Got Secrets?

"A woman's heart is a deep ocean of secrets." -a quote by Old Rose in the movie Titanic.

I'm a difficult person to embarrass. My trademark is being transparent and real and unafraid to acknowledge the truth about how I feel. I've pretty much always thought anything worth knowing is worth announcing to whomever would listen to me. Which works fine since my entire adult life has been spent in ministry where ever'body is in my bidness. Just the way I like it. So secrets aren't something I've thought a lot about. Until now.

I was raised to be "clean-livin'." And clean livin' just don't go well with secrets, honey. The word secret brings to mind sordid, embarrassing, or passionate moments that happen in the dark. Until now.

They say that major crises have a way of forcing us to reevaluate everything in our lives. Such is true for me. A major piece of my life's bedrock has been removed and so everything else's place is changing and rearranging. My priorities, my values, my reality... everything is shifting. And so, as my new life's picture is coming into focus, I'm getting to take a second look at lots of things I thought I had already formed an opinion about. Secrets happen to be included on the list of those things. How true that a woman's heart is a deep ocean of secrets. Even mine, miss blab-it-all-out-to-the-world. Even my heart holds layer after deep layer of soft, whispering secrets. Secrets even I hadn't known. Until now.

I once thought secrets synonymous with skeletons in the closet. And in a way, they are. Only a small way, though. The real stuff of secrets are the deep, precious, holy, sacred moments of life. Moments too valuable to be described in words. Truths too priceless to be cheapened by language. Experiences I love too much to share with someone who might not appreciate or grasp their profundity.

I didn't know it, but God has been sharing secrets with me for a long time. As I look back, He and I have built quite a history of inexpressible secrets. Moments of profound life-change or truth-revealing are tucked away inside my heart. They are secrets He has told me. Then there are the secrets I've created. Some of them written on pages I've burned, some of them lived out on beaches at night, some of them whispered in tearful or breathless moments. They are the things that turn up the corners of my mouth in a Mona Lisa smile when I think of them. And then there are those skeleton secrets. Those things that make me shake my head or want to smack myself. And yet, even in the secrets of the dark, scary, mistake variety, I find truths that are precious, lessons that are invaluable, and a depth of relationship with the God who knows ALL the secrets and is still crazy about me.

Perhaps I've been too busy, perhaps I've been afraid, or perhaps the idea that there are secrets inside me that no one may want to share is too painful. Whatever the reason, I've ignored quite a treasure of precious, holy secrets that exist in the deep ocean of my own heart. Until now.

I'm beginning to realize that a foundational part of a woman's mystique, my mystique, is secrets. Joyous, hopeful, deep, passionate, dark, intimate, profound, inexpressible secrets swirl inside me, inside every woman. They are the glimmer you catch, the sparkle that passes so quickly you wonder if you really saw it. They are the quiet smile, the peaceful knowing, the motivational reason. And they've had too little a place in my life. Until now.

I can see your own Mona Lisa smile. You're thinking of your secrets, aren't you? I hope so. For me, and maybe for you, too, now is the time. Time to treasure, appreciate, reflect, and enjoy the gifts that need not be shared with anyone. The moments that are yours alone to cherish, or yours to reveal.

The secret, my friend, is SECRETS! I had it all along and didn't know.

Until now.