by Cathy Franklin

Created on: July 27, 2009

Honesty includes such things as not stealing, and not lying. Does this mean it's okay to lie to keep yourself from getting in trouble? No. We should never lie, no matter what the reason. In the Bible, Jesus Christ, the Great Teacher, told his students "Just let your Yes mean Yes and your No, No." (Matthew 5:37) So Jesus told us that we should do what we say we will do.

Here is one example of some people who were dishonest. Their names were Ananias and Sapphira. They were members of the Christian congregation in Jerusalem after Christ Jesus died. Some people had come to Jerusalem and they stayed too long and ran out of money. So they asked the apostle Peter to help them and so the other Christians in the congregation helped them. They sold some of their things and gave the money to Peter to help the people. But a married couple, Ananias and Sapphira wanted to make themselves famous for giving their money to Peter. They told Peter that they are giving ALL their money to the people. But really they were being dishonest, because they didn't give all the money they had got from selling their belongings, they kept some of it. They lied about it. But God knew what they had done. So God told the apostle Peter that they were being dishonest and not truthful. Peter went to Ananias and asked him why he was being dishonest and lying to him. Ananias wasn't letting his yes mean yes. For his lie that he had told - Ananias fell down dead. And when Ananias' wife Sapphira came in to find him, she also died. So they both lost their lives because of lying and being dishonest. The lesson is that God hates anyone who is a liar. He always wants us to tell the truth, no matter what. (Acts 5:1-11)

Isn't it when you have done something wrong that you are tempted to tell a lie? Maybe you break something and you tell your parents that your sister or brother broke it, or that you don't know who broke it. That's a lie. We should never try to tell only half the truth either, because that's the same as not telling the truth at all, just like Ananias and Sapphira. It will always make matters worse if we tell a lie. God speaks the truth, and we want to strive to be like God as much as possible.

Satan was the first one who told a lie. When we tell a lie, we are being just like Satan, and we never want to be like him. So we wouldn't want to lie, ever.

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