January 14
A Half-Truth is a Whole Lie.
Jer 9:3 And they bend their tongues like their bow for
lies:
I remember when I was growing up and someone on the phone
wanted to talk to a person who did not want to take the call. “Is Charlie there?” The person who had answered the phone would
put one open hand over their eyes and reply “I don’t see them!” Now it was true that they didn’t see them,
but was it a “half truth” or a whole lie?
Webster’s defines a lie as something that is represented to
be true while knowingly false – an attempt to deceive. I like that definition. A lie is an attempt
to deceive. The best lies mix some truth
and some untruth, or fact and fiction, to more easily deceive.
Several years ago I heard of a liars club. One year the
winner said when he was fishing he hooked a fish that was so large it pulled
him out of the boat and across the top of the water so fast his pants caught on
fire. But no one was deceived by these “lies”.
It was all in good fun.
But there are people who say things that are not true
because they want to deceive the hearer.
The Bible lists several deceivers. Abraham’s family was infected with
using deception.
Ge 20:2 And Abraham said of Sarah his wife, She is my
sister:
Genesis 20:12 tells us she was his half sister. But Abraham wanted them to believe that she
was not his wife. That was an obvious deception that was not a half truth but a
whole lie.
Abrahams’s son Isaac
used the same deception.
Ge 26:7 And the men of the place asked him of his wife;
and he said, She is my sister: for he feared to say, She is my wife;
Isaac had learned how to lie from his father Abraham. Fear drove both of them to speak the same
lie. Unfortunately Isaac’s son Jacob
followed his father and his grandfather’s example.
Ge 27:19 And Jacob said unto his father, I am Esau thy
firstborn;
Next Jacob has most of his sons deceive him about what had
happened to Joseph.
Ge 37:20 Come now therefore, and let us slay him, and
cast him into some pit, and we will say, Some evil beast hath devoured him :31 ¶ And they took Joseph's coat, and killed
a kid of the goats, and dipped the coat in the blood; 32 …, and they brought it
to their father; and said, This have we found: know now whether it be thy son's
coat or no.
OK, technically they did not lie to him. But their plan was
to deceive their father. Webster says “Lie-.…to create a misleading impression”
They later found out the pain of being
deceived themselves when they traveled to Egypt for food and did not know they
were dealing with Joseph. Genesis Ch
43-44 record their dilemma and fear for the deception Joseph was playing on
them. The entire family used lies,
deceits, and falsehoods when they were fearful or wished to keep the truth from
someone. Unfortunately things are not
much better now.
It seems that lying is expected, accepted, and universal in
the world today. Not everyone speaks lies, but lying is more common than it
should be. So is the lesson for us today to not tell lies. No, I assume you do
not tell lies. (If you do…(gasp!) …stop
it!)
Zec 8:16 These are the things that ye shall do; Speak ye
every man the truth to his neighbour;
The lesson is we should be careful in this world of
deception and misinformation, especially when it comes to spiritual things. The
commercial world wants us to believe that things bring happiness. Governments want to decide what is moral, and
our culture wants us to believe Bible based religion is bigotry. Be like the Bereans who searched the
scriptures to see if these things be so. Do not let lies from the government,
advertising, or the culture diminish your Biblical principles. Our lesson today is a simple one.
Eph 4:14 That we henceforth be no more children, tossed
to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of
men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive; 15 But
speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things, which is the
head, even Christ:
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