Tuesday 30 July 2013

10 SHADES OF FALSEHOOD


You can NOT cover Lagos-Benin in 2hrs- map from google
Lagos traffic reveals the human heart. If you happen to take public transport on a Friday night, be ready to see, hear and experience a lot of strange things. It is not unusual to board a bus with someone who feels everyone must know his/her personal opinion on religion, politics and the economy. (I’m not talking about those who make really loud personal phone calls. Those people belong to a different category.) Some other people consider BRT buses the perfect place to render an audio version of their autobiography- right from the Civil War till date.
If you remove the embellishments, you can actually learn a bit of history but asides that, it can quickly become a competition on the person with the most interesting story on personal relationships with celebrities or popular politicians, disarming armed robbers, near death experiences, ritual killings, and other stuff. Many of us know these entertainers are lying through their teeth but we just keep quiet. However, my experience on Friday shows that folks are just tired of the tale-spinners they meet every day. Trust me; the dude in question is not likely to spin another tale any time soon. I will relay what happened in a bit.
For a while now, I have been considering doing a series on falsehood. After giving it some thought, I realised that falsehood goes beyond telling a lie. I thought and still think that the topic may turn out to require several posts to do it justice and I did not want to entangle myself with that but the young man I shall call Nnamdi clearly showed me that its high time we considered the issue of falsehood-among Christians.
I was in one of those long civilian buses that ply Oshodi- Sango route. If you have ever been on one, you will know that the number of people who stand is almost double the number of people who sit in the bus. Nnamdi was one of those standing. Now, normally, Oshodi to Sango shouldn’t take more than an hour but Friday nights in Lagos are anything but normal. You know how you grind your teeth as you realise that you have spent 45 minutes on almost the same spot. Now that I think about it, it is probably this frustration fires the imagination of tale spinners.
Anyway, we had just driven past Ikeja along when out of the blues, I heard Nnamdi’s clear voice “I once drove from Lagos to Benin in less than two hours.” It was quiet. All was still. Brethren, people were stunned! I know I was. Two hours! I can’t even begin to explain this to someone who is not familiar with the terrain but let me say that there are at least two big states between both locations: Ogun and Ondo states. I have attached a map to this post but I doubt if it will do justice to the issue at hand.
When one of us recovered his faculties, he asked (more like confronted) Nnamdi on how in the heavens he achieved this feat. Obviously, the young man did not expect anyone to take him up on the matter so to cover up his miscalculated speech; he launched into talks about speedometers, car models, kilometres, state of the road and other excuses. Trust Lagosians. They ‘oohed’ and ‘ahhed’ at the appropriate time to deliver the right amount of shame. Nnamdi was flustered but he couldn’t stop. He picked up his phone and called an anonymous friend to corroborate his report. When everyone yelled for him to put the phone on speaker “so we can ask your friend questions”, Nnamdi pocketed his phone and his voice dipped remarkably. To say it was embarrassing is an understatement. I blushed for him!
Why this matter really touched me was the fact that, without being asked, five minutes before the outlandish statement that ruined the night, Nnamdi had pointed out his church “where I go every Sunday” to everyone in the bus. Who asked him? When the events unravelled, I felt that another one of my brothers had shamed Jesus in a public bus. Indeed, in the multitude of words, there wanteth not sin.
Now that you have the background statement story, permit me to run a series on the issue of falsehood. Bear in mind that I do not write as a Pharisee, but as one whom the Spirit of God has convicted on the same issue in recent times. Typing this just hurt my pride. I wasn’t spinning tales, I was ‘withholding’ information- am I making excuses? I hope not- that’s even worse. Sometimes, one can approach the issue of privacy without wisdom and slip into telling lies- or withholding information which in itself could turn into falsehood.
As a matter of fact, falsehood has layers that range from subtle misinformation to blatant lies (ask Nnamdi). Is there any difference in these types of lies? Technically, No. I do not mean that I excuse one type of lie for the other. I only think that the differences between them lie in how they are able to sneak up on us without us realising that we just told a lie: for example, if I am working on my next blog post during official working hours but I leave the company’s e-mail window open so I can quickly make a switch when anybody appears to walk in my direction, am I lying? Yes, I am.
Falsehood is not a laughing matter. I believe it is one of the little foxes that can rubbish the testimony of a child of God and limit the extent to which such person can be used by the Holy Spirit. Jesus Himself stated that the devil is the father of all liars. We cannot claim to have God as our Father and still want the devil to adopt us. That is not a spiritually legal triune relationship. It can’t work. It won’t work and since God respects the will of a man, continuing in falsehood may just be us insisting on whom we want to call daddy.
If the Holy Spirit is convicting you of falsehood or any other sin, rejoice first and then repent. For at least, I take it to mean that my conscience has not been seared beyond repair. Then I still have hope. God is still interested in me. I fear for and pity the man whom the Holy Spirit no longer pricks his conscience on sin. That man deserves the world’s pity for he is a tragedy that has happened, waiting only to be revealed.
Has God at anytime convicted you of lying or any form of falsehood? Do you have a testimony of overcoming falsehood? Share your thoughts in the comments section, and strengthen other readers.

I leave you In God’s care,
Miss. August

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