My Little Lies and My Big Truths

On Friday night, Joel and I watched a movie called "The Invention of Lying." I was not impressed overall with the movie and really would not recommend it. That aside, it provoked a few thoughts for me.

The story follows the life of a man in a world where nobody has ever learned how to lie. Everyone only tells the truth and cannot even fathom doing otherwise, until this man stumbles upon lying. He is the only one in his world who learns to lie and so the story follows his life having this "advantage" over others.

This movie got me thinking about how often we lie in everyday life, so much so that it seems almost ingrained into our culture. In my own life I realized how often these lies come through without a second thought. How many times have these words left my lips in the form of a lie? "I'm fine thank you." "You look great!" "I understand." "That's ok." Even, "I'm Sorry." -- Yikes! When I stop to think about it I'm very guilty of not speaking the truth.  These lies have become almost necessary in life to get by and seem normal, and polite.  Our society is accustomed to both speaking and hearing these on a day to day basis.  I guess it made me stop and think that I need to hold myself more accountable for the things that come out of my mouth.  This doesn't mean I'm going to tell the polite cashier all my woes in the grocery lineup just because she asked me how I am doing today.  Really, it needs to balanced with a sense of propriety, but maybe I could be more careful about how I answer people.  There is the old saying we are taught as little children, "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all."  Maybe I can try to remember that balanced with "If you can't say anything TRUE don't say anything at all."  Just something to think about I guess.

This part of the movie was good and thought provoking I guess.  The movie became offensive to me in the second half.  You see, this man who is able to lie starts telling people that there is life after death.  He tells people that there is a "man in the sky who is in charge of the world." He tells people that there is a moral code that we must live by. The movie goes on and on implying that everything that we believe as Christians is a lie.  It implies that our belief in God (at least in a God who we can relate to personally), our belief in heaven and hell,  etc. are just lies that we believe to make us feel better -- that it all really does not exist.

I guess offensive is not really the right word.  There were parts that were downright offensive, but mostly I was not really offended, nor surprised, just disappointed, and a bit disgusted.  I actually found some irony in it all.  Christianity is shown as a series of lies that people use to make themselves feel better, or to explain things they otherwise could not explain.  In reality, that is the lie that people believe because it is more comfortable to them then to come to terms with the truth.  It is more comfortable to believe the lie that there is no hell, then to believe that it does exist and that people will go there.  It is more comfortable to believe the lie that there is no God and continue on living life the way you want, rather than to believe in a God that is too big for us to fully understand sometimes, and to change and live our lives for something bigger than ourselves.

In a way, the movie exposed some of the lies that people commonly believe. For example, that "good people" go to heaven and "bad people" go to hell.  This of course begs the question of "how good do you have to be to get to heaven?" In reality we are all bad people who need forgiveness and God in his mercy made a way through Jesus, for us to be forgiven and to be in communion with Him in this life and in heaven for eternity.

I guess it all boils down to being comfortable.  It is more comfortable to lie and believe lies than it is to tell and believe the truth, but is it worth it in the end?


So, as much as I did not like this movie, at least it caused me to thing and examine some things.
Well... I guess that's all for now folks!



Love,

M

My Birthday Blog

Today is my birthday. An ordinary day of sorts, especially since this year we are celebrating my birthday on another day (tomorrow actually). I cooked and cleaned and mommied as usual today and was again reminded of how ordinary Birthdays have become for me in some ways. When I was a little girl, I remember looking forward to my birthday for weeks and how the whole day had a special magic about it. When I awoke this morning, it was my husband who first reminded me of my Birthday, and I have since forgotten several times throughout the day. My birthday is still special and I am increasingly content to just share time with my family (not that I mind getting spoiled now and then too).
This year though, I found myself reflecting a lot on my life. There is no denying that I am now officially in my late twenties -- 28 is 2 years from thirty, which seemed so old when I was young, but now feels so ordinary. I have never felt like a real adult, more like an imposter. Maybe this comes from being the youngest of 4 children so I was always trying to act like I was grown up, so now that I have grown up it just kinda snuck up on me :S

... This blog got interrupted and now the thought line is gone. Prehaps I will revisit this at a later time... sorry.

P.S. My Birthday was earlier this week, not today when this was published :)