Walter, Eric and Eddie sang, “They smile in your face.  All the time they want to take your place.” I know from experience today the lyrical stylings of yesterday.

People wear masks.  I’m not saying this is entirely bad.  Sometimes, there's no other way to do it.  Life, that is. We all must learn to “fake it ’til you make it” in some arena.  This is not the same as being false.

It can be honorable to hide your true feelings and for more than one reason.  None of us knows everything, and it can be quite embarrassing to make a habit of popping off and sharing half-baked thoughts.  However, making a gaffe is one thing- being flatly wrong something else. In addition, our feelings change. I regret many words and feelings of my past.  Finally, if we are not our best selves at a particular moment, it can be better to can opinions.

It is not a denial of self to smile and hold your tongue.  I wish I had done it more often.

Of concern is that many portray a false image of themselves to the world for deceitful purposes.  Well, maybe not the whole world, but to you. Solomon wrote, “Enemies disguise themselves with their lips, but in their hearts they harbor deceit.”  People who will not present honest versions of themselves are not your allies.

I have been fortunate to have many fine friends and acquaintances and unfortunate to have encountered the backstabbers.  You know the kind of people. Those who instill uncertainty. You never know where they stand because they hide it from you.  And then they talk. Behind your back. It’s what they do.

The Undisputed Truth was spot on when they intoned, “Smiling faces, smiling faces, sometimes, they don't tell the truth.  Smiling faces, smiling faces tell lies, and I got proof.”

Many have learned to protect their own interests in life by not affiliating closely with much.  These will opine in secret becoming a part (if not leaders) of the mass of discontent. They can always say, “I told you so,” or some such because they lack plain courage to own their positions.  While they may retain their jobs or standing, they do not make good friends if friends at all.

Scripture has a lot to say about whisperers and talebearers.  These don’t think of themselves as such believing they perform necessary functions.  They have learned to operate covertly by observation and can maintain a form of wisdom in the eyes and minds of the simple.  It’s what they do.

Biblically, we are to avoid people who are untrustworthy and given to sins of the tongue.  If we are not careful, we will easily fall into negativity ourselves. For instance, people may say things in anxiety which we should bear but not support or use as opportunities to vent our own frustrations.  There is a vast difference between spiritual and worldly wisdom, and many pronouncements with a fair feel hide foul hearts.

I am eternally grateful for those who have seen errors in my ways and gently corrected me.  It has been calamitous and heartbreaking to rendezvous with those seizing on my humanity as opportunities for ridicule.  Not that it was to my face.    

If we are to support one another and prove true, we will have to learn to keep confidence and lend support to others in their weaknesses realizing that we will need the same.  This is not covering misdeeds or sins. It is practicing Christian love and dispensing the type of treatment we would like to receive. Every disagreement is not disastrous.

Many have suffered the slings and arrows of those posing as one thing and practicing another.  Treachery is not a tool in the arsenal of faith. It is indicative of the warfare of darkness.

Sterl