Message in a Bottle

It is time to admit something about myself: I keep to myself. Many of you know this, and are not shocked by it. Some of you may be. I keep things in that bother me. This is detrimental to my marriage, in that I do not tell my wife. I should come to her with anything, because she is my help meet in life. We should share things openly, and I am not a natural sharer. This is detrimental to my health, and could be one thing, along with lactose intolerance, that affects my stomach.
Most detrimental is the fact that I keep things from my God. I can still remember the time that I recommitted my life to Christ in 1998. I remember the many times that God has spoken to me and given me comfort. I remember church services, a tent meeting at Westview Baptist in Boone, where God just reassured me. I remember being baptized in the creek at Buffalo Cove park, the feeling that the public display of faith gave me, along with the rush of that cold water.
Time passes, life builds, and those memories get suppressed. Packed on top of those are the daily pressures, threats on my job, feelings of anger, hate, and frustration. What do I do with those? I keep them in. I build, like a hot dog in the microwave. We all know what happens if a hot dog gets heated for too long in a microwave, don't we? KABOOM!
This is not how it should be. Psalm 62, verses 7-8 (NLT) say: "7 My victory and honor come from God alone. He is my refuge, a rock where no enemy can reach me. 8 O my people, trust in him at all times. Pour out your heart to him, for God is our refuge." What good is a refuge if you don't run to it? What good is an umbrella in the rain if it is closed?
Venting to your friends is good. Like Homer Simpson's computer instructed him on the episode where he gained so much weight he wore a mu mu and worked from home: "Venting Prevents Explosion." Keeping things in the bottle for too long cause the bottle to break, the hot dog to explode, the nuclear meltdown, I could go on. There is no greater friend than Jesus, and he wants to hear from you (me). He also gave us friends to talk to on earth. We can go to these friends and tell them our fears, our dreams, and our troubles. We don't have to explode.
The most important thing is to not keep it bottled in.