Christian integrity

     Defined as "who you are when no one is looking."  I flunk.  End of my story. 
     But, I'll write something anyway.  Why?  Because it's not the end of the story for Jesus and others.  We like to think better of ourselves than we really are.  In so doing we systematically destroy who God desires us to be.  How can he build while I am so busy destroying?  There is no day much less hour when I'm not tempted to sin.  God knows this.  There are situations where I find myself and don't express God's love to people.  God knows this as well.  There is nothing we think, say or do that He doesn't know.  AND he knows ahead of time but chooses us be forgiven and loved.  Any integrity that I may have is found only in him. 
     I remember reading Orwell's "1984" quite a while back.  In this story the powers would and could change events in time.  They could create history as well as predict the future to aid in their selfish desires.  The people were left to assimilate the new "version" of history without question.  Control of the people in every way feasible was the goal.  Should you go astray you would be reprogrammed.  Not much integrity on any side of this story.  We think the same way in our lives.  We pretend the history of an event is what we make it to be.   We try to make ourselves look better than what the world sees.  Sometimes we think we can fool God too.  We can't.  Sorry but that's the answer to the foolish challenge we put before God.
     The problem with self deception is that you only need to convince one person.  What do others think when they see a problem where we don't?  What do you think when you see this in someones life that you know?  What integrity do you see in the professing of something wrong as right?  Once integrity has been compromised we cannot regain the innocence lost.  When we lose integrity in one area of our lives, the other areas of our lives are suspect as well.  This leads to two distinct paths which we can choose from.  We can choose to admit that we have no integrity and ask God to forgive us.  We can choose to deny the area in question and attempt to convince our fellow beings that what was truth wasn't truth.
     Which one are you doing?  It's a tough question but a fair question.  Why do we choose to do what we do?  Internally we have a hierarchy of needs that seek to be what we think our life needs.  If we think we have no sin, we lie.  Everything not from God isn't truth.  So goes the boundary setting.  We pretend that we have the sole authority to write our future.  We don't.  What we are really doing when we exercise control of our lives according to our rules is make ourselves to be God of our world.  I can hear the protests.  The protests lack integrity in and of themselves. 
     Who are you when no one is looking?
     Who am I when no one is looking?
     It's a valid question that has a lot of our life put on the line.  Rather than think about the loss when you give lordship back to God, why not look forward to your life being better?  Most of all we need to NOT be true to ourselves but be true to God.  The question of who we are always changes while the answer remains the same.  What changes in our lives is everything when God is allowed to write the script.