The Bible’s crystal clear: we shouldn’t lie. We could pull out loads of verses that tell us the same thing (check out Leviticus 19:11 or Proverbs 12:22 for starters). We know the big, terrible lies that hurt others are wrong. But what about the small ‘white lies’ that people tell every day to keep everything running smoothly? Things like someone exaggerating their skills a bit on their CV or saying someone’s not in when a phone call comes that they don’t want to take. We’ve all done things like this at some point. And is it really so bad? Nobody’s got hurt, there are no serious effects, it doesn’t really matter, right? But the Bible doesn’t give us any get-out clauses or exceptions. The problem is that even ‘white lies’ can eventually be damaging. Imagine this scenario: you’ve invited a friend out, but they say they’re busy that day. Then eventually you find out that they weren’t busy at all – they just didn’t feel like going out, but didn’t want to hurt your feelings. In trying to avoid hurting you, they end up damaging the friendship, breaking down trust, and hurting you more than if they’d been honest. Have a look again at today’s title verse. It doesn’t matter how small and insignificant a lie seems, eventually it’ll be revealed and cause all kinds of damage. We can’t speak a lie in love, we can only ‘speak the truth in love’ (Ephesians 4:15 NLT). When we tell any sort of lie, large or small, for any reason, we risk losing trust and credibility. And once we’ve lost them, they’re massively difficult (if not impossible) to regain. So let’s not take the risk, and resolve to speak only truthful words.
What now?
Today, resolve to only tell the truth (not even ‘tiny white lies’ are allowed).