Faithbase

There's an old Yiddish proverb that I love that says a half-truth is a whole lie. Honesty. There is nothing more difficult for me to talk about in this conversation with you, the lovely, lovely viewer, than this idea of what it means to truly be honest. Matthew 5, 37 talks about this idea of letting our yes be yes and no be no. And there's much dispute kind of around this and it's a deeper meaning. But on a basic level, right, on a surface level understanding, it basically means that when you tell someone you're gonna do something, you should do it, right? Your word should be as good as a deed as if it's already done. That can be such a difficult thing for us to understand as people because we are so into this idea of like half-commitment, right? So here's a good example. I will make plans with someone when I'm in a really good mood, right? My day is going really great. Somebody will text me and ask me to hang out. I'll be like, yeah, like we should do that. Let's put that on the calendar for next week, whatever day. And then next week, whatever day shows up and I am doing everything I can to think of a reason to get out of it because I just for whatever reason don't want to hang out anymore. And it's not because I don't like people. It's not because I'm a flake. Maybe because I'm a flake. But like largely I just find myself feeling like I want to remove myself from that situation. And so what I've learned, especially after getting married, is there's so much value in just saying, whatever, you know, you're gonna agree to, you're just gonna do it no matter what. And as that makes you a better person in your relationships with people, you become interested to find out, for me at least, that you like being around yourself more, right? When I tell someone that I'm gonna do something, I just know that I'm gonna follow through and do it. And this is still something that I work on. And so I would actually like to make you a challenge this week that you would just spend one day of the next seven looking at doing just everything you can to be completely honest in every way, in every conversation for a 24-hour period and just see what that would be like. And this is not to say that you are gonna be mean to someone. So if you get the, you know, obligatory question of, do I look fat in this dress? This isn't like a time for you to tee off on someone and call them, you know, fat or hideous or whatever, or anything like that. But the idea is like, how do you be honest in love to people? Because the only way we grow, the only way we get better, the only way we can understand, you know, life better and get deeper in our relationships with each other is by being willing to be honest. Now, there's an interesting component of honesty, which is vulnerability. You have to be willing to kind of show your cards first before you can expect that of other people. But it breeds genuine relationships. It breeds depth. It breeds honesty. It even breeds community. It breeds goodness and all of those things in us. If you want to talk about this more, feel free to hit me up on Instagram at Joshua underscore Carmen or leave a comment. I would love to connect with you. Thanks so much and good luck being honest this week.