Friday, November 19, 2010

Is It The Truth?

The first mate on a ship decided to celebrate an occasion with a "little" stowed away rum. Unfortunately, he got drunk and was still drunk the next morning.

The captain saw him drunk and when the first mate was sober, showed him the following entry in the ship's log: "The first mate was drunk today."

"Captain, please don't let that stay in the log," the mate said. "This could add months or years to my becoming a captain myself."

"Is what I wrote true?" asked the captain, already knowing the answer.

"Yes, it's true." the mate said.

"Then if it is true it has to go in the log. That's the rule. If it's true, it goes into the log, end of discussion," said the captain sternly.

Weeks later, it was the first mate's turn to make the log entries. So the first mate wrote: "The ship seems in good shape. The Captain was sober today."

Jokes aside, people can make things say or appear to be whatever they want them to say or be. The reality is that we see things not the way they are but the way we are. And the more untruthful (dishonest) we are with ourselves, the more we will distort all other truth, including God's truth, to make it match our perception of reality and to have it say what we want it to say. In other words we exchange the truth for a lie.

Not all, but many politicians are masters of deceit. They pull things out of context and twist them to appear what they are not. They make promises they cannot keep. They accuse political opponents of not fixing problems that they themselves have no way of fixing—all to gain votes. Far too many politicians have become unbelievable. What we need today, as another has said, are statesmen, not politicians.

Only the truth will ever set us free.

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