The Lies We Believe

by Dr. Chris Thurman

  Yes, God wants His people to be mature and practice what we preach in front of others. He doesn’t want us to be hypocrites. The world has enough of those. The world will never be the same because of Jesus Christ; He was the only One—the only One—to ever walk the planet who perfectly practiced what He preached. I’m just saying that if any of us wait until we are just like Christ before we make ourselves available to be used by God, we will wait a whole lifetime.

  The apostle Paul is a good example of what I am trying to say here. By his own admission, he was not a striking figure. He was not a great speaker. He was not anything that would have impressed us. He called himself the “chief” of sinners, so he obviously didn’t have his act together. Yet it is hard to think of anyone in Christianity who has had a bigger impact. God certainly used Paul greatly in spite of his flaws. In his letter to the Corinthians, Paul captured the paradox of it all when he said, “For when I am weak, then I am strong.”14When we admit to being weak, flawed, and insufficient, we quit thinking it is all about us and realize it is all about God working through us to do great things.

  I’ve come to realize I don’t have to be a spiritual giant to tell people about God. In fact, my being honest about my weaknesses and struggles gives those I tell a healthier, more realistic picture of Christianity—one, I hope, devoid of lies. As Christ said, it’s not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.15

  The bottom line is that we are all “sick” and in need of the Great Physician. We are always going to be less than perfect representatives of Christianity, no matter what level of Christian maturity we ultimately attain. Pretenses otherwise are hurtful and unhealthy. What better favor can we do non-Christians than to allow them to see the reality of who we are, be honest about how we struggle, and point them in the direction of the true help we have found in Christ?

  Growthwork

  We have reached the end of our discussion on the various lies we believe that destroy us emotionally, relationally, and spiritually. I’m sure it has been painful at times to read about these lies and realize the damage they have caused in your life. I want to pat you on the back for your efforts so far. You have shown a great deal of commitment and courage to have been willing to face these lies.

  For your growthwork, I want you to participate in Track a Lie Week. Think back through all the lies we have covered, and pick one that troubles you the most. Once you have decided on one, I want you to keep an A-B-C journal for a week focused on that one lie. In your journal, write down any situation you were in that triggered that specific lie and what the emotional and behavioral consequences were for thinking it.

  Let’s say that you chose the “I must have everyone’s love and approval” lie for Track a Lie Week. With that lie as your focus, you would write down any A-B-Cs that had to do with your need for approval getting triggered and what reactions you had. Your journal might look like this:

  “A” (Event) “B” (Self-Talk) “C” (Response)

  Coworker was upset with me when I was late for a meeting. I can 't stand it when he is mad at me. I want him to like me and approve of me as a person and worker. Tense, heart raced; felt anxious; bit my fingernails.

  Spouse didn 't like what I was wearing. I want him to approve of how I look. A little muscle tension; felt angry; changed into something I knew he would like.

  Waitress acted upset/ irritated when I told her my meal was cold. What have I done wrong? Why is she upset with me? I need her to accept me. Breathing got shallow; felt worried and angry; left her a large tip to soothe her feelings.

  This assignment is designed to help you see the role that one lie can play in causing emotional turmoil, relationship problems, and spiritual conflict. Whatever lie you choose to focus on, try to identify as many situations as you can where that lie reared its ugly head and damaged you. Chances are that you will see how often just one lie plays into your life and the horrendous cost of believing it. That alone can motivate you to overcome this lie in your life.

  PART 2

  TELLING OURSELVES THE TRUTH

  7

  THE TRUTH ABOUT THE TRUTH

  Seek the truth,

  Listen to the truth,

  Teach the truth,

  Love the truth,

  Abide by the truth,

  And defend the truth,

  Unto death.

  —John Hus

  Men don’t usually like to reveal their deeper feelings. When they finally decide they can’t keep things to themselves any longer, they often seek out another man to “talk things over with.”

  But when the problem runs really deep—deep enough to shake their world—they will bypass their golf buddies, work cohorts, and even their best friends. Instead, they turn to someone like me.

  Bill’s world was shaking. He called for an appointment and came to my office on a hot July afternoon. He dropped into an armchair and combed his fingers through his hair. His eyes were bloodshot. The fresh nicks on his face were indicative of the hit-and-miss shave he had given himself that morning. There were bags under his eyes. He had the haggard look of a man too exhausted to keep trying, yet too terrified to close his eyes and sleep.

  “How may I help you?” I asked.

  Bill was quiet for a few seconds, expecting me to say more. Instead, I just eased back in my chair and waited. Whatever he needed to talk about I knew he had rehearsed dozens of times before ever phoning me. I’d let him explain in his own time, in his own way.

  “I’m losing it,” he finally blurted out. “I don’t know if I’m cracking up or falling apart or what! I’m wiped out, and if I don’t get myself pulled back together soon, I don’t know what’s going to happen to me. I need some help.”

  “Tell me more. I’m listening.”

  “I’ve never had a time in my life like this past year,” he said in a low voice.

