Children Are Honest
--Part 7 of the "Like A Child" Series
The ability of children to tell it like it is has become the foundation for many a funny
story. Kids simply say what they feel, tell it exactly as they see it. This can be embarrassing
for the parents sometimes, but that kind of honestly is refreshing.
One of my favorite “I Love Lucy” episodes is about a bet that Lucy makes with Fred, Ethyl, and
Ricky. She tells them that for 24 hours, she will go without telling a single lie. It proves to be
a much more difficult task than she could have imagined. She had to fight against her every natural
instinct. The most difficult lies to avoid were when she had to tell one friend she hated her
furniture and another that she disliked her hat. You’d never hear a child put on such pomposity,
but we adults do it on a regular basis, in the name of courtesy. While it probably isn’t a good
idea to tell our friends that we don’t like their tastes, we can find ways to avoid hurting their
feelings.
Where is the spiritual application?
As Christians, we are called to hold each other accountable, not for our taste in furniture, but for our faithfulness to His commands. Holding each other accountable can include telling each other what we don’t want to hear. Conversely, we need to be open to hearing what is said to us in the name of accountability.Ephesians 4:25
“Therefore, laying aside falsehood, speak truth, each one of you, with his neighbor, for we are members of one another”Test
Try imagining these 3 scenarios: (1)Suppose you go into a grocery store and walk onto an aisle, and you run into a friend who is a Christian. You catch him telling someone else an off-color joke. (2)Suppose another Christian friend who owns his own plumbing business comes over to fix your sink, and then he asks you to pay him cash so he doesn’t have to report it on his taxes. (3)A Christian relative asks to borrow some software from you so that he will not have to buy it himself. He plans to install it on his computer, then return the disk to you.In these scenarios, what do you do? What society tells us and what God’s Word tells us are diametrically opposed to one another. Society tells us that we should leave these friends up to their own convictions, that’s it’s none of our business, that we should not judge them. “Live and let live.”
But here’s what the bible says:
Proverbs 24:24-25
“Whoever says to the guilty, “you are innocent”—peoples will curse him and nations denounce him. But it will go well with those who convict the guilty, and rich blessing will come upon them.”Pride Check
Accountability works 2 ways. Are you willing to identify a Christian friend who will hold you accountable? You should give him permission up front to ask tough questions, and along with that permission should come a promise that you will not refuse to answer the questions, and that you will always give honest answers.NEXT: Part 8 -- Children Like To Play
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an email to james@middletree.net.