Truth Telling

Hello friends, Dick Foth here, with stories to make sense of it all. And in the reading of the book that Ruth and I wrote some years back, we're in chapter 17 called Truth Telling. This is how it begins. To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, if you hold to my teaching, you're really my disciples. Then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. That's what my gospel of John. As the old contractor surveyed the interior wall, one of our maintenance fellows asked, say, anything we can do to help, a load-bearing wall in the dining commons of the college, where I was for a number of years, had been rebuilt during a renovation. We were trying to save money by using our regular maintenance crew. The guys were tremendous, hard-working, generalist, but not professional drywall installers. The 20-foot high interior wall surface looked rather shall we say, wavy. The seams were obvious, it was time for help from the outside pros. With a grin, the contractor said, no, I believe you fellows have helped me about as much as I can stand over the next week, he and his crew made things right. In construction, builders use a plumb line and a measuring tape to help get things right, but getting it right means executing things based on correct information. The plumb line provides vertical accuracy, and the measuring tape tells us precise length. Without the plumb line and the measuring tape, designing and building would be guesswork. Measure twice cut once is the rule of thumb and carpentry. Precision is the name of the game in accuracy and laying out a foundation or the distance between joints or the size of a window opening, it's critical to both the stability of a structure and its aesthetics. The plumb line allows for accurate vertical relationship to be established for the construction of the building, and building your eyes can play tricks on you, depending on the relative rise and fall of the surrounding terrain, what looks correct, may not be so at all. That's just like building a relationship, being able to read where a relationship is in its growth trajectory can fool us too, can it? First built on partial information and inaccurate assessment are no relationships at all. That's why conversations are so critical. The helpless measure where we are, how we're doing, without chats like that, we are left to guess what's up. In my experience, guessing goes more wrong than right. Quality investment of time and energy is critical to the outcome, and there are no shortcuts. I have an nephew in the trades, a few years back while he and his cousin were building some bookcases in my home study, we were talking about the cost and time when he said Uncle Dick, we have a saying in construction, fast, cheap, and good, pick any two. If it's fast and good, it won't be cheap, if it's cheap and good, it won't be fast, and if it's fast and cheap, it won't be good. If you put, if you want your relationship to be good, it won't be fast and it won't be cheap. Lots of conversations and time spent together will be required to get the right orientation and assessments. Bill Bryson, an expatriate American living in the Midlands of England, wrote a wonderful book titled, At Home. It's a pretty thick tome, this is both just parenthetically talking here, but it's a fascinating thing about building in homes and structures. It's a history of housing, it covers everything from huts to Prince Albert Hall in England. He goes into great detail to describe the evolution of indoor kitchens, toilets, the upstairs and downstairs of well-th English homes, and the advent of hallways and porches. We won't go that far, but let's just consider how the building of a relationship is much like the construction of a house. The way the house is oriented is critical, which way the house faces how the structure catches the sun, from which direction the prevailing winds blow and the stability of this soil all need to be studied. A house can take a thousand different shapes, can it? The desires of the owners and the capacities of the builders all come into play in the process of drafting architectural plans. Once the style and orientation on the property are decided and construction starts, nothing is more critical than the exactness with which the foundation is laid out. If a measurement goes wrong there, the whole structure is affected. Making the foundation right makes all the difference. Truth is the foundation for any friendship. When you know the truth of my history, it helps to frame our unique friendship. All along the way as commitment grows, healthy adjustments are dependent on our telling each other what is accurate to the best of our understanding. If time and tenacity are the tracks on which covenant runs, truth is the locomotive. Truths allow truth to be told. If I believe you will not run away, that you will not bail on me, I can afford to tell you the truth. If I think the truth will cause you to run, I cannot afford that. I'll hold back. But truth is more than simple facts. Truth defines what is real. Relationships are not courtroom trials and shouting is not the order of the day. But truth simply shared is the basis for all friendships. The truth is expressed at three levels. The truth about what I know, the truth about what I think, and the truth about what I feel. In a friendship, all three levels are needed to have the complete picture. So how does that kind of truth telling work? We see how it works in the Garden of Gisemini with a crucifixion looming when Jesus talks to his father, his closest relationship. He went to a place called Gisemini, and Jesus said to his disciples, sit here, while I pray. He took Peter, James, and John along with him, and he began to be deeply distressed and troubled. My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death, he said to them, stay here and keep watch. Going a little farther, he fell to the ground, prayed that if possible, the hour might pass from him. Of a father, he said, everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me, yet not what I will, but what you will. Conversations that tell the truth about what I know, think, and feel are what I will. Conversations that tell the truth about what I know, think, and feel are covenant conversations. I don't naturally talk that way, I have to admit. But I continue to learn how to, it's the plumbline ruler effect at work. That type of conversation gives us an accurate understanding of where we are and often where we need to be. I've had hundreds of chats with Ruth over our 50-some years together. When I've heard her say something like this, Dick, I know you think you have to take responsibility for all those matters, but I think you're spreading yourself way too thin. When I keep bringing the subject up, it feels like you just blocked me out. It makes me feel that you don't value what I say to you. When you add a natural difference in how men and women talk to each other, things can get dicey. I'll pause there just for you to cogitate on that for a few moments and replay a few conversation you guys have had. Going on, we've observed over the years that men are often quick to say what they think and women are much better at saying what they feel. But when time is taken to explore what both parties know, feel and think, we make progress. Doing this way telegraphs a desire to understand the other person and not to rely on assumptions. Relying on assumptions is futile. And we deceive ourselves when we assume. We don't value the other person when we assume. And in the end, assumptions simply settles for less. We owe ourselves more than that. Many years after I left the presidency of Bethany College, I received a letter from a former colleague. It was a cordial but straightforward letter. In short, he recounted a shift in administrative staffing that I had made during our mutual tenures of the school that resulted in a de facto demotion for him. I scrambled a bit, actually, to remember the circumstances, but I finally did. And the substance of his note said, I know you didn't make the change out of malice. I think you were under great pressure and made a decision you thought was right at the moment, but what I felt was a great devaluing of me. I've held that feeling over these years and I want to let it go. I responded in gratitude. What courage and grace it took for him to write that note. I already respected him, but he rose in my estimation as I read that letter. He embodied kingdom-thinking when he stayed the course and he spoke the truth. To this day, we are friends. David Benner caught the broad sweep of truth-telling and covenant when he said, in caring for me, my friends support my emotional, spiritual, intellectual, and physical development. They do not want me to stay as I am, rather they seek my growth. They want me to become all I can be. By daring to be honest with us, friends offer us invaluable opportunities for growth. They can help us penetrate our self-deceptions and cherished delusions. Tenacity and truth-telling are the great catalyst for success in friendship. Tenacity says, I'll never say quit. Truth-telling says, I'll not settle for less. When those things meet, covenant blooms. And when covenant blooms, everyone wins. Well, I'm out. This is a shorter, little broadcast, but sometimes you eat shorter. Except got lots of words, and they don't always correlate with deep truths or great ideas. So God bless, thanks for being with us, we'll catch you later. Bye-bye.