Lies – Candle in a Cave

26 October 2025

Sermon: Proper 25 RCL C – “Truthfulness”

On a Sunday afternoon, an elderly man sat on the back porch of the parsonage, talking to the young priest, and said, “Father, I’ve got something to tell you. I’ve never told this to a soul; it’s extremely difficult to tell you now, but my wife and I have had a fight almost every day for the past 30 years of our marriage.”

The priest was surprised and looked away. He nervously sipped his coffee, unsure of what to say. The young priest asked, “Every day?” “Yes, just about every day.” “Did you fight today before coming to church?” “Yes.” “How did it end?” “She came crawling to me on her hands and knees.” “My goodness, what did she say?” “Come out from under that bed, you coward, and fight like a man!”

Jesus tells a parable about two men who “went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.” The Pharisee was very knowledgeable about God’s teachings. The tax collector, not so much. Plus, the tax collector was generally seen as a plague on society. So, after their prayer, you might think the Pharisee would be the one justified before God, but that’s not the case. When he prays, he believes he knows the mind of God, how things work—he’s not just on the team, he’s the star quarterback, so he is all puffed up. When he prays, he says to God, “You know me and I know you. We’re tight, and thank heaven I’m not like that poor schmuck over there. You and me, we’re good.” He sees himself as a righteous dude because he thinks God views him as a righteous dude.

On the other hand, the tax collector could not even look up toward heaven when he prayed. In the temple, he stayed as far away as possible, keeping his head bowed. He didn’t consider himself worthy, so he prayed, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” And Jesus said, “I tell you, this man went down to his home justified rather than the other; for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted.”

What was the key difference between the two? If I had to pick one word, I would say truthfulness — not with the world around them or even with God, but truthfulness with themselves.

In The Brothers Karamazov, Fyodor Dostoevsky writes, “And, above all—don’t lie… Above all, don’t lie to yourself. The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to such a pass that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others.”

The tax collector, despite feeling miserable about himself and his sins, was at least honest with himself. He had no illusions about being a good man, so instead of trying to justify himself before God, he cast his soul on God’s mercy. He prayed, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.”

As for the Pharisee, he couldn’t see past his own self-deception to repent for any wrongdoing. He stood before God, having lied to himself so completely that, in Dostoevsky’s words, he could not “distinguish the truth within him, or around him.”

Unfortunately, I believe that more people are like the Pharisee than the tax collector. They deceive themselves into thinking they are justified and righteous before God. Why? Several reasons come to mind.

First, looking inward and facing the truth about ourselves can sometimes be quite painful. For example, if you have a long work history, jumping from one job to another, it’s easy to blame others. “Well, the boss didn’t like me.” “At this job, they didn’t appreciate me.” “There, the employees were always after me.” Each of those statements could be true and reason enough to leave, but if you are honest with yourself and those circumstances, you might ask, “What is the common denominator? What do each of those positions have in common?” The answer: you. That doesn’t mean you were the problem, but it’s a question you need to ask. If, in asking that question honestly and realizing it was you, well, that can be a painful revelation, and we don’t like pain—whether physical, emotional, or spiritual—which leads to another reason for self-deception: fear of change.

In those jobs you held, you were honest with yourself, you discovered that you were the one who was the issue, and even though it was a painful revelation, you still must make a choice. Will you remain the same, or will you work to change and improve yourself? Everyone talks about how change is a good thing, and I believe that it is, right up to the point where I’m the one who has to do the changing; then change is very, very bad.

If we choose to overcome the pain and change, we must also face another part of being honest with ourselves—letting others see and understand who we truly are and that we were wrong. Oh, the humanity! Pride is a harmful trait.

In the end, if we overcome these and other fears of being truthful with ourselves and with God, I believe there is one more reason why we will continue to deceive ourselves: we don’t believe we have the capacity or the tools to do anything about it. We say, “I am who I am, and there’s nothing to be done about it in Heaven or on Earth.” O woe is me, but that is just another lie we tell ourselves so we don’t have to do the work.

The Psalms we read on Sundays are usually very pleasant and easily consumed. From the Psalm today, praising the Lord.

“Happy are they who dwell in your house! they will always be praising you.”

However, if you explore the Psalms beyond our Sunday readings, you will notice there is quite a focus on enemies. Take Psalm 63, for example. When we read it, we see verses one through eight. It begins,

“O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you;
my soul thirsts for you;
my flesh faints for you,
as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.”

Nice and comforting, but when we only read verses one through eight, we never get to verses nine and ten.

“But those who seek to destroy my life
shall go down into the depths of the earth;
they shall be given over to the power of the sword;
they shall be a portion for jackals.”

Hoorah! But who are these enemies that seek my life? Who is it that will be put down by the sword and fed to jackals?

