Please - Kill the Liar! Part II

I have been needing to write this for weeks but have not been able to. Every time I think of sitting down to begin, I shrink back and put it off another week. 


Why is this so difficult for me?


Because I am a liar.
Confessing this makes me feel very vulnerable, and I am afraid. 

Now don't get me wrong: I'm honest most of the time. I don't tell tall tales or excessively embellish my stories. I answer questions with the truth as I know it and don't tell people I do not know something that I actually know...but I might tell them I don't know even though I have a pretty good suspicion.



When I was young I was spanked for lying more often than for anything else - usually the scenario went something like this: 
       "Alice, did you get into that canteloupe?"
       "What do you mean?"
       "There's a hole poked in the side of the canteloupe. Do you know how it got there?"
       "...mmm...Nooo...I don't know how that got there....That's strange."


My parents could usually see right through me, of course, and I was punished for my untruths.


As I got older, I became better at owning up to my mistakes, but still, if the situation seemed particularly embarrassing or shameful I would hesitate to confess. When I was young, I feared punishment; as I grew older, I feared loss of reputation. I feared disappointing those I loved. So I learned to put on the best front possible so I never appeared to be doing anything wrong. I started to hide things from my friends and my family. To this day I don't know why I was so ashamed to be known. If I had curiosities, why could I not dispel them by asking questions of my parents and teachers? How did I come to believe that I was not really worth knowing? I wish I knew the root of all this so I could somehow remedy it even now.


In moments of introspection I have always thought it ironic that my name is Alice, which means 'truthful' and 'noble', when I am so often neither truthful nor noble. Though I do not often struggle now with outright lying, I still hide. I hide my less-pleasant habits, tendencies, and traits from those who are close to me, and this has caused tension in more than one relationship. I am so afraid that others will think ill of me that I will try to keep them from seeing the real me. I am indebted to those who call me up short on this, because I know that I would be much worse if it were not for friends who care.



But how can I improve? How do I learn to let people see all of me, even the parts I am not proud of? How can I live up to my name and be a noble woman whose word no one has occasion to doubt?



Friends, please forgive me for hiding myself and my flaws, for failing to be entirely open with each of you. I need help. I am a perverse and flawed person, and it is only by the grace of my God that I am able to stand at all. Thank you for loving me in spite of my rottenness.


"I know that I deserve to die / For the murder in my heart, / So be gentle with me, Jesus, / As you tear me apart. // Please, kill the liar, / Kill the thief in me, / You know that I am tired of their cruelty."


Father God, only You can free me from this disease. Teach me to care only for what You think of me and forget the opinions of the world. Show me how to live a life hidden in You so I can stop trying to hide myself. Give me a true love for others, such that I will not dream of hurting them by deception.


Please...kill the liar!