Actually his costume was just a mask. He wore his regular
farm overalls, but he had donned a small plastic mask that was the face of a rotund, smiling man with
a big cigar clamped in his teeth. It looked exactly like the real Glenn. He dressed up as himself! That’s what you call “truth in advertising,”.
What you saw was truly what you got.
Most masks are intended to obscure or distort, to conceal the truth. So, because it's Halloween, I have two points of application.
First, here's how I'm praying about the Presidential election--that the real President Obama and the real Governor Romney will be revealed to the voters. Any political campaign tends to distort the other guy--to put a mask on him, so what you see is a caricature. It's also true that the candidates themselves wear masks to appeal to voters. But I'm praying that the masks will be gone, and that people will vote based on seeing the candidates clearly.
Second, about Halloween. When I was a boy I honestly don't remember that Halloween had an evil, supernatural component. Costumes were cowboys and princesses and jolly fat men with cigars in their teeth.
The dark side of Halloween has become prominent, maybe even preeminent, since those simpler days. Sinful people, apart from Christ, are blinded by their own masks. Even worse, they (we) place masks over the face of the Savior. ...the god of this world has blinded the minds of
the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory
of Christ, who is the image of God (2 Cor. 4:4).
Let's pray that today, and every day, we may see the real Jesus. When our masks are torn off so we can see the beauty and perfections of our Savior--well, that's the start of everything. And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the
Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to
another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit (2 Cor. 3:18).
