Faces

To face something implies that one should turn to whatever something might be. Suck-it-up and take it like a man. Take a direct approach, confront it. To face something means to see it for all that it is. See the coming storm, take it in because sooner and later you will be swallowed up by it, and it will batter you.
A face is what the world sees when we walk out of our door each morning. It is the first thing we notice, and often the last thing we forget. A face can at any time carry the weight of this troubling world, or it can reflect the beauty of this carefully crafted world. Some try to hide their face while others plaster the world with their face. We face our faces in other directions when the sight is too painful to bear. We face our faces to the ground when we are shamed.
The human face is an open book, laid bare for all to see the hurt, agony, or joy. We search the faces of a crowd in hopes of finding someone to connect with--a familiar face. By chance, maybe we will recognize somthing in a face that we know to be true. Maybe that familiar face will speak to us about our own loneliness or our own shortcoming. Ultimately, I think, when we search the faces of others, and even ourself, we are searching for the only face that really matters--God's.
We hope to recognize, in the face of humanity and in the face of pain or loneliness, the face of someone we can only experience. We long to see if the face of Jesus or of God is real, if that face really was full of the compassion we lack, if that face truly was nothing special to behold as people wrote. Because if that face is true compassion and true simplicity, then we too can face this world with our face and make it through. If that face is as honest as we hope it to be, then we can look out at the mass of faces we see each day, at the bus-stop or the Starbucks, and we can empathize with them.