Are you always 100% honest? I want to believe I am. But alas, I know me.
Lying, doctoring the truth, minimalizing truth, white lies, whatever we call it, I have done it. As a kid, I lied a lot. I believed (and I proved this to be true), that if I told the truth, I would be punished anyway for whatever I was confessing. If I lied and got away with it, great. Trouble is lying is like many other vices: I lose a part of myself - that part of me created to be in right relationship with others and with my Creator.
I don't lie anymore - on purpose - at least not just to be lying. I do not always say every-thing I think (even if you believe I do!).
I do believe integrity is very important. Once at Safeway, the clerk and I forgot the bottled water on the bottom of the cart. I got home before checking out the receipt and had to go back and pay for it.
Two other true stories: In another city, I met a woman from church in the supermarket parking lot. She was a single mom, with three girls to support alone. She greeted me warmly and excitedly reported, "Wow, God has really blessed me today. The clerk made a huge error in my favor! She gave me almost $15.00 more than she should have!"
A friend of mine once told me the story of a tube of lipstick. As a child, she was fascinated by lipstick, but her parents thought her too young to wear it. One day her piano teacher had forgotten to put her lipstick back in her purse, and the child slipped it into her pocket.
Hers was a very religious family, where family prayer took place every night. That first night, little E. couldn't concentrate on prayer for thinking of the tube of lipstick in her coat pocket. In fact, every time she prayed, the tube of lipstick got bigger and bigger, like some magic potion was making it grow. How could everyone NOT know about it?
Finally she had to confess her theft and her mother made her immediately return the lipstick.
I've been thinking about John 1 --- Jesus is described as full of grace and truth. I want to be too.
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