Some deceptions stand between someone and harm.
I lied. The Bible says God hates lying lips. I am dishonest at the core.
Rahab is in the faith hall of fame because of a lie. The question isn't whether you said it — it's who it cost, and who it saved.
Elder Marvin J. Ashton
Ashton on integrity that protects, with the underlying principle: a real friend is loyal to you when it costs them. The frame for understanding when truth-telling is loyalty to a system and lying is loyalty to a person.
Both of these are in your scriptures. Both are true.
"Lying lips are abomination to the Lord: but they that deal truly are his delight."
— Proverbs 12:22
"By faith Rahab the harlot perished not with them that believed not, when she had received the spies with peace."
— Hebrews 11:31
"Lying is one of the most despicable of all sins. It is dishonesty that destroys character. But disciples are also called to act in a world that is not always simple, where to speak too plainly is sometimes to betray the very people we are charged to defend."
The Hebrew midwives — Shiphrah and Puah.
Pharaoh ordered them to murder every Hebrew baby boy at birth. They refused. When Pharaoh demanded to know why the babies were living, they lied: "Hebrew women are not like Egyptian women; they are vigorous and give birth before the midwives arrive" (Exodus 1:19). And the text says, plainly: "Therefore God dealt well with the midwives… and because the midwives feared God, he gave them families" (Exodus 1:20–21). God did not overlook the lie. He blessed them.
Exodus 1:15–21
Honesty that builds trust.
Proverbs 12:22
Protection that costs you.
Hebrews 11:31
It is 1943. A family in the Netherlands has built a hidden room behind a false wall in their home. Behind that wall, right now, are six Jewish people who will be executed if they are found. A knock comes. German soldiers at the door. "Are you hiding anyone?" Corrie ten Boom's family said no. That lie was not a sin. It was a sacrifice — a deliberate surrender of personal integrity in a specific moment to protect the lives of people more vulnerable than themselves. They did not lie for convenience. They did not lie to protect their image. They lied because the alternative was murder. And they knew the cost: they were eventually caught, sent to concentration camps, and several of them died there. The lie did not save them. It saved the people behind the wall. There is a category of deception that is not self-serving. It costs you something. And the cost is the proof.
"By faith the harlot Rahab perished not with them that believed not, when she had received the spies with peace."
— Hebrews 11:31
Rahab — Faith Hall of Fame.
Hebrews 11 — the chapter that lists Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Sarah, and Moses — includes a Canaanite prostitute whose act of faith was a lie. She hid the Israelite spies, told the king's soldiers they had already left, and sent the soldiers chasing in the wrong direction (Joshua 2:4–5). And James doubles down: "Was not also Rahab the harlot justified by works, when she had received the messengers, and had sent them out another way?" (James 2:25). Scripture calls it faith. Scripture calls it justification.
Joshua 2:4–5; Hebrews 11:31; James 2:25
Bridle it: right time, right place, right person, right reason.
This is not an excuse. God wants both — words you can stake your soul on and the courage to stand between someone and harm. Bridle this.
Most lying is selfish. Most of the time, when you tell yourself "I'm protecting them," you are protecting yourself. Habitual dishonesty — even in small doses — rewires your relationship with truth until you can no longer tell the difference between protecting someone and protecting yourself. The convenient lie that costs nothing is almost always the one God names abomination.
"Lying lips are abomination to the Lord: but they that deal truly are his delight."
— Proverbs 12:22
Refuse to ever bend the truth, even when someone vulnerable is at risk? Then you have made "I never lie" matter more than the person standing between you and harm. The midwives could have obeyed Pharaoh. They did not. God blessed them for it.
"Therefore God dealt well with the midwives… and because the midwives feared God, he gave them families."
— Exodus 1:20–21
Take the bread. Take the water. Adjust. Come back.
Hand this to someone.
Two Are True is a small, gift-able book — designed to be opened to any page and read in under a minute. Send a copy. Leave one in a bathroom. Give one to a teenager.