Will a heart rejoicing in the LORD show in our faces?

I think so.

Please don’t misunderstand me. I’m NOT talking about putting on a mask over our sadness, our depression or just the every-day-ness of a rainy Wednesday in December. I’m not talking about painting on an inane grin like a clown putting on his makeup.

In my last post I mentioned that my children’s regular enquiries about what was wrong had given me pause for thought.

Why? Well it wasn’t because I fear them seeing me weak or low. I was not annoyed with myself for failing to hide my feelings. It isn’t that I want them to always see me laughing and happy rather than sad and full of sorrow.

Which is just as well because I tend to wear my heart on my sleeve.

If this is a poker face..

Then this is me!

In other words – I do not have a poker face! What is in my heart is written on my face

My children see me in all sorts of states – and I’m glad they do. What an opportunity to rejoice in the LORD together in the context of hardship!

But if what is in my heart is written all over my face than what do their enquiries reveal about my heart? If worry and pained despair, stress and deep anxiety alone are etched into my expression it should give me pause for thought. Have they ever walked into a room to find me deep in thought or concentrating hard on something and asked me what was making me smile? If so I can’t remember it.

If my face displays to all and sundry that I have a terrible hand (of cards) and am about to lose the game then it is probably because that is what I believe in my heart. It reveals what grips me, what I am meditating on as my mind wonders.

I want my face – and posture and tone of voice and… – to be the result of a heart that rejoices in the Lord, a joy that bubbles up from the inside and takes up residence in my demeanour.

I don’t think it is life’s circumstances that are the enemy here – they will affect our moods of course they will and they will come and go – but it is what place they have in our hearts and how they push and shove our joy around that matters.

Our joy in Jesus is secure and constant through all the ups and downs. But to rejoice in that joy – that is a choice, and a heart issue.

We have a full house, a royal flush, a …ok I really know very little about poker, but you get the picture. So why don’t we have something about us – sitting comfortably and companionably alongside all the real and necessary emotions of life – that gives people the impression that we must have a winning lottery in our pockets!