Take off your make-up and come.

I like when thoughts come to me in the most random of places...like in the bathroom of my hotel room at IndyCC (Cru's annual Winter Conference in downtown Indianapolis!).

I realized this. To go meet someone, you touch-up your make-up. To come before God, you have to take off your makeup.

It's funny, because in the morning, you look at your face (if you are of the female type), and think disgusted thoughts. You can't possibly be seen like this. You cake on whatever you can to make yourself presentable to the world.

But by the time you've made it through a day, it's the best feeling to be exposed. To take off the mask and be real. To let your pores breathe again.

And God doesn't want the beautified version of yourself that you put on for everyone else. He doesn't wanted the smoothed-out, concealed, covered-up you. He wants the bumpy, uneven, oily, zit-faced you. Not the perfect, has-it-all-together, rule-following, well one. The conceited, prideful, stubborn, sick one.

I find great rest in that thought. Not that it is always easy. Sometimes I'd rather keep my make-up on for Him. But He already knows what's beneath. He knows all of my blemishes better than I do. But He wants me as I am. And He has a better kind of make-up, a real solution: the precious blood of Jesus.