Honesty In Every Step.

Honesty is something I have been taught to practice from a very young age. I can remember many times during my younger years where ignoring honesty got me in trouble, maybe not right away, but most often, eventually. Honesty seems to be something that we can’t expect from people nowadays yet when people clearly see honest most are very appreciative. I have heard stories of people finding money and returning it the owner, of having extra items accidentally put in their package and bringing them back to the store, and of persecuted Christians not denying God but honestly answering and confessing their faith. Not everyone who was honest in these situations were praised, honored, or awarded for what they did but each one of them were happy with what they did and did not regret speaking and acting honestly.

A few years ago, I’m not even really sure when this was exactly, I decided that I was going to be more honest in everything that I said and did. A couple weeks ago I gave someone advise to be honest. After that I got thinking about what honesty is and what it really means to me. This started cascade of thoughts, which I decided to write down and make some sense of, and times of reflection on areas in my life where I have not been honest. In the end my thoughts and reflections have left me convicted. I think honesty has to be practiced as a lifestyle in order to be continuous with it. In the last month or so there has been lots of revealing of the truth and I know it has given many people relief including myself. The following is what the bible says about honestly and what I believe about it. I trust God has guided me to write what is true and good.

First I do believe that we are commanded in the bible to be honest. Proverbs 12:17 says, “Whoever speaks the truth gives honest (or righteous KJV) evidence, but a false witness utters deceit (or lies NIV).” This gives almost a definition of honesty; it is truth and not deceit or lies. While In my bible (ESV) honesty is only mentioned three times, the opposite of honesty, deceit and lying, are talked about much more. In Leviticus 19:11 “You shall not steal you shall not deal falsely; you shall not lie to one another,” and the commandment “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor,” are both direct commands from God through Moses to be honest. Mark 7:22 Jesus speaks of many things including deceit as a thing that “defiles a person.” A pure and clean life lived before God will be void of deceit. Collossians 3:9 “Do not lie to one another seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices.” If we are Christians the Holy Spirit has worked in us so we are able to put off our old self and put on the new self which chooses honesty instead of lying. If we choose to lie we go back to our old life apart from God, we actively deny our Lord and savior, and do not grow in our faith or honor God.

Being honest gives honor to God, since when we are honest we imitate Jesus who, 1 Peter 2:22, “committed no sin, neither was any deceit found in his mouth.” It is really interesting to me that Peter writes here that Jesus was without sin, which includes deceit, but then specifies on deceit directly following. Maybe the readers of Peter’s letters especially needed to learn to imitate Jesus in the way of honesty. Maybe it rather draws from Peter’s own personal experience in learning to be honest the hard way after denying Jesus. Whatever the reason the point I take from it is that Jesus was without deceit, he was honest, and we as Christians are told to be imitators of this. To be honest like Jesus was honest.

Besides being imitators of Jesus which gives honor to God, being honest also promises other rewards to the Christian. Isaiah 3:10 gives hope to the Christian who lives an honest life when it says, “Tell the righteous that it shall be well with them, for they shall eat the fruit of their deeds.” David in Psalm 101:7 talks about keeping what is good in his environment and not what is evil when he writes, “No one who practices deceit shall dwell in my house; no one who utters lies shall continue before my eyes.” Ephesians 4:28 “Let the thief no longer steal but rather let him labor doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need.” To me this implies that the person who does honest work will be rewarded with fruits from his labour so that he can then share it and be by doing so have a double blessing of receiving and giving. The last verse I found that speaks of rewards for the honest is confusing to me. If anyone has an idea of what this verse might mean please do share your thoughts with me. It is Proverbs 24:26, “whoever gives an honest answer kisses the lips.” My thoughts are that ‘kisses the lips’ might speak of being given a privilege or honor or maybe about having a more intimate relationship with God because of our obedience to him through our honesty. These are only guesses on my part and I would love to hear any other opinions on this verse.

So can we honestly say that we are honest? Jacob was confident when he said to his father in law Laban, Genesis 30:33a, “So my honesty will answer for me later, when you come to look into my wages with you.” Are you able to say this in your life? To your spouse, your children, your friend, your boss, your siblings, and most of all to God. When areas of your life are inspected can your honesty answer for you?

I the past couple weeks I have been struggling with these questions and the struggle has led to action. Honesty involves not telling lies but also telling the truth. When I decided to be more honest I focused more on the not telling lies part. Telling the truth might possible be a harder thing to do as in my experience it often involves standing out and speaking up. I’m a very closed person, so there are areas in my life where I choose not to say something when it should be said. Until now I have not considered that wrong because it is not lying, but I do believe it is withholding the truth which is deceitful and therefor I am not living honestly before God.

I have identified two reasons why I don’t want to be honest about some things. The first is I am not sure how people will react to the honesty and it might not be pleasant or comfortable for me which is also selfish. The other reason is that if I am honest with others I must first be honest with myself which can be hard to do as well. I must be true to myself that I was wrong or that a situation affected me before I can be honest with others and speak truthfully of these things. A quote by Aubrey De Vere pretty much summed up my thoughts about this. “To be really honest means making confession whether you can afford it or not; refusing unmerited praise; looking painful truths in the face.”

Being honest may cause you hardships, the cost of honesty may be great, you may have the struggle of then refusing unmerited praise, and whether the truth is painful or not you will have to look the truth in the face admitting it to both yourself and to those you are being honest with. Yet after searching the bible to see what it has to say about honesty I believe the rewards of honesty are far greater that the hardships or struggles we may face through it. We will eat of the fruit of our deeds, our houses will be filled with goodness, we will be blessed both to receive and to give, and most of all honesty will give the reward of bringing honor to God. 

For myself I know that honesty is a struggle that I will constantly have to fight to accomplish. It’s not easy for me and I know that sometimes it will be scary but I have faith that God will help me to do this thing. I pray that my conviction of this will become action and that you may be convicted and encouraged by this and act as well. Honesty is something that is seen and wanted by the world but more importantly it is seen and demanded by God. May he be given all the glory.

Blessings, Laina