Some people have a loose relationship with the truth. I get that. Now me, I was born with this pesky built-in truth-telling device that makes it dang near impossible for me to lie.\u00a0 I would fail a lie detector test in 2 seconds flat. If i even catch myself wandering from the truth, my heartrate goes up, i get naseous, i feel the beginnings of canker sores\u2026 and these are for the little white lies. Like when somebody asks me \u201ccan you tell I\u2019ve gained weight?\u201d or \u201caren\u2019t my kids the\u00a0 cutest things you\u2019ve ever seen?\u201d<\/p>\n
Now, i can spin. I can speak or write a fluent bit of bs that makes my truth come across in any color or light that i want it to. I can pretty much say, of course I can tell that you\u2019ve gained 80 pounds<\/em> in a way that makes it sound like a compliment. But an out and out lie? Can\u2019t do it.<\/p>\n I get that sometimes lies have to be told. And I\u2019m glad that somebody else besides me has to tell them. But the lies that have to be told\u2026well, they are usually in response to something. And hopefully, a means to an end that will ultimately do more\u00a0good than harm.<\/p>\n What i don\u2019t get are the lies that come out of nowhere\u2013dramatic stories cooked up to elicit a response (often from a minister) or to impress or\u2026 you know what? I don\u2019t know what for. I have never understood what leads a grown-up person to just make something up and tell it true, like a toddler who has not yet learned the difference in fibbing and pretend. There\u2019s a line somewhere between, I am a monkey today <\/em>and no, i\u2019m not the one who painted the bathroom with toothpaste\u2026\u00a0<\/em>Awareness\u00a0of that line is a developmental milestone, a major step on the path to learning right from wrong, not to mention being able to use one\u2019s creative energies for good and not for ill.<\/p>\n And really, some grown-ups are waking up this very minute and deciding to be a monkey today. Again.<\/p>\n I know this because my built-in truth-telling device\u2014which is its own sort of downfall, believe me\u2013is also a lie detector. At a recent retreat with my church leaders, we played this awesome game called \u201cFact or Crap.\u201d It\u2019s pretty much a boxed up version of 2 truths and a lie, or BS. Someone reads\u00a0a random and totally obscure statement that most normal people could not possibly <\/em>know, and the players have to decide\u00a0if it is\u2013that\u2019s right\u2013fact or crap. I say it\u2019s awesome because i dominated at it. I know when I smell a rat, and i know who is a monkey, and i ALWAYS know who painted the bathrom with toothpaste (hear that kids? always\u2026)<\/p>\n Perhaps it\u2019s because, in my profession, I get lied to alot. But really, I\u2019ve had this awareness since i was a kid. (YOU won the McDonald\u2019s dream house? yeah, that\u2019s crap, i would have seen that on tv\u2026You\u2019re moving to Hollywood\u00a0and you\u2019re going to be on the Cosby\u00a0Show? Fine then, I\u2019ll just go ask your mom\u2026)<\/em>\u00a0 I knew people like this in high school. Ran into them in college. That inner device always on high alert, beep beep beep\u2026crap crap crap\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n As a minister, it\u2019s hard to know what to do when someone is handing you the crap card. I know that there are any number of personality disorders, mental illnesses, and emotional traumas that lead people to fabricate personal fiction out of thin air. But as a minister, I am not trained to diagnose or treat any of these things (though believe me, the temptation to do so is real\u2026)<\/p>\n The irony is, the reason i get lied to alot is that people seem to think ministers, by trade, are required to believe anything they tell us. On the contrary, pathological peeps, let me tell you this\u2026 most of us can spot it a mile away. And we can\u2019t help you.<\/p>\n What i DO try to do, from a pastoral perspective, is discern why the person might be feeling the need to fib. Do they want money? Attention? A kind of human connection that they don\u2019t know how to make in healthier ways? Sometimes it\u2019s all of the above. In any case, I try to find a way of meeting that need, without responding to the lie. I try to give them what they really need, without buying into the made-up part or encouraging them to dwell there.<\/p>\n Yes, that is as tricky as it sounds. For instance, to the person with a made up illness, I by-pass asking about the details (I mean, they\u2019re not going to want me to come to the hospital. there is no hospital) but find some round about way of connecting them with people. For the person with the made-up [VERY long] story of how they came to be stranded in Phoenix, I give them the gas card, or food card, but make it clear that I did not<\/em> give it to them because of their great [crap] story\u2026 I gave it to them because the church had it to give, and because Jesus asked us to.<\/p>\n That last part is important.<\/p>\n There is no red-letter text for dealing with pathological liars. But I figure, pretend it\u2019s leprosy and the directive is clear. Touch. Bless. Restore to community. It\u2019s all we can do. And over the beep-beep-beep-crap-crap-crap<\/em> chaos going off in my head, I have to believe that, ultimately,\u00a0 it is enough.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Some people have a loose relationship with the truth. I get that. Now me, I was born with this pesky built-in truth-telling device that makes it dang near impossible for me to lie.\u00a0 I would fail a lie detector test in 2 seconds flat. If i even catch myself wandering from the truth, my heartrate […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1154,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65,5,1],"tags":[23,11,59,12,448,24,25,425,26,34,79,35,27,140,60,89,68,40,53,449,105,30,31,117,450,451,452,14,9,453,32,44,10,107,85],"class_list":["post-413","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-being-a-person","category-faith-and-community","category-uncategorized","tag-arizona","tag-christianity","tag-church","tag-community","tag-compulsive-behavior","tag-connect","tag-desert","tag-development","tag-disciples-of-christ","tag-discipleship","tag-discipline","tag-evangelism","tag-faith","tag-family","tag-gifts","tag-grace","tag-hope","tag-hospitality","tag-jesus","tag-lying","tag-ministry","tag-neighbor","tag-neighborhood","tag-parenting","tag-pastoral-care","tag-pathological-liars","tag-personality-disorders","tag-phoenix","tag-progressive-christianity","tag-psychology","tag-relationships","tag-simplicity","tag-spirituality","tag-vocation","tag-work"],"yoast_head":"\n