Naked and unashamed

This week I attended the funeral for a man who died much too young. His service was a beautiful celebration of his life and, I suspect, many people walked away learning many new things about his character. Hearing more about him made me wish I had taken the time to know him better.

One story that was shared seemed, at first, "inappropriate." His dearest friend from college days shared a story of  a wild adventure the two of them had together (some number of years after college). In the middle of a cold winter night, the two of them stripped down to nothing but their shoes and ran around the apartment complex. Naked. It was a story that, perhaps, felt awkward and uncomfortable at times. Yet, in the end this friend also talked about the many conversations that the two of them often had about deeper matters.

These two had become friends who were able to "get naked" in front of each other, in every sense of the word. They were comfortable in their own skin when they shared together. Ideas and feelings that most would hide deep inside were able to come to the surface and be shared.

We all need a friend like that. Someone with whom we can be vulnerable. Someone  to whom we can tell the naked truth and who can do the same with us. We need that person who will tell it to us straight, who will trust us with the deepest matters of their hearts.

Do you have that someone? I pray you do. In the Flesh. And if you don't, be reassured that Jesus can be that person for you and, if you ask, perhaps He'll help you find HIM in a fleshy form through someone here on earth. Be encouraged by these words from Psalm 139:

¹ You have searched me, Lord,
    and you know me.
² You know when I sit and when I rise;
    you perceive my thoughts from afar.
³ You discern my going out and my lying down;
    you are familiar with all my ways.
⁴ Before a word is on my tongue
    you, Lord, know it completely.
⁵ You hem me in behind and before,
    and you lay your hand upon me.
⁶ Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
    too lofty for me to attain.

⁷ Where can I go from your Spirit?
    Where can I flee from your presence?
⁸ If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
    if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
⁹ If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
    if I settle on the far side of the sea,
¹⁰ even there your hand will guide me,
    your right hand will hold me fast.
¹¹ If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me
    and the light become night around me,”
¹² even the darkness will not be dark to you;
    the night will shine like the day,
    for darkness is as light to you.

¹³ For you created my inmost being;
    you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
¹⁴ I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
    your works are wonderful,
    I know that full well.
¹⁵ 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.
¹⁶ Your eyes saw my unformed body;
    all the days ordained for me were written in your book
    before one of them came to be.
¹⁷ How precious to me are your thoughts, God!
    How vast is the sum of them!
¹⁸ Were I to count them,
    they would outnumber the grains of sand—
    when I awake, I am still with you.

¹⁹ If only you, God, would slay the wicked!
    Away from me, you who are bloodthirsty!
²⁰ They speak of you with evil intent;
    your adversaries misuse your name.
²¹ Do I not hate those who hate you, Lord,
    and abhor those who are in rebellion against you?
²² I have nothing but hatred for them;
    I count them my enemies.
²³ Search me, God, and know my heart;
    test me and know my anxious thoughts.
²⁴ See if there is any offensive way in me,
    and lead me in the way everlasting.