<\/p>\n
Trick or Treat<\/u>! Thursday was Halloween<\/u>. One day every year people wear masks and others have to guess who they are. Lots of people wear masks all year long. <\/strong><\/p>\n By this I mean, when other people have to deal with us, what do they see? Do they see who I really am or a mask that I am wearing?<\/u> I often wear a mask. I wear my \u201cI\u2019m So Busy Mask\u201d.<\/em><\/strong> \u201cThere are so many things I have to do. I don\u2019t have time for you. I am so busy, I hope you don\u2019t start telling me about your problems. I have so many of my own.\u201d <\/em><\/p>\n Then there\u2019s my \u201cJohn Wayne Mask\u201d <\/em><\/strong>that I wear. \u201cHey, everything\u2019s just fine with me. I\u2019m a tough guy. I\u2019m resilient. I can take what comes my way. I\u2019m not worried one bit. I\u2019m cool.\u201d Another mask I try to not wear is my \u201cTeasing Mask\u201d.<\/em><\/strong> My dad wore it all the time to tease my mother and I hated how he teased her. But I still wear it and do it. \u201cYou eat all of that and you\u2019ll have to get new clothes. That\u2019s what happens when you don\u2019t listen to me. Was your mother as messy as you are?\u201d WHY<\/u>?<\/strong> Because inside I\u2019m afraid. Inside I\u2019m weak. Down deep I\u2019m lost. Down deep I don\u2019t have all the answers I pretend to have. If you knew who I really am, I\u2019m afraid you wouldn\u2019t like me. You\u2019d laugh at me. That would kill me! <\/em><\/p>\n In a spelling bee in Third Grade I thought I spelled a word correctly<\/u>. But all the kids laughed at me. For the next 16 years I never raised my hand in class again. I don\u2019t like to be laughed at. None of us do.<\/p>\n So what does this have to do with today\u2019s Gospel<\/u>?<\/em> (Luke 19:1-19). Jesus is going along doing his thing of preaching and working his miracles. This little guy named Zacchaeus heard about him and he wanted to meet Jesus.<\/p>\n But Zacchaeus had two big problems: 1. He was short and 2. He was the chief tax collector. People hated him. They wanted to get their hands on him and beat him up. <\/em><\/p>\n Zacchaeus seizes the moment:<\/strong> \u201cI want to meet this Jesus. I want to be like Jesus, not a bad guy or a jerk. I want to take off my mask and be real.\u201d<\/em> So Zacchaeus climbs a tree and literally goes out on a limb. The Result: Jesus says, \u201cI want to eat with you today.\u201d<\/em><\/strong> There is a dramatic change in Zacchaeus\u2019 life. He gives half of his money to the poor. He repays many times over those he had defrauded. A God Alert<\/u> We have here a Zacchaeus moment, where he seizes the moment. He throws caution to the wind. He tears off his masks. He gets to meet Jesus and to know him as a friend so he could be like Jesus. I had a Zacchaeus moment. I wrote my dad a letter and included my feelings. I took off my masks. I told my dad that I loved him. I told him I was sorry for the ways I had hurt him. I asked him why he wouldn\u2019t let me into his life? When I finished the letter I slipped it under the door of the apartment where he was living. <\/em><\/p>\n What masks do you wear? Trick or Treat! Thursday was Halloween. One day every year people wear masks and others have to guess who they are. Lots of people wear masks all year long. By this I mean, when other people have to deal with us, what do they see? Do they see who I really am or a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3869,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"qubely_global_settings":"","qubely_interactions":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"qubely_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured.png",150,150,false],"landscape":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured.png",150,150,false],"portraits":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured.png",150,150,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured.png",150,150,false],"medium":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured.png",150,150,false],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured.png",150,150,false],"large":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured.png",150,150,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured.png",150,150,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured.png",150,150,false],"ocean-thumb-m":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured.png",150,150,false],"ocean-thumb-ml":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured.png",150,150,false],"ocean-thumb-l":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured.png",150,150,false],"qubely_landscape":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured.png",150,150,false],"qubely_portrait":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured.png",150,150,false],"qubely_thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured.png",100,100,false],"rpwe-thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1572651952_featured-45x45.png",45,45,true]},"qubely_author":{"display_name":"Medard Laz","author_link":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/author\/medlaz\/"},"qubely_comment":0,"qubely_category":"Weekly Messages<\/a>","qubely_excerpt":" Trick or Treat! Thursday was Halloween. One day every year people wear masks and others have to guess who they are. Lots of people wear masks all year long. By this I mean, when other people have to deal with us, what do they see? Do they see who I really am or a…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3870"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3870"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3870\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3869"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3870"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3870"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3870"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n<\/em>
\nAnother mask I wear is my \u201cComplaining Mask\u201d.<\/em><\/strong> I wind up complaining about everything<\/u>. I mean just about everything! \u201cAren\u2019t you ever on time for anything? Boy, it\u2019s hot in here! That team is so bad, I don\u2019t think I\u2019m going to watch them anymore.\u201d<\/em> And of course there\u2019s always the politicians and the people in Washington to complain about.<\/p>\n
\n<\/em>
\nI hope you get the point. On Halloween, we wear masks one day a year. But I and a lot of people wear masks 365 days a year. WHY<\/u>? To keep people at a distance. I don\u2019t want to be real or honest with you. I don\u2019t want you to know the real me. <\/strong><\/p>\n
\n<\/em><\/p>\n
\n<\/strong>
\nWhen I was first ordained, my dad was always wearing his \u201cComplaining Mask\u201d.<\/em><\/strong> My mom had died and he was all alone. So he felt sorry for himself and he let you know it. So if I called him, he said I was bothering him. If I didn\u2019t call him, he said I didn\u2019t care about him. I was in a \u201cno-win\u201d situation.
\n<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n
\n<\/em><\/em>From the day he received and read my letter, many things got to be so much better between us for the next 25 years. He often removed his \u201cComplaining Mask\u201d<\/strong> so I could deal with the real man. We had a much better relationship for the rest of his life.
\n<\/em><\/p>\n
\n<\/em><\/strong>
\nEvery day is not Halloween. So why do you and I keep wearing our masks? Take off your mask and seize the moment like Zacchaeus did. It may never come again. Trick OR Treat?
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"