Honesty

Mark Dunagan
01/01/11 - N/A

Honesty

I read just recently where New York authorities arrested seven former and current students at a top-ranked Long Island high school after charging that one of them, a 19-year-old, collected up to 2500.00 a pop to masquerade as those that hired him to take the SAT for them.  Furthermore, in the United States, studies show that 20 percent of students started cheating in the first grade, and that 50 percent of middle school students and 70 percent of high school students have cheated.

Obviously, students are not the only ones who are “honesty challenged”.  A study among North Carolina school teachers found that some 35 percent of those polled said they had seen their colleagues cheating in one form or another.

Fake Resume is a website that offers a resume “tune up”.  You can even get fake references and transcripts from any university with the GPA you desire. Background Information Services is a company that does background checks. It has found that well over half of all resumes contain false information about past work experience or educational credentials.   How far our culture is removed from the principle of “...laying aside falsehood, speak truth each one of you with his neighbor” (Ephesians 4:25).

Honesty and Goodness

As I read both Testaments, the Bible routinely connects honesty with being good and lying with being wicked: In defending themselves, repeatedly, Joseph’s brothers described themselves as being “honest men” (Genesis 42:11,19,31,33,34).

• God has no tolerance for dishonesty: “Thou does destroy those who speak falsehood” (Psalm 5:6).
• Honesty is precious and rare: “Help, Lord, for the godly man ceases to be, for the faithful disappear from among the sons of men..They speak falsehood to one another” (Psalm 12:1-2).
• God requires honesty to have a relationship with Him: “Who may ascend into the hill of the Lord….he who has clean hands and a pure heart, who has not lifted up his soul to falsehood” (Psalm 24:3-4).
• The rewards of living with honesty are deep: “How blessed is the man who has made the Lord his trust, and has not turned to the proud, nor to those who lapse into falsehood” (Psalm 40:4).

Recently I saw this demonstrated in an article that pointed out that conservative people are more honest than people who describe themselves as being very liberal.  57 percent of those who call themselves very liberal said it was okay to cheat on one's taxes, compared to 20 percent of those who describe themselves as being very conservative.  One writer noted that the reason for this is that modern liberalism is linked with the idea that truth is relative, consequently, if truth is relative, then it must certainly follow that honesty isn’t that important.   Hence, lying for your own self-interest makes complete sense when one accepts the bogus notion that there is no absolute truth.  Certainly no one should be shocked when the people who reject God’s truth end up becoming self-centered and dishonest any time it serves their goals—at the expense of all of us around them.

A Definite Choice

When I deal with any sin among men I guess I should just expect to find someone today either justifying the sin or arguing that those who are practicing it where born that way.  When it comes to cheating in school, some scholars argue that the students who cheat have a pathological urge to cheat.  Yet there are always people that seem to come back to reality.

Thomas Malton concluded that it is probable that most cheaters make a rational choice when cheating.  With this the Bible agrees.  Honesty or dishonesty are choices that we make:

• “Why do you boast in evil, O mighty man?...You love evil more than good, falsehood more than speaking what is right” (Psalm 52:1-2).
• “They delight in falsehood” (Psalm 62:4).
• The Holy Spirit in Ephesians 4:25 clearly puts this in the category of choice, as something that can be removed from one's life: “Therefore, laying side falsehood”.

“Times are Hard”

Often I have heard people justify lying or dishonestly on the basis of the situation or that with the misconception that in our modern age, one needs to lie to get ahead.  In fact, the website Fake Resume offers the following justifications for its existence:

• The bottom line is that you know you can do the job and we all know people who have held jobs for which they were not qualified.
• Is this lying?  Perhaps, but you deserve a shot at this job.
• What about the prospective employer’s honesty?  How open and honest are they to their employees and future employees?  If they are lying to you, why not lie to them?

This all sounds pretty good—except for the fact that the Bible consistently condemns lying, even during the hardest times.

Yes, the job market today is tough—but this isn’t anything new to the world.  Life has always been a struggle.  God expects us to be honest, even though we might be surrounded by dishonesty at every turn:

• “No one sues righteously and no one pleads honestly.  They trust in confusion, and speak lies” (Isaiah 59:4).

Too many people in our world today “trust in confusion”, that is, when you point out what the Bible says about something like honesty, they immediately try to give a number of examples where they contend that the Biblical Ethic isn't workable.

Trusting in confusion is the same thing as trying to make everything a gray area by making up all sorts of “what if” scenarios.