  “It’s like a black cloud is floating over my head all the time. I’m constantly depressed. Every day is a burden. I toss and turn at night, and I don’t want to face each day. I can’t seem to shake this feeling of hopelessness.”

  “Things seem pretty bad all the way around,” I said, stating the obvious, hoping he would say more about what was bothering him.

  “Yeah, everything seems pretty bleak. I thought something might be wrong with me physically, so I had our family doctor give me the once-over. He couldn’t find anything wrong with me. No symptoms. No headaches or stomach cramps or fevers. He thought it was stress. He talked me into trying to rest more often and get some exercise. It didn’t help, though. I’m still walking around like a zombie. I went back to see him again. I asked him for some sleeping pills, but he said I needed something else. He said I needed to talk to a guy like you. You know . . . a . . . a . . .”

  “A listener?” I suggested.

  Bill grinned ever so slightly. “Yeah, a listener.”

  “Well, I’m glad you decided to come. Let me ask you, was there anything that triggered all this?”

  “I don’t know,” said Bill, waving one hand limply before his face. “Just a bunch of stuff. At work . . . at home . . . it all adds up after a while.”

  “Tough times at work, you say?”

  “Aw, yeah, work has been a real bummer since we lost a government bid back in February. It was my project all the way. I had every angle figured. Our plans were the best. Our prices were the lowest. Our guarantees were the most dependable. Anyone with half an ounce of sense would have seen in an instant that our company should have been awarded that contract.”

  “But . . . ?”

  “But we didn’t get it. Our main competitor did, although I have no idea why. I did my best, but we lost. And losing that contract meant losing millions of dollars and years of steady work for everyone in the company! Nobody said anything, but I had this feeling that everybody felt that it was my fault, that I had blown it somehow and now everyone else was going to suffer because of my failure. I could feel their eyes on me when I went to work each day.”

  �
��Losing the contract was a big disappointment for you and your company.

  I take it that this isn’t the first big contract that your company has lost out on.”

  “No, no, that’s true. But it came at a time when I needed something positive in my life. I didn’t need any new troubles. My son—the middle one—was having trouble in school. He’s the sweetest kid you’ve ever met, but he just can’t read very well. They worked with him all through last school year, but it was slow going. He just couldn’t keep up with the other kids his age.”

  Bill stood up and walked to the window, blinking back tears in an effort to appear strong. I gave him a moment of silence as he collected himself and recalled events from the previous year.

  “They told us before last year to hold our son back a grade,” Bill continued, “but I resisted it. I should have listened. Midway through the school year he was way behind the other students in everything except math and physical education. My wife and I told the teacher to help him as much as she could and we’d let him repeat that grade this year.”

  “You felt bad about that, didn’t you?”

  Bill nodded. “It tore my heart right out of me. The kid tried so hard, but there I was breaking the news to him that he’d be in that same grade again this year,” he replied, tears again welling up in his eyes.

  “It was almost as if you had failed that grade along with your son, wasn’t it?”

  “I failed him, that’s for sure. And it came when I failed the company too.”

  “The double whammy,” I said, trying to console him.

  Bill smirked, turned from the window, and moved back to his chair. “The triple whammy. My wife and I started having some marital problems about then. She started in again with this ‘thing’ she’s always had about wanting to buy her dream home. Well, that dream home has a nightmare price tag. I put my foot in my mouth when I promised her we could buy it. I got her hopes up.”

  “That was back when you were certain your company was going to land the big government contract,” I surmised.

  “Yeah. And that would have meant a big bonus for me and probably a raise too. We could have handled the new mortgage payments with that kind of money. But when the bonus and raise didn’t materialize, my wife still wanted the new house. She told all her friends we were going to build it.”

  “I assume you and your wife have discussed your financial situation?”

  “Hey, I tried. Believe me, I tried. But she wasn’t in a very receptive mood . . . and that’s putting it mildly. I may have to go ahead and buy that new house if she keeps on like this. It doesn’t look like I’ve got any other choice if I ever want any peace with her again. How I’ll pay for it is anybody’s guess, though. It’s crazy. My whole life is crazy. Maybe I’m crazy. What do you think? Am I nuts or what?”

  I smiled reassuringly. “No, Bill, you’re not crazy, just hurting and confused. You’re hurting over some painful situations that would be tough for anyone to deal with. Also, you’re confused about the truth of your situation.”

  Bill’s head jerked up. His eyes narrowed as if I had just called him a liar. “Hey, I’m not making any of this stuff up. What I told you is true!”

  “Bill, I believe you’re telling me the truth as best you understand it,” I suggested, “but there’s a lot more truth to your circumstances than you realize. Have you ever heard the expression, ‘You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free’?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, in our work together, I hope to show you just how true that statement is. Knowing the truth and being set free by it are what counseling is really all about. Here in this office, you and I are going to play our own version of ‘To Tell the Truth.’ We are going to find out the real truth about the situations troubling you. Are you willing to try?”

  Bill looked a little dubious, and he shrugged his shoulders.

