59. HONESTY/DISHONESTY
--page 502--
Providing for honest things, not only in the sight of the Lord, but also the sight of men (2Cor.8:21).
1. Honesty is the best policy. Honesty pays.
2. We're all nudists as far as God's concerned! All things are naked before Him with Whom we have to do. (Heb.4:13)
3. Just because you must tell Systemites the truth doesn't mean you have to tell them everything!
4. Admitting Error clears the Score
And proves you Wiser than before.
5. To treat your facts with imagination is one thing, but to imagine your facts is another.
6. This is the punishment of a liar: He is not believed even when he speaks the truth.
7. It's not your business to decide whether it's going to cost you anything or not, or cause you trouble by telling on somebody else; it is your duty to tell, whether you like it or not, or whether he likes it or not! It is your duty to report something, and if somebody knows something's wrong and doesn't report it, then it is their fault as much as the actual perpetrators of the crime. Failure to report a crime is a crime!
8. There are quite a few instances in the Bible where God told people to lie.
9. Often it is easier to do a good job than to explain why you didn't.
10. It's a terrible thing to tell lies to try to cover up wrong doing. The Lord is against lying, He hates it!
11. If you lie about one little thing or break the smallest law, people figure you could be guilty of much greater things.
12. Oh, what a tangled web you weave,
When first you practice to deceive!
13. Not even God Himself can stop people from lying, as long as there's free moral agency and there's free will.
14. Falsification is the product of pride, an effort to hide the awful truth of which you are ashamed.
15. Confess to yourself continually what a fool you are, how stupid, dumb, slow, thoughtless, selfish, inconsiderate and hopeless you are without God!
16. The Lord Himself says, "I will send them strong delusion that they might believe a lie, that they might all be damned who receive not the Love of the Truth." God Himself is going to lie to them and deceive them because they refuse the Truth. So they deserve to believe a lie. So God lied to them and deceived them and deluded them and damned them!
17. If you're going to do what God wants you to do and accomplish what only you can do, you are going to have to recognise your limitations.
18. He that is not honest with himself cannot be honest with anyone else.
19. A guilty conscience needs no accuser.
20. Those who stretch the truth usually find that it snaps back.
21. You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.
22. You must be willing to face yourself and your own weaknesses and your own strengths, and to know the difference.
23. Striping away all the cover-ups and laying your heart bare before someone else is like the way you humble yourself before the Lord.
24. One of the greatest assets to a good relationship is honesty.
25. One of the smartest things you can do is to assess your own assets and liabilities.
26. You don't solve your problems by running away from them!
27. Flattery is like Grandma's soap--90% "soft soap" and 10% "lie"!
28. You pay a big price if you get caught stealing and you pay the price of fear and apprehension if you don't.
29. You are really three persons: What you think you are, what others think you are, and what God knows you to be!
30. Better to speak truth rudely than to lie correctly.
31. It's better to report it and be wrong than not to report it and be right.
32. Hesitation to most people seems a sign of evasiveness and unwillingness to tell the truth!
33. If you're not honest with yourself, if you keep on trying to fool yourself, you'll do the same with God and others, and the result will be one awful mess--you'll make a mess of your own life, hurt all those associated with you, and hurt God most of all.
34. The best thing we need to do with faults and failures and mistakes and weak points is to see them, recognise them, be honest about them and then try to somehow overcome them or improve them and do something better if we can!
35. The Lord and His Prophets frequently used deceit and sometimes outright lies, believe it or not, to accomplish God's purpose. The law is a standard, but there are always exceptions to the rules, particularly if God is the One Who makes the exceptions.
36. I hate to lie and very rarely in my life I've done it. It hurts me and bothers me, but if I have to do it to save my life I might do it. And a few times, although I have not outright lied, I have misled. I said one thing when I really meant another, and deliberately in order to save some situation or spare someone, or in order to escape some very serious situation. If you have to lie to save a life, I think it's worth it, but I certainly don't recommend it and it would have to be in and absolute extreme emergency.
