I smiled as I shook the hand of each greeter, smiled just like I was supposed to. I walked in through the back door and slid into my typical row just as the first song was beginning. Perfect timing. I looked around and noticed hands in the air during the chorus of the familar song, and so I joined in, lifing my hands when the music built, bring them back down to my sides during the more mellow verses.

I saw that there were once again empty blanks in the sermon note guide, so I filled each gap with the appropriate word at just the right time, making sure to turn the page of my handout along with the rest of the congregation. The end of the service came and the pastor asked people to stand if they were willing to surrender everything they had for Jesus. I always hated that part of the service. My stomach would do that flippity-floppity thing, and I'd get that unsetled feeling that I just couldn't shake. I knew that if I kept my head down it would look like I was praying, and no one would think less of me for not standing up.

Finally the last song began to play and just before it ended I slipped out the back door, where the greeters had once again found their posts, ready to send me off into my week with blessings and well-wishes. Great.

As I pulled out of the parking lot, I quickly changed the station on the radio to catch the end of the top 40 countdown. My favorite sexually explicit, degrading pop song was playing and I rolled down the windows, ready to cruise all the way home. As I approached the next stop light, I looked over to see one of the older couples from church on their way home, windows also rolled down. Horrified, I quickly flipped the radio to whatever that positive encouraging station was, and hoped that the church couple hadn't realized what had happened.

Wiser from my mistake, I waited until I was home to peel off my painted smile and remove the tight mask from my soiled face. I knew I'd have to cover for my faux pas in the car, so I sent a quick email to the children's pastor, offering to volunteer with the kids the following Sunday. It'd mean I'd have to wear the mask for an extra hour, but I was getting used to it, and it was worth the extra effort to keep up appearances.

I knew one day I'd crack, but I wasn't ever ready to give up control.

And it happened just like I knew it would, and yet I didn't see it coming. I was sitting in my row, and I had raised my hands at the right times and filled in all the blanks in the note taking guide. I had almost made it through another week.

I just couldn't get over how clean all those people looked.

It got to that awful part again. The pastor was giving his periodic speech on surrender, and I was looking at my feet as I always did when I got that uncomfortable feeling in my stomach. But the pain didn't go away. I looked down and was horrified to see the stains forming again on my hands- they came back quicker each time.

And suddenly it was like someone was pressing the rewind and fast forward buttons at the same time. My feet were carrying me down to the front of the church, out of my safe row and into view of that mass of jarringly clean congregants. My feet carried me all the way to the cross. That smooth unassuming brown cross, draped with twinkling lights and shining in the glow of the stainglass window behind it. There my feet gave way and I fell, not onto the hard church floor but into a pair of open arms.

I felt my mask coming off, and I fought with everything I had left. But it wasn't enough. I looked down and saw my dirty hands and knew my face looked the same. I saw my smile float down to the floor as it was drowned in a puddle of tears and forgiveness.

A silent moment of surrender, and I knew in that moment I was soiled for good. But as I opened my eyes that had been pinched shut for years, I saw what couldn't be true in the reflection of my tears that surrounded me and that cross.

A new smile had found it's way onto my face. The mask was gone. And I was clean.