the mask

Do they see behind the mask?

So much darkness within
It rages to get out
I push it down but it rises again

What is true?
What is false?
What is sin?
What is accusation?
Give me light for the way

Anger welling up
Must keep it down.  Must keep it down
Tension building
Must keep it down.  Must keep it down
Must keep it inside
Must maintain the mask

The sad tense well in the guts
Make it go away.  Make it go away.
A bite of sweetness to ease the hole
Though I know it will make it worse
The disappointment
The shame
The hiding
Still it doesn't go away

Too hard to keep up the mask
So I retreat

One person saw through the mask though
He saw a crack in it
I let him in a little
And he didn't cause harm
Perhaps another day I lower the mask a little more

the dark days

In our chaplaincy group we have been talking about depression and anxiety.

At one point we read this Psalm.  Can you relate to this?

Psalm 88: A Cry of Desperation
A song. A psalm of the sons of Korah. For the choir director: according to Mahalath Leannoth. A Maskil of Heman the Ezrahite.

 1 LORD, God of my salvation,
I cry out before You day and night.
 2 May my prayer reach Your presence;
listen to my cry.
 3 For I have had enough troubles,
and my life is near Sheol.
 4 I am counted among those going down to the Pit.
I am like a man without strength,
 5 abandoned  among the dead.
I am like the slain lying in the grave,
whom You no longer remember,
and who are cut off from Your care.
 6 You have put me in the lowest part of the Pit,
in the darkest places, in the depths.
 7 Your wrath weighs heavily on me;
You have overwhelmed me with all Your waves.         

 8 You have distanced my friends from me;
You have made me repulsive to them.
I am shut in and cannot go out.
 9 My eyes are worn out from crying.
LORD, I cry out to You all day long;
I spread out my hands to You.
 10 Do You work wonders for the dead?
Do departed spirits rise up to praise You?       

11 Will Your faithful love be declared in the grave,
Your faithfulness in Abaddon?
 12 Will Your wonders be known in the darkness
or Your righteousness in the land of oblivion?
 13 But I call to You for help, LORD;
in the morning my prayer meets You.
 14 LORD, why do You reject me?
Why do You hide Your face from me?
 15 From my youth,
I have been afflicted and near death.
I suffer Your horrors; I am desperate.
 16 Your wrath sweeps over me;
Your terrors destroy me.
 17 They surround me like water all day long;
they close in on me from every side.
 18 You have distanced loved one and neighbour from me;
darkness is my only friend.


I've been in a place like that.  Have you?

Good to know that the Bible touches real life.

Thankfully today hasn't been a day that bad, but it certainly hasn't been a good day.

Do you want to get better?

As I was walking out the door my counsellor asked me this question.

"Do you want to get better?"

It came out of the conversation we'd been having about self-care (ie looking after myself).  [Not something that I'm good at].  I'm realising more and more that so many of my thoughts, feelings and actions are related.

I don't take time to look after myself because I think that doing stuff for others is more important.  More important to serve God.  More important to help others.

Indeed these are fruits of the gospel: seeking to serve God and work for His glory and not my own, and also being other-person-centred rather than self-centred and self-seeking. But I think that my problem is that I've come to these actions by the wrong pathway.  I act in this way because I am of the opinion that I am worthless.  Without value.

This is a lie.  I am valuable because God made me.  I am valuable because God made me in his image.  I am valuable because God thought I was worth sending Jesus to die in my place.  I am valuable because I am an adopted child of God.  I do not need to perform stuff in order to be valuable.  Being able to do work and do good things doesn't make me any more or less valuable.  This is totally opposite to so much of what our world says to us.  But it is true because it is what God says.  Please pray that I would believe it.

Please pray that I would have both right actions and right motivations.  That my service to God and others would be motivated out of gospel generosity: being so thankful at what God has done for me in Christ and so secure in knowledge of the grace of God that saves me, not my own works.

the land of black

This post has been sitting in my drafts folder since July.  It was good to write it down, but I wasn't convinced about sharing it with the "world." But given that I just spoke at church sharing this sort of stuff with everyone, I suppose that there may not be harm in doing this now...

Today hasn't been a great day.  Well neither have the past few days.  Not that this is something new for me.

I feel like everything around me screams that I'm a failure.  Dishes not done.  Bible not read.  Gift not bestowed.  Emails not written.  People not phoned.  A look.  A sigh.  The absence of a greeting.  Though these things might not be in words they speak to me.  They tell me not just that I've failed, but that I am a failure.


Some of it I've tried to counter.  Tried to challenge these negative thoughts as I've been taught to.  But they've still been winning.  So then I feel more like a failure cos I've failed even to challenge the thoughts successfully.


I did an activity the other week which uses the "6 thinking hats".  This has helped me to articulate that I'm always wearing a black hat when it comes to my view of myself.  The hat is so black that it even keeps out other "white" and "yellow" thoughts.  Negative thoughts only.