Some may have a person or group they consider an “enemy” (I would suggest you rethink that), but what if, instead of a person or group, we interpret the enemies in Psalms as the self-deceptions and sins within us? What if we see the enemies as those parts of our lives that we need to rid ourselves of, to fight so that we can conquer, in order that we might change and be transformed into the image of God? What if we say we must defeat the pain and fear of change and put the pride under our feet? Think about these ideas and consider them in the context of a portion of Psalm 118.

For who is God, but the Lord?…
He trains my hands for war,
so that my arms can bend a bow of bronze.
You have given me the shield of your salvation,
and your right hand supported me,
and your gentleness made me great.
You gave a wide place for my steps under me,
and my feet did not slip.
I pursued my enemies
—I pursued my sin and self-deception—
and overtook them,
and did not turn back till they were consumed.
I am running a few minutes late; my previous meeting is running over.
I thrust them through, so that they were not able to rise;
they fell under my feet.
For you equipped me with strength for the battle;
you made those who rise against me
—those enemies within—
sink under me.
You made my enemies turn their backs to me,
and those who hated me I destroyed.
They cried for help, but there was none to save;
they cried to the Lord, but he did not answer them.
I beat them fine as dust before the wind;
I cast them out like the mire of the streets.

What if, like the Psalmist, when our enemies come against us, we don’t crawl under the bed, but instead say, “Bring it!”—trusting completely in the words of the Lord, “No weapon that is fashioned against you shall succeed” (Isaiah 54:17a).

If we will, then we know that we can and must stand against the enemies and self-deception, so that when we come before the Lord, we don’t pretend as though nothing is wrong. We don’t stand there like a Pharisee saying, “Oh, look how perfect I am,” but instead, we are in a place where we can humbly pray, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” And in doing so, like the tax collector, be justified, be made right before the Lord. Jesus said, “All who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted.

In his first epistle, the Apostle John wrote, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:8-9).” If we will humble ourselves by being truthful with ourselves and with God, then we will be justified in God’s eyes.

Let us pray: God, the author of peace and lover of concord, to know you is eternal life and to serve you is perfect freedom: Defend us, your humble servants, in all assaults of our enemies; that we, surely trusting in your defense, may not fear the power of any adversaries; through the might of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

29 June 2023

Sermon: Proper 8 RCL A – “False Prophets”

Boudreaux dies and arrives at the Gates of Heaven, where he sees a huge wall of clocks behind him.

He asks St. Peter, “What are all those clocks?”

St. Peter says, “Those are Lie Clocks. Everyone on Earth has a Lie Clock. Every time you lie, the hands on your clock will move.”

“Oh,” says Boudreaux, “whose clock is that?”

“That’s Jesus’ clock,” Peter answered. “It has never moved, showing that he never told a lie.”

“Incredible,” says Boudreaux. “And whose clock is that one?”

Peter responds, “That’s Abraham Lincoln’s clock. The hands have moved twice, telling us that Abe told only two lies in his entire life.”

“So where’s my clock?” asks Boudreaux.

“Your clock is in God’s office. He uses it as a ceiling fan.”

In his book Phaedrus, Plato wrote, “An alliance with a powerful person is never safe.” The same is true with alliances between nations. The history of Israel, during the time of the prophets, makes the point.

In 609 BC, Josiah was the King of Judah (The King of the South). At that time, the Egyptians were marching north for battle with another kingdom, but Josiah decided to attack them for unknown reasons. That did not go well, and Josiah was killed in battle. Judah then became a vassal of Egypt and had to pay them a handsome tribute. Josiah’s son, Jehoahaz, ascended the throne, but Egypt didn’t like him as king, fearing that he would seek vengeance for his father, so the Egyptians removed him and installed Jehoiakim as king.

That relationship was rocky but was working as planned until along came the Babylonians, who won a decisive victory against Egypt in 605 BC. Jehoiakim, wanting to save his own backside, switched his allegiance to Babylon and paid them tribute, including some of the holy items from the Temple. As you would imagine, this did not go over well with everyone, including Prophet Jeremiah.

Jeremiah had been close to Josiah, but he saw Jehoiakim as a wicked king—which he was—and denounced him.

Although strong, the Babylonians could not fully control the Egyptians and the surrounding area. In 597 BC, thinking that the Babylonians had been so weakened that he could do as he liked, Jehoiakim stopped paying them tribute and once again allied himself with the Egyptians. But remember, “An alliance with a powerful person is never safe,” because—as you may remember from last week—there’s always someone looking to be king of the mountain.

When Jehoiakim stopped paying tribute to Nebuchadnezzar, the King of the Babylonians, returned and laid siege to Jerusalem. He conquered the city, killed Johoiakm, took some Israelites into captivity, and installed a new king. If you think Jehoiakim wasn’t all that bright, meet Zedekiah.

