Believing the Lie

All our lives people tell us things. Some things are the truth, and some things are lies.

You're stupid, you're an idiot! How dumb can you be, you failure.

We hear those things from people. Sometimes these people are close to us, our parents and siblings, and friends.

We grow up a bit and society says to us you're fat, you're poor, or you're ugly. You dress lousy, you have no taste, you're a loser.

We age some more and the boss tells us we're no good at what we do. Our parents remind us we are not amounting to anything, and we can't get a date to save our soul. Literally.

When is it exactly that we start to believe the lies we hear. When is it that we give credence to the voices that have found their way inside our heads. When do we give them power over us?

When we were five and that man touched me "There?"

When our dad said "Why aren't you more like your older brother?"

When no one would take us to the "Prom?"

When we couldn't loose that extra weight?

When?

It's easy to understand that when you start to believe the lies you hear about yourself, you withdraw from the world around you. After all, it hurts out there. And at the exact time they need people to speak the truth into their lives, they remove themselves from public access. There can be no loveable thing within them.

Their heart is already safely cut off from others, and they withdraw into a dark downward spiral which confirms all the lies they ever heard about themselves.

They end up alone, hurting, living the lies they believe.

Once and a while, if they are able, they will screw up their courage and stick their heads up out of the darkness. But what they are projecting is not themselves, it's an image of what they want us to see. A safety mask. And you never know who they really are, because in believing the lie, they don't have a clue who they are any more either.

They are broken people.

They end up alone, or living on the street. Some are diagnosed as having personality disorders, but really they are just people who believed the lie, and having believed it, they broke.

Take a friendly reminder from a pastor. Watch what you believe about yourselves. And watch what you say about others. And don't withdraw, but get involved in community.

(This public service announcement brought to you by one pastor who sees far too many people who have been broken.)