lies

One time I lied about my son to my wife.  I told her he was being disruptive and causing problems with the customers in my shoe store and he needed to go home with her.  He was just a little boy at the time, probably five or six, and the look on his face as I stood there and lied about what he was doing was a mixture of shock and disappointment.  Not to mention the fact his mother got very upset with him for doing the supposed things I had said he’d done. It was not one of my best days as a dad.

Lies.  We’ve all told them; either to get out of trouble, to save someone’s feelings or just to get past some uncomfortable situation in our lives.  And if you say you’ve never told a lie, well you just did.

No one is immune from being put into a position to tell a lie, but it’s like the old saying goes, “You may not be able to keep a bird from flying over your head, but you can sure keep him from building a nest.” It’s  what we do in these situations which makes the difference.

Remember the story of Pinocchio?  The little wooden puppet who came to life in the workshop of Geppetto, and every time he would tell a lie his nose would grow.  Wouldn’t this be awesome if this happened in real life too?  There would be no guessing who was lying to us, not to mention it would be a great deterrent to keep us from telling lies as well.  But alas, this is not the case; so it falls to us to use self control and discipline instead.

Lying seems to have become the norm in our society.  It seems I expect to hear lies than truth any more. Or at the very least I’ve come to expect that I will have to weed out the lies in order to actually find the truth; which is exhausting.

It’s uncomfortable to tell the truth though isn’t it?  For example say your friend is learning to play the banjo. They’ve been at it for a year or so, and you know they are not really getting any better, but when asked by them how their latest song sounds, you reply, “Hey, that sounds great!  When are you going to produce a CD?”  What will they take a way from your words? They will believe they sound better, when in all reality they aren’t.

Yeah Dave, but I don’t want to hurt their feelings, it’s easier just to tell a little white lie. I understand, I wouldn’t eant to hurt their feelings either, but by telling them they sound really good don’t you think maybe it will hurt them in the long run?  

The Bible encourages us to speak the truth in love.  Perhaps instead of lying, you could say something like this, “You know, that song needs a little work, but keep at it, you are sounding better than you did a couple of months ago.”

Constructive criticism can seem hurtful if you let it, but it really is a good thing if you’ll let it be. I remember a few years back asking a friend to read through and help me edit a book I was writing.  When I sent it to her, I felt as if I had written the next best seller. 

 When she replied a few days later with her critiques I was devastated.  I thought, “She doesn’t know what she’s talking about.”  But after a few days, I re-read her comments and looked at them objectively and I realized she was right and made the changes. Her truthful comments made my book so much better.

The bottom line is we should never lie, because it goes against everything a man should stand for.  If you are honest at the core of who you are, people will notice and then you can and will make the difference in this life you are destined to. You’ve got what it takes to do this, so stop telling lies and begin cultivating honesty in your life and see what happens. You may be surprised by the reactions.

Now you know what I think, what do you think?