Avoiding “˜I” Contact! (Do You See What I See!)

By Lisa Jernigan

I recently attended a training conference for women themed, “The Masquerade.” We talked about the various masks women wear and how we have become very good at disguising who we really are.

I spoke with a sweet older woman who seemed to show the spirit of Jesus. As we were talking she began to tear up as I complimented her genuine smile and sweet spirit. She graciously thanked me and said, “If you only knew my past.”

Well, I didn”t and I couldn”t imagine that this gentle lady could have ever had a “past.” I said her history would only help her relate to the younger women in her church that she would be going home to minister to.

Her reply was, “I don”t think the women in my church are ready for the real me”!

The real me! Who is the real me and you? I started thinking about how proficient we have become at masking our true identities and hiding our true selves from others. One of the ways we hide is by avoiding eye contact.

Hide-and-Seek

Remember playing hide-and-seek as a child? I played it with my son on quite a few occasions, too. He seemed to have a hard time grasping the concept of the game. Instead of running and hiding while I closed my eyes and counted to 10, he would “hide” in front of me with his eyes closed! He thought if he couldn”t see me, I couldn”t see him!

Years go by, we grow up, and we still play hide-and-seek, but with a little more sophistication. Have you ever run out the door to a store or some other public place, hoping you wouldn”t run into someone because you were looking rather “casual”? All of a sudden there she is, right in front of you, your long-lost friend! The question you must quickly answer is, Do I make eye contact? You think to yourself, If I avoid her and don”t look at her, she won”t see me!

Eye contact makes us vulnerable. It lets others “see” us. Our eyes, as they say, are the “mirrors of the soul.” When you ask someone to look you in the eye, you really are asking him to open up to reveal a part of who he is. So many times we try to avoid eye contact because it makes us uncomfortable. Sometimes we just don”t want to be seen, so we go into hiding. We isolate ourselves and play the pretending game. Over the years, we perfect this art to the point where we don”t even know ourselves.

Do you ever try to avoid eye contact with God? We say to ourselves, “If I don”t look at him, he can”t see me!” For the moment we feel safe, but how long can we continue with this masquerade? Don”t we realize he already sees us?

There is another kind of eye contact . . . “I” contact! When I give “I” contact to God, I must be honest before him. In the process I must confront myself. Ouch! “I” contact is where I look inside myself to see if I am living and being all that God created me to be. It”s authentic living.

Our churches are popular places to hide and avoid “I” contact. Many times we engage in this behavior because we do not feel safe or trust other believers with our true identities, and rightly so. Unfortunately, believers can be the toughest group to confront without masks. We attack instead of attract.

Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother”s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, “Let me take the speck out of your eye,” when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother”s eye (Matthew 7:3-5).

Avoiding “I” Contact

How do we avoid “I” contact?

We avoid “eye/I” contact with people in a variety of ways . . . looking away, looking down, wearing sunglasses. Don”t we do the same thing with God? We look away, we look down, and we put on blinders. We still think that if we don”t look at and see him, he doesn”t see us . . . the real us! That means, no accountability, right?

Why do we avoid “I” contact?

So many times we avoid “eye/I” contact because we don”t feel presentable physically and/or we don”t feel presentable on the inside. We don”t want others to look at us because if they do, they might see something we don”t want them to see . . . the real us! We don”t feel safe or trust others.

I love Henry David Thoreau”s saying, “It”s not what you look at that matters, it”s what you see.”

So many times we find ourselves in “mission mode” and we don”t take the time to see what”s really going on around us and inside us. To stop and take the time for an “eye/I” exam is too costly and time-consuming””mentally, physically, and spiritually.

We also avoid eye contact because when we connect eye-to-eye we must engage with the other person. Engagement usually leads to involvement, and we shy away from this. Our lives are too busy, too complicated. It is messy to get involved. We just might “see” something and have to do something about it!

I can get so busy and distracted with life that I don”t slow down long enough or often enough to become aware of what is going on inside. Like a routine “eye exam,” I must make time to give myself a personal “I exam.” Avoiding this “I” contact can keep me from experiencing all that God has for my life and ministry.

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! (Psalm 139:14-17).

Seeing Through His Eyes

If we are created in God”s image and we know how amazing, loving, and forgiving he is, then why don”t we see ourselves through his eyes?

Who are we really hiding from? Ourselves? God? Others?

What are we hiding? Insecurity? Pride? Shame? Guilt? Trust?

“Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1).

We can only be our true selves and the person God created us to be when we can look Jesus in the eye and see ourselves through him. We must get real with God and be willing to make some adjustments in our lives if we really want to be a vessel he can use. No more avoiding. It”s OK to give eye/I contact. In fact, it is very freeing! Let”s give each other permission to be real and to see who we are from the inside out.

As churches, let”s create safe places full of grace. Together we can all become what God wants us to be and then we can effectively make a difference in people”s lives. Let”s attract the world.

Reflecting back on my conversation with that sweet older lady, I would like to say to her now, “The real you is wonderfully made, fully forgiven, radically changed, and created in the image of your Father in Heaven. He sees the real you and has a huge smile! You are a gift and you have a gift to give other women in your church. Go ahead, let them see the real you! Give them eye/I contact!”

 

 

Lisa Jernigan is cofounder and chief visionary officer of Girlfriends Unlimited (www.girlfriends-unlimited.com). She lives in Mesa, Arizona.