37. As Shakespeare said, "If thou canst to thine own self be true, thou canst not be false to any man."
38. King David left a dummy in his bed to make it look like he was still there while he escaped through the window. Paul was let down over the wall in a basket. Jesus' disciples pretended to go one way when they left town but actually went another. The Three Wise Men, instead of going back the main road to Herod, went another way home. Jesus hid Himself and escaped out of their midst.
39. To treat your fact with imagination is one thing, but to imagine your facts is another.
(See also No.143A, 266, 286, 302C, 555, 629, 662, 985, 1108, 1248, 1299, 1400, 1406.)
40. LEV.19:13 Thou shalt not defraud thy neighbor, neither rob him: the wages of him that is hired shall not abide with thee all night until the morning.
41. PSA.24:3,4 Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? or who shall stand in His holy place? He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart; who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully.
42. PSA.35:11 False witnesses did rise up; they laid to my charge things that I knew not.
43. PSA.55:21 The words of his mouth were smoother than butter, but war was in his heart: his words were softer than oil, yet were they drawn swords.
44. PSA.62:4 They delight in lies: they bless with their mouth, but they curse inwardly.
45. PSA.119:29,30 Remove from me the way of lying: and grant me Thy law graciously. I have chosen the way of truth: Thy judgments have I laid before me.
46. PSA.119:128 Therefore I esteem all Thy precepts concerning all things to be right; and I hate every false way.
47. PSA.119:163 I hate and abhor lying: but Thy law do I love.
48. PRO.18:5 It is not good to accept the person of the wicked, to overthrow the righteous in judgement.
49. PRO.19:5 A false witness shall not be unpunished, and he than speaketh lies shall not escape.
50. PRO.24:28 Be not a witness against thy neighbor without cause; and deceive not with thy lips.
51. PRO.28:13 He that covereth his sins shall not prosper: but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy.
52. ECC.5:4,5 When thou vowest a vow unto God, defer not to pay it; for He hath no pleasure in fools: pay that which thou hast vowed. Better is it that thou shouldest not vow, than that thou shouldest vow and not pay.
53. ZEC.8:16 These are the things that ye shall do; Speak ye every man the truth to his neighbor; execute the judgement of truth and peace in your gates.
54. MAT.19:18 Jesus said...Thou shalt not bear false witness.
55. ACT.5:3,9 But Peter said, Ananias, why hath Satan filled thine heart to lie to the Holy Ghost, and to keep back part of the price of the land? Then Peter said unto her, How it is that ye have agreed together to tempt the Spirit of the Lord? behold, the feet of them which have buried thy husband are at the door,and shall carry thee out.
56. ROM.9:1 I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost.
57. 1COR.9:20,21 And unto the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews; to them that are under the law, as under the law, that I might gain them that are under the law; To them that are without law, as without law, (being not without law to God, but under the law to Christ,) that I might gain them that are without law.
58. 2COR.4:2 But have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, not handling the word of God deceitfully; but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God.
59. 2CO.6:8b As deceivers, and yet true.
60. 2CO.8:21 Providing for honest things, not only in the sight of the Lord, but also in the sight of men.
61. EPH.4:25 Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor: for we are members one of another.
62. COL.3:9,10 Lie not one to another, seeing that ye have put off the old man with his deeds; And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created him.
63. 1TH.4:6 That no man go beyond and defraud his brother in any matter: because that the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also have forewarned you and testified.
64. 1TH.4:12 That ye may walk honestly toward them that are without, and that ye may have lack of nothing.
65. HEB.13:8 Pray for us: for we trust we have a good conscience, in all things willing to live honestly.
66. 1JO.1:10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His Word in not in us.
(See also examples of "Deceivers Yet True"; GEN.12:10-20; GEN.20:1-18; GEN.30:25-43; GEN.38:1-26; GEN.42:1-24; GEN.44:1-17; EXO.1:15-21; EXO.2:1-10; EXO.3:19-22; EXO.8:20-29; EXO.10:8-11; EXO.11:1-3; EXO.12:31-36; JOS.2:1-22; JDG.16:21-30; RUT.3:1-18; ISA.19:8-18; ISA.21:10-15.)
Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family