Wise vs. Wild Contrast #12: Authenticity
Authenticity
Her public versus private personaGirl-Gone-Wild: Two-Faced
Girl-Gone-Wise:Genuine
Girl-Gone-Wild: “… with bold face she says to him, ‘I had to offer sacrifices, and today I have paid my vows.’” Proverbs 7:13-14
Girl-Gone-Wise: She who walks in integrity walks securely. Proverbs 10:9*
Mr. Facing-both-ways. His name says it all. This allegorical character in John Bunyan’s classic book, Pilgrim’s Progress, was two faced. One face pointed toward the Celestial City, and the other pointed toward the City of Destruction. Scripture talks about people who have a double heart, and are double-minded, double-tongued, and double faced.
The Proverbs 7 woman is a prime example of this kind of individual. As the story unfolds, the narrator tells us that she seizes and kisses the young man, “and with bold face she says to him, ‘I had to offer sacrifices, and today I have paid my vows.’” The face she showed when she worshipped together with people at church wasn’t the same brash face she showed after church, on that back lane, hidden in the shadows. She was duplicitous. A hypocrite. Ms. Facing-both-ways.
Authenticity is another point of contrast between a Girl-Gone-Wise and a Girl-Gone-Wild. A Girl-Gone-Wise is genuine. Her public persona is congruent with her private one. The outside matches the inside-the visible matches the unseen. She is a woman of integrity. Her counterpart, the Girl-Gone-Wild, is two-faced. She wants people to think she is something that she is not. She puts on a religious face to impress, but secretly behaves in a way that is totally at odds with the faith she professes. She’s the type of girl that religiously attends Saturday-night service with her boyfriend, sings on the worship team, and then sleeps with him in the back of the car after the church parking lot has emptied.
The Proverbs 7 Wild Thing was a hypocrite. Her religious behavior was a farce. A hypocrite is a person who deliberately and habitually professes to be good when she is aware that she is not. The word itself is a transliteration of the Greek, hypokrites, which means play-actor or stage player. In ancient Greek comedies and tragedies, hypokrites wore masks. The mask was the most essential part of the hypokrite’s costume. They used them for many reasons.
The primary purpose was to show the audience certain qualities or emotions of their characters, so the audience knew if a character was happy, upset, tired, or scared. The actors were all men, so the mask was also necessary to let them play female roles. Furthermore, because the number of actors varied from one to three, they had to put on different masks in order to play more roles. The hypokrite hid behind the mask and the mask projected the necessary image. Hiding their true selves behind a mask is what hypocrites do.
The Lord despises hypocritical behavior. He says, “I cannot endure iniquity and solemn assembly.” (Isaiah 1:11-17) For Him, an unrepentant heart and religious behavior don’t mix. Do you recognize any signs of hypocrisy in your life? If you are honest, I think you’ll be able to identify some. At least I hope you do. I can certainly see some of those sins in my life. The problem is not when we fight against hypocrisy in our lives-but when we don’t. All of us have a long way to go when it comes to true authenticity.
The passage in James 4:3-8 explains that the way to combat double-mindedness is to draw near to God, to examine your life constantly for sin, and to humbly repent. “Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.” A Girl-Gone-Wise is concerned about keeping the inner, hidden parts of her life just as pure as the outer, visible ones. She fights against hypocrisy in her life. She knows that the two-faced woman will be found out, but one who walks in integrity walks securely. (Proverbs 10:9)
© Mary A. Kassian
This is a pre-publication excerpt from “Girls Gone Wise in a World gone Wild,” © Mary A. Kassian to be published by Moody Publishers in 2010. All rights reserved. You are welcome to link to this post, but please do not copy and/or reproduce this copyrighted material without express written permission of Moody Publishing.
