Roger Clemens, first round draft pick in 1983 by the Boston Red Sox, Cy Young Award Winner seven times for being the best pitcher in baseball that season, Most Valuable Player in the American League in 1986, winner of 354 games in twenty-four seasons, and one of the greatest pitchers of the modern era, this same Roger Clemens is going to trial next week for lying to Congress—committing perjury is the formal term for it, but it is still just lying!
Pitchers are paid big bucks to be deceptive. They hide their hands in their delivery to keep the batter from discovering how they hold the ball. They hide their mouths when they talk to the catcher. The throw one pitch to make the batter think they are getting ready to throw another. With only talent and no deception, would Clemens have been as successful as he was?
Of course, in a game where both sides know that deception is part of the strategy, we don’t feel any moral dilemma, but when one swears before a court to tell the truth and then lies, the consequences are more dire.
Psychologists say that most people lie multiple times every day, from the simple “what a nice dress!” to lies that seem only for convenience: “I got caught in traffic, that’s why I’m late.” Then, of course, other lies grow in seriousness: “no, I was working late at the office” or your signature on your tax form that says you have told the truth.
We know what God thinks about lying. “The LORD detests lying lips, but he delights in people who are trustworthy,” says the writer of Proverbs (12:22). Liars are included in the same list with the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, and idolaters, who all will receive final punishment.
If that isn’t enough, here are some other reasons to avoid lying:
- Lying hurts people. Just lie to someone you love about anything important and see if they aren’t hurt! See if the relationship doesn’t suffer! Sometimes even jokingly lying will produce the same effect–which is sometimes a cover-up anyway!
- Lying makes you distrust other people. You think they lie too.
- Lying keeps you on edge for fear of being caught.
- Lying successfully is very difficult to do. It is easy to mess up and get caught in one’s own web.
- Lying shows a lack of courage to face the truth, so the liar feels like a coward.
- People don’t like liars when they are found out, so you can lose lots of friends.
- One lie can destroy a whole career of achievement!
Telling the truth sets you free! Sure it is uncomfortable, inconvenient, and sometimes even incriminating because we are all sinners, but isn’t that the First Truth that we have to confess before God can do His work of Grace on us. My name is Mark Woodward and I have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
Until we can tell the truth, God may let us believe our own lies and suffer the consequences in our own bodies (Romans 1). Perversion of truth leads to perversion everything good.
Once we learn to tell the truth, then we learn to love the truth! ! Speaking the truth in love! The truth proceeds from love, is motivated by love, and is framed by love. Truth and Love seem to be indivisible, don’t they! Both are the same core attribute of God.
I always liked Roger Clemens and I hope he wasn’t lying. If he was, I hope he’ll tell the truth now. But I pray even harder that I will love the truth and tell the truth—all the time.
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Regarding lying: Let’s say person A is sick and gets well. People get sick and get well every day. Getting sick and getting well is a natural occurence. I will not argue here that we have proof that it can only be a natural occurence, but I will argue that we have no proof that it is other than natural. Let us just admit there is no way of knowing. Now suppose person B says God healed person A. Person
B is asserting (claiming to know) more than person B knows. Why is that not lying?
Howard, that’s really a stretch. Two points. First of all, lying is generally understood to be intentionally deceiving another as opposed to knowing what another doesn’t know. Your issue is really with the concept of “knowing”. Christians “know” that God heals people because they believe in a sovereign God and faith is “knowing” that which can’t be scientifically proven. If I tell you that God healed you, you understand that I am telling you what I perceive to be true. You know also that you have a choice as to whether to believe me or not. You have no way of proving me wrong, so you have no reason to accuse me of lying–except your own faith in what cannot be proven.
What you know when A recovers is that it could be a natural act. If I grant that you also know it might have been a supernatural act, you still only know it was either a natural or supernatural act. You have no way of knowing which. So a correct statement is “A’s recovery was due to either a natural or supernatural act.” If you said that, I would have no reason to complain. If you are going to claim you know it was a supernatural act, how do you know this?
If you are claiming that one can know something simply by choosing to know it, can I choose to know that 2+2 is 5 simply by choosing to know that? If I don’t know the number of black beans in this jar, can I know it simply by choosing to know it? We cannot choose to know. We only can know what is evident.
First, you are assuming a difference between natural and supernatural. Secondly, there is plenty of evidence of God. We choose to know all kinds of things that are evident, but not scientifically verifiable. Every theory that we use to base decisions on is an unproven basis for knowing and acting. Since all of our senses are capable of being easily deceived, one either chooses to trust that they know things that are true, or they have to decide they know nothing at all and cannot ever know anything.