True Colours

I touched on this a bit in my last post, about Mr O, and how different he is to me. I need to explain this a bit more.
I've spent the past six years working in an office, first with Mr O, and then for three years at Forticrete. That means I have spent six years being totally oppressed. When you work in an office here, in England, in 2009, it is incredibly difficult to mention your faith. A nurse was suspended a few months ago for offering to pray for a patient. When you hear things like that, it puts you off telling people about Jesus. That's why I talk about horses all the time, because that's acceptable.
In fact, in the office, conversation about anything is acceptable, except Jesus. I had to sit and listen to people talking about pornographic films, or violent films, that were so bad in the end I went to the kitchen to make coffee just to get out of the way. You can talk about who's sleeping with who, which fortune teller you're going to and which medium. But you are not, absolutely not, allowed to talk about Jesus. Isn't it strange?
So you go to church on a Sunday, praise God and come home filled with love and peace and joy, so that you're bubbling over, but you must not share that at work on Monday morning. You must keep silent. So silence it is then, because if the conversation is dominated by all those nasty things, which obviously you're not going to contribute to, because you think it's vile, you end up saying nothing at all, until in the end you're silent most of the time.
I was going to title this post, 'living outside the box' (which is a phrase I hate) because finally I am allowed to come out of my little box that people try to put me in, and be myself. But when I thought about it more this morning, I realised that actually where I want to be is inside the box. God has hand-picked, hand-painted and lovingly decorated a box for me, where everything I am is put in, my personality, my character, the way he made me to be. ('In my father's house there are many rooms - a room is just a big box, isn't it?) This box is where the real me can kick off my shoes and feel right at home. I was pondering this when 'True Colours' by Cyndi Lauper came on the radio.



You with the sad eyes
Don't be discouraged
Oh I realise
It's hard to take courage
In a world full of people
You can lose sight of it all
And the darkness inside you
Can make you feel so small


But I see your true colours
Shining through
I see your true colours
And that's why I love you
So don't be afraid to let them show
Your true colours
True colours
Are beautiful like a rainbow


Show me a smile then
Don't be unhappy, can't remember
When I last saw you laughing
If this world makes you crazy
And you've taken all you can bear
You call me up
Because you know I'll be there


And I'll see your true colours
Shining through
I see your true colours
And that's why I love you
So don't be afraid to let them show
Your true colours
True colours
Are beautiful like a rainbow.




And that is what the Lord wants me to do right now, every day, He wants me to discover my 'true colours' because I've been made to conform to the world for so long, even though I've loved the Lord all that time.
I did a quiz back in the summer, in my early days with Facebook. The question said, 'Describe yourself in one word,' and I instantly put, 'innocent' which is exactly what I am. I am innocent of all the muck and grime in the world because I am redeemed. I am cleaned up. And I don't want to get dirty again. And living here has enabled me to do that. I am free to be myself here, I don't care what anybody thinks. I am me, and I love it. The freedom is incredible.
To give you an example: at work they would say, "You're really posh, aren't you?" meant as an insult, because I speak good english. I felt like saying, "Certainly well brought up enough not to say, "You're really common, aren't you?" because I know that would be a nasty thing to say. If I said that, they'd all say I'm a snob, but it's okay for them to insult me. Does that make sense? So I lived with that insult (and a lot worse) for three years at work. It's just bullying really, isn't it? It's sad that adults are allowed to do that. It's bad enough coping with it at school.
This got so bad that when we came for the interview here and when I first started, and was obviously out to impress, I found the stress from work meant I could hardly string a sentence together. Just when I wanted Pongo and Missis to know I wasn't thick, that I was nice and capable and competent, I couldn't get the words out. It has taken all this time to go back to expressing myself the way I want to, because no one here is going to criticize me for it.
Facebook, and now blogging, have been instrumental in this, because I have made some wonderful new Christian friends on there, and regained some old ones that I've lost touch with. They've shown me that I am part of something huge, something true and something amazing. I am still a daughter of the King, and always will be. They've shown me that's it's okay to be innocent and funny and creative and articulate because that's the way God made me. I am unique, and I'm allowed to be, and I am revelling in it.
My only hope is that, should our circumstances change in the future, and I have to go back to work in an office again, that I have the courage to show my 'true colours', in fact, to nail my colours to the mast, and not put myself in their box ever again.