Cheerful

Proverbs 15:13 A happy heart makes the face cheerful, but heartache crushes the spirit.

You can guess a lot about a person by looking at their face. The older they get, the more the lines on their face reflect the expressions that are expressed more often. Frown lines and laughter lines are very different.

You can look at a person’s face at rest and see so much. Go to WalMart and look at the faces if you don’t believe me. Frowns get etched into the tissue. And there a lots of frowns these days.

Our disposition shows through our face. If we are happy, our face shows it. If we are angry, our face likewise has the marks to prove it. What is on the inside will show up on the outside. We can’t help but tell our story.

I learned that saying, “We can’t help but tell our story” when I was going through a year long residency while training to be a hospital chaplain. One of the greatest things I learned was how to listen to a person’s story, how to draw them out, to give them space to think, process and reflect. My job was not to answer their questions, but to sit with them as they asked their questions, their deepest and scariest ones.

I learned how to listen, really listen. It was hard work, because my own story kept getting in the way. The struggles I had would pop up at the most inconvenient moments and muddy the waters. And if I could learn how to listen carefully to what they were saying, I could hear their story, even if they didn’t know they were telling their true story.

Some people like to “put on a happy face.” Some do it to hide what is just under the surface. Some do it as a conscious choice, changing their mood starting with their face. Inside out and outside in. We can change how we feel by changing our outward posture, including changing our facial expression.

Our text tells us that happiness shows up on the face. But so does heartache. What is your face telling others?