Face the Front

     When I think about the title, it takes me back to elementary school. We’d line up to go to the cafeteria and we’d all have to face forward. If we turned around to talk to our friend, the teacher would tell us “turn around and face the front”. Never did I realize how profound that statement really is, especially if we have faced any forms of abuse in our past. 
     As the Lord dropped this in my spirit, He reminded me that it is important to face the Front in our lives.  I thought, hmmm, yes I suppose it is. We don’t want to walk forward and keep turning around to look behind us. Then I heard “No that’s not what I meant”. I knew that the Lord was trying to lovingly tell me this was important. 
     You see, when we go through different traumatic events such as physical abuse, emotional abuse, verbal abuse or even sexual abuse, we learn how to mask our pain because it can be too hard to face. But what if you thinking you haven’t gone through a traumatic event? You didn’t suffer any abuse per say.
     I had a friend who said, she didn’t go through anything really bad during her childhood. Her parents have been married for 28 years, and her and her brothers never suffered any abuse. So I told her, well then, you’re very blessed to have had a stable family. Then she asked me “ Is it abuse if my dad was in and out of my life until I was 14?” I asked her to explain.  She began to tell me that her dad was the sweetest man she’d ever known. However, every year he’d just go a way. No one ever knew where he went, he’d be gone for several months, and then come home. He did this until she was about 14 years old.  Her mom never told her or her brothers where their dad would go, all she would say is he was- he’s home now and that’s all that matters. But for my friend, she said she always felt insecure about growing up and getting married. She explained that the reason she is still single is because she didn’t want to commit to someone who might just get up and leave for no reason.  
     Do you think she was putting up a “Front”? The definition for putting up a front means: to pretend or falsely represent.
What was her front? She “pretended” she was fine and had no issues, however, she was suffering with fear, insecurity and rejection.   So maybe to her, this wasn’t a traumatic event in her life, but it did affect her relationship with men because she wouldn’t commit, for fear that her future husband would randomly leave.
As us Texans would say; she was frontin)

     We all put on fronts when we’re hurting. We all have a front that we wear or wore in our journey through coping. Yes believe it or not, we learn to cope instead of walk in freedom.  Coping has several definitions, but the one that stuck out to me the most was: “To keep one’s head above water”.   Wow, isn’t that something we’ve all said at one time or another? (Hey how are you? Eh you know, I’m just keeping my head above water)
We learn to cope and front, in order to just survive.

     But let me tell you something friends, Jesus doesn’t just want us to cope, or keep our heads above water, He wants us to face the FRONT that we are putting on.  My favorite quote is something the Lord gave me a couple of years ago-“If you confront that thing that once held you, it no longer has power over you”. Isn’t that awesome?  For instance, you may wear a front to cover up your fear, anger, rejection, insecurity, lust or even greed.
 But if you FACE YOUR FRONT, it’s like standing up to a bully! When you finally stand up to the bully, he can’t torment you anymore. It’s the same with your FRONT.
Don’t live just coping with it, face it, and take your freedom back.

     So today, take an inventory of what your Front may be.  God wants us to walk in Freedom! He doesn’t want us turning around and pretending it isn’t there, nor does He want us to act like we’re fine and everything is just blessed all the time.
You don’t have to do it alone. Jesus promised us, He would NEVER leave us or forsake us. He will walk this out with us. He WILL give us the courage to overcome.
So quit frontin and start walking in your Freedom today!

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Matt 11:12
From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and the violent take it by force.