really fully engaged in a relationship. You become a person who is blown and tossed about by every wind of new teaching. You become unstable in everything you do. You become this person who is always in their head trying to sort out what is acceptable to display and what is not. Because you are so WORRIED about what people are going to think if you let a part of you slip out, and be made known. You are WORRIED about being EXPOSED. In my mind, being exposed to people means being hurt and rejected because often times, that is exactly what has happened. I fear that I am a slave to this method of adapting to the possible expectations of others, and I have lost touch with who I really am. Who I was meant to be.
In a sense, I am hiding. 
Oh humanity. 
We have been trying to hide since the Fall in the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve tried to hide from God after they had sinned. They became exposed to knowing evil. They had been exposed to sin, and felt ashamed of being so exposed physically because of the shameful things that had now entered into their minds about being physically exposed. They lost their innocence, their goodness, their right standing with God and with each other. 
This has been the curse of humanity since that point: we have lost our right standing with God and with each other. We try to hide things from God and from each other. We put on a facade of being alright. We pretend to bless, and then curse. We pretend to love, when we hate. We pretend to be something we are not for approval. It might work for a while, but at what cost? We never become the people God created us to be.
So how does this relate to the above verse? God knows us. Did you get that? GOD KNOWS US, and we don't have to hide from Him. We don't have to pretend to be something we are not for His approval. He already knows us because He made us. We don't have to hide from Him. In fact, we CAN'T hide from Him. Everything is exposed before His eyes (Heb 4:13). We can be so real with God. He is SO real with us and to us. The Psalm 139 verse backs this up. We can try (and we do) to escape from God. We try to hide in our highest moments. We can try to hide in our lowest moments. We can try to escape. But even in our darkest moments, we can't hide from God because to Him "the night shines as bright as day." Darkness and light are the same to Him.
He won't reject us. He won't leave us. He won't forsake us. 

This is two-part really: through Jesus' life, death, and resurrection we also have the ability to be real with each other. To be people who are trustworthy and safe. To be people who love without limits because we radiate Christ. To be people who heal, instead of break. To be people who speak truth, instead of lies. To be people who do things out of genuine concern, rather than selfish motivation and ambitions. People who encourage, rather than discourage. People who build up, instead of tear down. To be people who affirm instead of deny. People who do not try to push their own agenda of who a person should be, and instead let them be who Christ created them to be. Essentially, we need to be Jesus to other people.

This is a lesson for myself than anything. If I happen to help someone today, then praise God. But I was brought to a stark realization of my adaptability act here recently. I started to do my repression thing, and became extremely resentful because I felt so restricted. I felt like I was hiding myself, and started to forget myself. I started to wander away from God, and back into the world. Things I once never dreamed of doing, I entertained the thought of doing. I came to a realization that apart from God, I really do not have any lasting interests. Most of the things I do or know have to do with God, and the person He has made me to be. So here I am, back to a realization of how much I need God, people that I trust and can open up to, and to be a person that is trustworthy and can be opened up to.