Proverbs 14:25

A truthful witness rescues lives,
but the one who breathes lies brings deception.

The Lie-breathing dragon.

Have you ever known someone whom you could just never trust? The one who opens his mouth, and you have no idea if it’s true or not. It sounds like it might be true, but so much of what you’ve heard from this person in the past hasn’t been true that you now no longer know if they are speaking the truth or lying.

They’re the – Lie Breathing Dragon. They’re so accustomed to telling lies that it comes as natural to them as breathing in and out. They breathe lies.

It reminds me of an audition I once held as a Worship Pastor. I’ve done quite a few auditions in my time, but this one sticks in my head. There was a young man who had been coming to our church for several months and really wanted to join the worship band. I asked him if was any good, and he assured me that he was pretty good. He was playing in a band. He would go hang out with some mormon guys and play music with them for hours on end.

So, we had an audition. He didn’t have a guitar, so I got out a guitar for him to try. What came next was not music. I knew from the first “chord” he played that he didn’t know a thing about playing guitar. He was moving his fingers up and down the fret-board, in all kinds of crazy positions. Not a single one of them made a chord or music. So, I asked him to just play a G chord for me. He had no idea what I was talking about. I asked him to play a C – again, nothing. D – nope. A – absolutely not.

He didn’t know a single chord. I don’t know a ton about playing guitar, but I could fake it way better than this guy!

It turns out, he was a compulsive liar. He’d told others that he could do other things and they had the same experience I had.

I don’t know what it is in people that dives them to the place where they just can’t speak the truth anymore. Do they think they will be able to lie and lie and never be found out? Did this guy think he’d be able to get up on stage and start playing music and no one would ever know? I guess the mormon guys he was playing with were way more desperate for a guitarist or for just getting someone into their religion than I was.

Don’t be that guy. Be the truthful witness. Even if it’s hard. “No, I don’t know how to play guitar.” “Yes, I did see that man running from the Seven Eleven just before the cops showed up.” “Yes, I did see that he was stealing money.” The truth is way better.

Don’t be the Lie-breathing Dragon.