It is attempting to push people to the point that they'll say things like, “Well, the lines aren’t that clear”.   During the same time period as Isaiah spoke, Micah also pointed out that there was a lack of honesty even among God’s people during his lifetime:

• “If a man walking after wind and falsehood had told lies and said, ‘I will speak out to you concerning wine and liquor’, he would be spokesman to this people” (Micah 2:11).   In other words, they didn’t like Micah’s preaching the word, rather they loved to listen to a man who talked about indulgence and would tell them "sweet little lies."

Dishonesty is Contagious

So what about lying on your resume —given to that employer who "is lying already to you anyway."  Or what about cheating on that test, "everyone else does" and "you need that good grade to get into college and get a good job so you can provide well for a family one day." Think again.  The Bible is all over these excuses:

• “If a ruler pays attention to falsehood, all his ministers become wicked” (Proverbs 29:12).  “Courtiers adjust themselves to the prince—when they see that deception and court flattery win the day, they learn how the game is played” (Gaebelein p. 1114).  
• “I have seen a horrible thing:  The committing of adultery and walking in falsehood; and they strengthen the hands of evildoers, so that no one has turned back from his wickedness” (Jeremiah 23:14).  

The Downside of Dishonesty

So many people seem to want to concentrate on the benefits of lying or stretching the truth, and the very short-term gains of cheating.  Yet godly people know better:  “A righteous man hates falsehood” (Proverbs 13:5). Why does a righteous man hate falsehood? Think of the implications on the mere earthly level alone:

• What if everyone lied?  What if you could not depend upon anything people said or even put in writing?  Would you really enjoy living in a world where all contracts, guarantees and warranties were meaningless, all oaths were lies, and all promises were empty?  
• Would you enjoy being married to a liar?
• Would you like to have parents that were habitual liars? Who would say, for example, they would pick you up after practice—and then never show up.
• What if you could not trust anything written on the packaging of the various products that you buy?  What if products that said they did not contain peanuts or wheat—actually did?
• Would you like to travel on an airplane that was built or maintained by liars?
• Would you like to buy a car that was put together, engineered and serviced by cheaters?
• Would you like to go to a dentist or doctor that was dishonest?

The Spill Over

As previously noted, Jeremiah spoke of those who committed adultery and walked in falsehood (23:14).  It is significant that one form of cheating is mixed with another form of cheating.  Once one allows dishonesty into one's life one will find “reasons” in other areas to cheat as well.  I am always amazed by the person who will marry someone who isn’t truthful and yet naively believe that this woman or man will be truthful to them—that they will somehow be "the exception."  How it is that we convince ourselves that someone who is a liar to everyone else, or mean to everyone else, is going to be forever honest and kind to us?

It is clear that sometimes when people are dishonest other people may not be merely inconvenienced or even hurt, rather, people can and do die as a consequence of another's dishonesty!  Yet there is even more at stake.  Dishonesty concerning what the Bible actually says can cause people to end up lost forever.  And this is not a small problem; religious lying has been common for centuries:

• “The prophets prophesy falsehood in My name, I have neither sent them nor commanded them nor spoken through them” (Jeremiah 14:14).
• Jeremiah 23:25-26; 32 “Nor do they furnish this people the slightest benefit”.
• Ezekiel noted the same problem and observed that such false prophets create two huge problems.  First, they discourage the righteous, and second, they encourage the wicked to remain in their sins (13:22).
• The same problem is found in the New Testament.  Jesus spoke of the false prophets (Matthew 7:15), and Paul spoke of people willing to cooperate in tickling the ears of those who no longer want the truth (2 Timothy 4:3).

No wonder righteous people in the past completely hated falsehood, “I hate and falsehood” (Psalm 119:163).

Reaping The Benefits of Honesty

• It is liberating to simply be yourself—if you are good. You no longer have to pretend.  
• Honesty encourages other people around you to be honest as well—especially the next generation.
• The rewards for dishonesty are short-lived and fake.  In same various studies have noted that kids who cheat on tests do not get better grades in the end.  The rewards for honesty are real, permanent and eternal.  When I have seen honest people rewarded, I have seen them receiving something that no one could take from them.
• Honesty silences the excuses of the wicked, it holds them accountable, and it rebukes and exposes the easy path they have taken.
• Honesty saves souls: 1 Timothy 4:16; 2 Timothy 4:2
• When other people can depend upon you—stability is created in all your relationships.
• It provides clear boundaries for our children and makes them feel safe.
• It produces genuine spiritual growth and real knowledge.
• It will make you someone that people respect.

Mark Dunagan/Beaverton Church of Christ/503-644-9017

www.beavertonchurchofchrist.net