Honesty

If you had to ask married couples what they feel one of the foundations of a marriage should be or what quality they feel would be most important in a mate, I think honesty/trustworthiness would definitely be among most men and women's top traits. When you say your marriage vows, you make a promise to your mate and they take you at your word. We promise to take care of them, provide for them, protect them, and then being human gets in the way. We create situations in our marriage where our spouse doesn't feel provided for, or protected, or taken care of, or loved and they feel that we have let them down and our promises are no longer valid.

In the book "His Needs, Her Needs," Dr.Willard Harley, Jr. says "Whenever and wherever your mate asks you how you feel, tell the truth. It is foolish to lie out of fear that you will hurt your spouse's feelings (or possibly hurt your own pride). Your mate has a right to your innermost thoughts. Your mate should know you better than anyone else in the world- even your parents."

Dr.Harley goes on to say that a man may lie for several reasons:
1.) He lies chronically from an early age.
2.) He wants to avoid trouble.
3.) He thinks the truth might be too much for his wife.

I am guilty of all of these things in my marriage. Dishonesty was a wrecking ball in my marriage. When I was younger, I was wild. I tried to hide these things from my parents so the easiest way to "hide" it was not to tell them the truth. As I got older, I continued to be dishonest about things in my life. When I got married, I told myself that I was going to be different. I was going to be a man of my word. It worked for a very little while, but I was also lazy. I didn't have a job for about the first three months of our marriage. All I did was sit around the apartment playing games on my computer, watching TV and doing nothing constructive. When my wife came home after working all day, I didn't even have dinner ready for her. When she would ask me what I did all day, I would "bend" the truth or just flat out lie to her because deep down, I knew I had no excuse and didn't want to fight with her about it.

Over the course of the next few years of marriage, the dishonesty became more and more abundant in our marriage. It was all from me. I'd been doing it for so long that it was almost second nature for me. As I sit here typing this and thinking back on all of it, it almost makes me sick to my stomach.

Well, the one thing about being dishonest is that the more lies you tell, the more lies you have to come up with to cover up for the ones you've already told. I had put my marriage on the line with my dishonesty. I had put myself above my wife and my daughter. I had put myself above my God. There was so much dishonesty now that I feared my wife couldn't handle it.

As with all situations that are filled with bad things, it finally came to a head. Because of my dishonesty, I've put my marriage in place that it never had to go. But, thank God, I had not lost all of my conscience. This began to produce a deep and profound feeling of guilt. If I wanted my marriage to have a chance, I knew what I had to do.

Dishonesty and lying are parasites that eat away at the very core of a marriage. No one, especially a Christian, should be dishonest. Lies are from Satan himself.

"You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies." John 8:44

God hates lies, but when we see the error in our ways, we repent, we ask for forgiveness and we are truthful, we are set free from hold that lies can take on our lives.

"Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” John 8:32

I spent a lot of time praying for strength and for courage to undo what my dishonesty had done. I finally began to break the walls down around me that I had put up so my wife couldn't really see what was inside of me. I did something that I had not done very often... I began to be honest. I confessed my dishonesty to her. Over the course of a couple of weeks, I was able to tell her more and more. It broke her heart and there were many tears shed on both sides.

During all of this, I began noticing something. I began feeling less and less guilty. I began feeling more and more peaceful. I didn't know how it would all play out, but I did know that I was doing the right thing for once in my life. I spent many hours talking to God. I knew in my heart that I was forgiven by Him for all of my transgressions. The Bible says " May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit (Romans 15:13)."

The two questions I still had were: would my wife forgive me and how would I ever rebuild her trust in me? When "two are to become one" (Mark 10:8) and I refuse to share with my wife, then we really aren't one, are we? Her distrust of me hurt her sense of security. I didn't know where or how to start, but I knew one thing... I was going to do all that I could to save my marriage.

I took some of the following steps to begin the healing process. Let me just say that it is an ongoing process and by no means a quick fix if you find yourself in this situation.
-Pray. Pray. Pray. "Pray without ceasing." (1 Thess. 5:17)
-Study the standard of truth that God expects. "The LORD detests lying lips, but he delights in people who are trustworthy." (Proverbs 12:19)
-Don't do anything that you would want to lie about. "In the way of righteousness there is life; along that path is immortality." (Proverbs 12:28)
-Learn from your mistakes. "These things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the culmination of the ages has come. So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall!"(1 Corinthians 10:11-12)
-Remember that I love my wife and I am committed to our marriage. "A wife of noble character who can find? She is worth far more than rubies. Her husband has full confidence in her and lacks nothing of value." (Proverbs 31:10-11)

Honesty and trust are at the core of a marriage. I can't undo all the things that I have done, but I can move forward with a clear conscience, knowing that my wife has given me an undeserved chance to rebuild. By keeping God first, knowing that He is the truth, and following His standard of truth, I can put all dishonesty away for good. In that process, my wife can see that I am worthy of regaining her trust.

No marriage can survive with dishonesty in it, no matter what the reason. Make it a point to do what is right and truthful. There is nothing worth being dishonest over. Yes, the truth can hurt sometimes, but a lie will grow and grow until it consumes everything in a marriage. Truth is essential for unity.

Prayer: Lord, I thank you for the examples of truth that you have shown me in the Bible. May anyone reading this that has dishonesty in their character or marriage be given the strength to correct it and may their marriages be rebuilt on honesty.