  “Look,” he finally agreed, “I’m open to anything if it will help.”

  “All right, Bill, let’s look at the truth of the situation with your son,” I began. “Why wouldn’t you let him be held back last year when his teacher suggested it?”

  “Because I was stupid,” said Bill. “I should have listened to the teacher and trusted her suggestion.”

  I shook my head. “No, you didn’t make that decision because you were stupid, Bill. The truth is, you aren’t stupid. I’ll ask you again: Why wouldn’t you let your son be held back last year?”

  Bill look full-faced at me, blinked a few times, then stammered, “Because . . . because I hoped my son would do better without having to face the pain and embarrassment of being held back. I didn’t want the other kids to make fun of him as if he were stupid. I kept hoping for some kind of a miracle where he’d wake up one morning and just start to do better.”

  “And now? Why are you willing to let him be held back now?”

  “Because it’s best for him. I can see that now. He was in over his head, and he always will be unless we can do something now to help him out. As painful as it will be for him, keeping him back a year will help him learn to read better and catch up on what he has already missed.”

  I nodded my head in agreement.

  “You’re a good father, Bill. Better than you realize. You let your pain for your son get in the way of doing what was best for him at first, but you saw your mistake and corrected it. You saw the truth that the only way your son would really learn to read was through the pain of repeating the same grade. While it hurt to admit it to yourself, you faced the truth ‘there is no gain without pain.’ Seeing that truth helped free you up to do what was right for your son. But you seem to be missing an important truth that might help you out a little.”

  “You’ve got my attention. What truth am I missing?” he asked.

  “One you have heard a thousand times before but seem to have quit applying to yourself, that ‘to err is human.’ As trite as that may sound, it is one of the truths you need the most right now. You aren’t cutting yourself much slack about what you did regarding your son or what happened at work with the contract not coming through, and you are feeling like a failure as a father and a worker when you are actually pretty good at both.”

  Bill slowly sat back in his chair. He massaged his face with his hands, then relaxed his shoulders. I could hear a soft sigh ease out of him.

  “I see what you are after. I really don’t allow myself to make mistakes with my kids or at work, either. I guess I have forgotten that making mistakes is pretty normal.”

  “It’s a truth that’s easy to forget, but it’s emotionally deadly when we do. Truths such as ‘to err is human’ and ‘there is no gain without pain’ are the building blocks of emotional health. If we get away from them, we emotionally suffer in ways that could have been avoided. The suffering you have been experiencing isn’t so much tied to your son’s reading problems or the job setback or the struggles with your wife as it is tied to your having gotten away from these and other basic truths.”

  “That sheds a new light on things. When you mentioned that the truth sets people free, I guess I kind of blew that off as one of those platitudes that counselors say that doesn’t mean much. But it really is true. How about some more?”

  “Sure. Let’s look at that situation with your wife and the new house. You said you don’t feel that you have any choice in the matter, that you have to buy the house whether you can afford it or not.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Well, what about that? Is that really the truth? Do you have to buy the house? Can your wife force you to buy that new home?”

  “Well . . . not literally force . . . that is, she can’t actually make me sign the . . . what I mean is . . . uh . . .”

  “What you are saying is that you do have a choice,” I injected, pushing him to confront the situation squarely. “No one—not even your wife—can force you to do something you know is careless and irresponsible. Isn’t that true?”

  Bill’s forehead furrowed in thought.
He turned serious.

  “Yeah,” he agreed. “Well, of course, I have a choice.” He paused, then added, “I don’t have to buy the house my wife wants. I guess I tell myself I have to and end up feeling trapped by that. Maybe I trap myself.”

  “I think that’s right. We often tell ourselves, ‘I have to do this’ and ‘I have to do that,’ only to feel trapped. We end up doing things that we either don’t want to do or know to be wrong to do, or both. In a very real way, we trap ourselves with a have to mind-set when the real truth is that we don’t have to do anything we don’t believe is right to do. You and your wife have a tough decision to make together regarding whether or not to buy a new home, but it is important for you to realize that you don’t have to buy one. That truth may free you to pursue what you feel is wisest rather than give in to keep her pacified and then resent the whole thing once it’s finished.”

  “This truth stuff is starting to make some sense,” Bill admitted. “I guess I didn’t realize that I had gotten so far off in my thinking about all these things. I can see how some of the emotional strain I have been under is related to all this. I have a feeling, though, that there are some things about truth you haven’t told me yet.”

  Bill was right. There are certain realities about truth—the truth about the truth—we hadn’t discussed yet. For any of us to become whole people, we must understand certain things about the nature of truth. We need to know what we are getting into before we start. Failure to understand the truth about the truth sets the stage for disappointment and failure in our quest for healthy lives.

  “Yes, there is a lot more about truth that we haven’t even scratched the surface of yet. Where do you want to start? What about the truth do you want to know?” I asked.

  The Truth Comes Piece by Piece

  “Why does the truth sometimes seem so unclear? Why can’t I just ‘get it’—see the whole truth about a given situation all at once?” Bill responded.