Like Jehoiakim, Zedekiah played along with the Babylonians, but after ten years, it became increasingly clear that he wanted to stop paying tribute. Many were with him, but others, including that nagging prophet, Jeremiah, opposed.

Jeremiah told the people that the Babylonians were essentially the hand of God, working God’s judgment against them for their sins. As a visual aid, the Lord said to Jeremiah, “Make yourself straps and yoke-bars, and put them on your neck.” (Jeremiah 27:2) The yoke said to the people, “For a time, this must be you. You must be under the yoke of the Babylonians while God exacts His punishment on you for your misdeeds.” Jeremiah said, to King Zedekiah, “Bring your necks under the yoke of the king of Babylon, and serve him and his people and live.” (Jeremiah 27:12) As hard as he tried, the king and the people opposed, and even some that claimed to be prophets were against him, one of which we heard about today, Hananiah.

Hananiah, claiming to speak for God, said, “I have broken the yoke of the king of Babylon. Within two years I will bring back to this place all the vessels of the Lord’s house, which Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, took away from this place and carried to Babylon.” (Jeremiah 28:3) Hananiah was calling the people to rebuke Nebuchadnezzar and the prophecies of Jeremiah and to believe that they would be free within two years. This is where our reading from today came in. In responding to him, Jeremiah said, “Amen! May the Lord do so; may the Lord make the words that you have prophesied come true.” Jeremiah said, “Those are nice words, and I pray they come true.” Hananiah then broke the yoke that Jeremiah had fashioned for himself and declared that the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar would be broken similarly. Jeremiah heard these things and then went his way, and the people and King Zedekiah remained in their sin. Two months later, the prophet—the false prophet—Hananiah died, and the Babylonians completely sacked Jerusalem.

Thomas Sowell is an author, economist, and social commentator.

He wrote, “When you want to help people, you tell them the truth. When you want to help yourself, you tell them what they want to hear.” (The Thomas Sowell Reader, p.398) Jeremiah was speaking the truth, but Hananiah was simply telling the people what they wanted to hear. Like ol’ Boudreaux, Hananiah had told many lies, and he paid for his sin.

Jeremiah said, “As for the prophet who prophesies peace, when the word of that prophet comes true, then it will be known that the Lord has truly sent the prophet.” The Prophet who preached peace was Jesus. St. Paul tells us in his letter to the Ephesians that Jesus “came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father.” (Ephesians 2:17-18) And the peace that Jesus was preaching was not about the peace between nations, but the everlasting peace between God and His children—between God and us.

If that were the end, then all would be well, but throughout the New Testament, we hear of those who will come and spread lies like Hananiah. In his first Epistle, St. John tells us, “Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world.” (1 John 4:1) Just so you know how bad these false prophets are, John declares they have “the spirit of the antichrist.” (1 John 4:3) St. Peter also warns us, “Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” (1 Peter 5:8) Jesus has prophesied and brought peace between God and humankind, it is ours for the asking. Still, some would seek to destroy that peace, so we must be on our guard against them. It can, however, get a little tricky. Why?

Paul wrote to Timothy, “The time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.” (2 Timothy 4:3-4) Like Hananiah, these false prophets will tell us what we want to hear instead of what we need to hear. The heart of the false message is the same as it has always been. The same as it was in the beginning when the snake—the greatest of false prophets—tempted Eve and said things like, “Did God really say…” and “You will not surely die.” The false prophet’s message is confusing, for it contains half-truths and subtle lies, but they are there, and many believe.

So there are various false prophets in the world, and there is the snake, but there is one other false prophet that runs a close second to it. My friend, Stephen King, said it best, “We lie best when we lie to ourselves.” (It, p.445)

If we pay attention and stay true to the teachings of the Gospel, then I believe we have a good chance of not falling prey to the Hananiahs of the world, but when it comes to lying to ourselves, we are experts. We know all our own arguments and weaknesses, and strategies and the Hananiah within can play us like a fiddle. St. John told us to “test the spirits to see whether they are from God,” so we must also test our own spirit and those things we believe to be true. Are we simply telling ourselves those things we want to believe, or are they consistent with the teachings of Jesus? If we are lying to ourselves, then we’ve already lost. As The Bard wrote:

“This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.”

(Hamlet, Act 1, Scene 3)

Jesus said, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” (John 8:31-32) You are Jesus’ disciples. Do not listen to or tolerate the lies from outside yourself or from within, but seek to discern the truth.

Let us pray: O Mary, Mother of Mercy, watch over all people that the Cross of Christ may not be emptied of its power, that humankind may not stray from the path of the good or become blind to sin, but may put their hope ever more fully in God who is “rich in mercy.” May we carry out the good works prepared by God beforehand and so live completely “for the praise of his glory.” Amen.

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