The Lies

I was never a good liar, which was probably a good thing for me looking back, but when I was in the moment of lying it wasn't so good in my view. I would stand with my fingers crossed behind my back and think that would cure everything and I would be able to get away with the white lie that was being planned in my head and would soon come out of my mouth. I would, inevitably, begin to smile or laugh when I was younger and as I got older that trait turned to dismay and anger, offense that the person I was lying to would call me a liar; even tho it was true. Lies would be part of me in many fashions - words, actions, in my mind when I was thinking about something-literally anything- and they would play out in my real life. Why? Well because, I think, like most people (not all) I believed that I was due something that I didn't get. What? I have no idea but I truly believe that was the reason for my continual, habitual lying when I was another person. That part of my life, in the recent past, has changed, thankfully (and on a side note aren't you, my friends and family, thankful too). But just in the past week, I heard a song that the lyrics, the chorus, says "I love the way you lie". If you haven't heard it its an Eminem with Rhianna song, word of warning if you want to hear it, you can go to youtube and watch the video its very good but the lyrics from Eminem are filled with 'f-bombs' (I think actually 3) and some other colorful language. But the song, after looking up the words and watching the video and researching where the song came frome, is at its core about physical abuse. Mostly a song that Eminem wrote about his marriage with his ex-wife Kim and their elongated, abusive relationship, and how, after several times of trying to make it work without abuse in that relationship, he (and I undestand Kim too) would lie to the other about no more abuse the next time. The song is very pointed to this type of relationship. For those of you wondering, no I'm not in an abusive relationship or a bad relationship...thought I should clear that up.

So why this song? Why this title? Well, I know the lyrics but this morning, get this, during my devotionals, this song came to mind, actually the chorus came to mind. I am, to some degree still lying...to myself. This song is about abuse and lying, and it held a different meaning to me. It is, in essence the lying of me to me. When the words "i love the way you lie" come to mind, I think of the perverbial abused woman who continually returns to the abuser. When I heard these words this morning, playing on in my head, I thought of the internal me, the one that lies to me about who I am, what is happening around me, why things are the way they are, and in essense I listen to that inner me...loving the way it lies to me. David wrote about lies he believed in Psalms, if you read it David goes from joy to fear to anger to happiness to distress to relief and on and on. In Psl 41 David says "I have waited patiently for the Lord, he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire, he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand." This wasn't always David's prayer or words; throughout his time of being 'on the run'-so to speak- David finds himselft in a lot of places where he doesn't believe that God is listening or working for his good. I bet David, during these times, was living in the lies he heard from his inner self and those who told him of rumors from afar by his enemy. This passage is a promise from God to David, one that I have found in the past few weeks or month, and I wonder if it is real, wonder if it is true. I believe that in the midst of David's struggles and distress, when he would hear a blessing or promise, he believed it without haste. I also believe David went thru, after this promise, many different emotions and anguish during his trials, so the inner lies did not stop or cease during the small flashes of promises.

I'm still living in the lies, even tho they don't come out of my mouth, they still are part of my life. They live in the inner me telling me the things that I don't want to believe but love to hear, they take over when I struggle to shut the voice up, and they continue even in moments of living in a promise. I don't think this is bad, I think it is where I'm at right now, walking thru durations of lies with moments of promises that don't last long. But in the midst of the durations, somewhere in the middle of the lies that I love to hear, I know that the promise of being lifted out of the "slimy pit" "mud" and "mire" is true, even tho the lies out wiegh the fleeting moments of promises, the promise is still there.