Calling Out The Lies

Calling Out the Lies

Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings.

In a late-night email, she poured out her thoughts over a situation—thoughts of self-doubt, recrimination, and accepting blame that, quite frankly, was not hers to accept. It involved complex family dynamics that had her feeling defeated and at fault for things beyond her control. As I read her words early the next morning, indignation rose up within me for the lies she was believing.

I picked up the phone, catching my friend on the way to work, and gently but clearly started dismantling the lies. I picked them apart, one by one, and, because I know my friend well—both her strengths and her weaknesses—and am familiar with the ongoing saga, I was able to point her to the truth in the situation, giving her the freedom to rethink some of her destructive thoughts through the lens of Scripture and Christ’s grace.

Satan’s lies are the most difficult to detect when they are mixed with a grain of truth, and I’m convinced that those truth-lie hybrids are his terrible specialty. Sometimes, we are so close to a situation that we need a spiritual sister to come alongside us in objective observation. We need someone who knows the truth of Scripture so well that she can sift the lies of Satan, gently holding us accountable for the grain of truth while absolving us from his poison. These loyal friends are our true sisters in times of need.

As desperately as we need such friends in our lives, we should be this kind of friend in the lives of women around us. We should be women who are constantly listening for those lies to be revealed in conversations with our friends, ready to spend time and energy to be God’s truth tellers cloaked in grace and love.

— Julie

— Today’s Act of Friendship —

Look for ways to gently and compassionately call out the lies the women around you are believing. Ask God if there is someone in your life believing a truth-lie hybrid that needs to be addressed, and then invite her out for coffee and a long chat.