TRUTH TELLERS

Leviticus 19:11 “'Do not steal. Do not lie. Do not deceive one another”

How many of you have ever received a gift you didn’t like? Maybe it was a really hideous tie. Maybe it was a fruitcake. I’ve heard of families where the same fruitcakes were passed along from member to member for years.

Nobody could bring themselves to eat it. Well, in the interest of helping you handle these situations without having to hurt someone’s feelings, I offer the top 7 things to say about a gift you don’t like:

7. Hey! There’s a gift!
6. This is perfect for wearing around the basement.
5. If the dog buries it, I’ll be furious!
4. I love it - but I fear the jealousy it will inspire.
3. Sadly, tomorrow I enter the Federal Witness Protection Program.
2. To think - I got this gift the same year I vowed to give all my gifts to charity.
And the Number One Thing to say about a gift you don’t like:
1. "I really don’t deserve this."

We’re all faced with such situations. Maybe you agree with the little boy who was asked what a lie was and replied, "A lie is an abomination to the Lord, but a very present help in time of trouble!"

But the truth is that there is a cost to lying. Those who lie, sometimes even once in a given situation, find it hard to win their way back to being trusted again. I find it very interesting that in our culture of lying, it’s still one of the worse things you can say of someone...He or she is a liar.

Almost everybody does it, but no one wants to be labeled a liar. A look at secular bookshelves tells you that. On the left these books include Al Franken’s Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them. On the right of the political spectrum, you have Ann Coulter’s Slander: Liberal Lies About the American Right.

If there’s anything in scripture that’s absolutely clear, even if only by the sheer force of the number of times it’s prohibited, or spoken about negatively, it would be lying. As people who follow the One who said, I am the Truth, Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the hallmark of our character, a mark of our integrity, should be that we are truth-tellers. It’s interesting that, the admonition to tell the truth, and the corresponding injunction against lying, is something that is spoken of clearly in almost every major world religion.

It’s a standard on which most of the world seems to agree, even if that agreement doesn’t seem to affect behavior as it should.

Taoism says: Do not assert with your mouth what your heart denies. Buddhism says: “Lying is the origin of all evils; it leads to rebirth in the miserable planes of existence, to breach of the pure precepts, and to corruption of the body.” Hinduism says: All things are determined by speech; speech is their root, and from speech they proceed. Therefore he who is dishonest with respect to speech is dishonest in everything. Islam says “There are three characteristics of a hypocrite: when he speaks, he lies; when he makes a promise, he acts treacherously; and when he is trusted, he betrays. Confucius says, "I do not see what use a man can be put to, whose word cannot be trusted.”

I believe the world agrees that lying is not a good thing for very practical reasons. Have you ever thought about what the world would be like if there wasn’t at least a general agreement that we should relate to one another on some level of truthfulness?

Lying is not something we should avoid just because it causes trouble for us, and for the people around us. Another reason that we are not to lie, is because it’s part of that old man, that old part of our old selves that has been nailed to the cross, has been tried and convicted, and put to death. Our lies are sins that Jesus died to pay the price for. Lying is part of our old life, and we shouldn’t have any use for it anymore.

Let’s tell the truth....

In all of our interactions with one another, and with the world we’re trying to reach for Christ, let’s reflect the character of the One who is the embodiment of truth. Let’s be truth tellers. Let’s take lying seriously, so seriously that we cannot do it... we must not live in it.