A legacy of lies...

"Telling a half truth is the same as telling a whole lie."

How many times have we heard our parents say this?  I don't know about you, but I heard this more than enough times.  Yet, how many half truths do we tell...?

Maybe you don't struggle with half truths or whole lies.  Perhaps you always tell the pure, unadulterated truth, never embellishing anything.  If that is you, great!  Wonderful.  You can stop reading now, because this post is not for you.

As we studied (in Moms' Bible Study) Abraham and Sarah, and then later Isaac and Rebekah, I was struck with a scary realization.  I lie.  A lot.  Way more than any God fearing Christian should.  I don't mean that I have grand webs of lies, or that I tell tales with the intention of hurting people.

Nope, my lies are of the more "innocent" variety.  You know, pretending your are not home when someone calls.  Using a little fib to get out of doing something you don't want to do.  Even glassing over a few parts of a story that don't make me look great.

I don't even call them lies... did you see that?  I pretend, I fib, I glass over things.  I don't lie.  Yeah, right.  

The scary thing is that I am a mom.  I have a beautiful little 2 year old who is watching everything I do and everything I say.  She is in full blown parrot mode.

What am I teaching her?  I tell her that lying is bad, lying hurts.  I tell her that lying only leads to further consequences.  But like any child, she is paying WAY more attention to my actions.

This brings me back to the Bible.  Twice in the story of Abraham and Sarah, Genesis 12:10-13 and Genesis 20:1-2, the couple lie.  They lie to the king and the pharaoh about their relationship.  

Genesis 12:10-13:  Now there was a famine in the land, and Abram went down to Egypt to live there for a while because the famine was severe.  As he was about to enter Egypt, he said to his wife Sarai, “I know what a beautiful woman you are.  When the Egyptians see you, they will say, ‘This is his wife.’ Then they will kill me but will let you live.  Say you are my sister, so that I will be treated well for your sake and my life will be spared because of you.”

 Genesis 20:1-2:  Now Abraham moved on from there into the region of the Negev and lived between Kadesh and Shur. For a while he stayed in Gerar, and there Abraham said of his wife Sarah, “She is my sister.” 

When we read this scripture it is easy to see why they would have lied.  If they told the truth, that they were husband and wife, Abraham may have been killed so the ruler of the area could take possession of his beautiful Sarah. 

They lied to save Abraham.  Well, kind of lied.  They half truthed... since they were half siblings.  (Gen 20:11-13)  Either way, Abraham and Sarah agreed to deceive people, instead of having faith that God would protect them.

Later we find their son Isaac doing the exact same thing with his wife Rebekah.

Genesis 26:7-9:  When the men of that place asked him about his wife, he said, “She is my sister,” because he was afraid to say, “She is my wife.” He thought, “The men of this place might kill me on account of Rebekah, because she is beautiful.”  When Isaac had been there a long time, Abimelek king of the Philistines looked down from a window and saw Isaac caressing his wife Rebekah.  So Abimelek summoned Isaac and said, “She is really your wife! Why did you say, ‘She is my sister’?”  Isaac answered him, “Because I thought I might lose my life on account of her.”

Isaac's parents taught him that it was okay to lie.  Abraham and Sarah used a half truth to protect Abraham, and Isaac and Rebekah used a whole lie to protect Isaac.  Both couples choosing deception over faith.

The legacy of lies continues on and on and on through out scripture, and in our families.

We can tell our children to, "do as I say, not as I do," until we are blue in the face, but we all know how that turns out.  Our children grow and reproduce our bad behaviors.

So, parents and grandparents, what kind of legacy do we want to leave for our kiddos?   Surely not a legacy of lies...


Lord, please help me to hold my tongue when I am tempted to lie.  Help me to be truthful and to teach my child that telling the truth is always the best option.  Guide me in raising my little one, leaving behind a legacy of hope, and truth, and love.  Amen.