Wednesday, May 7
…I have walked in my integrity, and I have trusted in the LORD without wavering.
—Psalm 26:1
All of us long to lead authentic lives. We want our public selves to fit the self we know in our heart. We want integrity. What we often settle for, however, is a deeply conflicted life. This disconnect may manifest itself in the career we’ve chosen, or in the kind of schedule that we keep. Rather than nourishing us, our leisure activities may be a burden, draining our energy away. The cost of such dissembling is high.
As we begin the process of spiritual self-examination, we may find that expressing ourselves creatively—through writing our spiritual autobiography, playing music, or making something with our hands—helps clarify our identity and reinforce our sense of who we are. It’s a way of stripping away pretense and saying, if only to ourselves, “I trust where my life is going.”
We may think of “integrity” only as a quality belonging to people who keep their word, but it implies an even deeper faithfulness than that. It suggests, as well, a soul that is being honest, a heart that is seeking to live into the image of itself as seen through the eyes of God.
O God, when I sense that my life is out of joint, that who I am at heart isn’t the self I portray to the world, please help me to discern my true identity, to find my real self in you.
The Signposts for May are written by Susan Hanson and originally appeared on explorefaith.org in September 2004.
