Honesty

Honesty is important to me.  I've known many honest people.  In turn, I've known some dishonest people.  From both sets of people, I have learned a lot.  I have learned that an honest person gains my trust.  The most effective honest people are those who know how to coat their honesty with grace and love.  Don't get me wrong, some times I need a good honest smack down!  But on the whole, I take to heart what the honest, merciful, graceful person has to say.  My papaw, Hayward Watts, was one of the most honest people I have ever known.  I listened to everything he said to me, applied it to my life, and thanked God for it.  He knew how to coat his words with grace and mercy while being totally honest!  I knew that if my papaw said it, it was true.  So when he said "You cook those shrimp in lots and lots of garlic, butter and fresh lemon juice and you won't go wrong", I did it!  And boy are those shrimp good.

I want to surround myself with honest people.  People who will encourage me, challenge me, pray for me, confront me, uplift me, and be my wise counsel.  I have a few close friends and mentors of whom I am so very grateful.

I want to be a person of utmost honesty.  I am not a good liar anyway :)  I want people to be secure in the fact that if I say it, they can trust me.  I want to coat my words with honey though - I want my words to be full of grace and mercy.  Believe me, I can be brutally honest and upfront when I need to be, but I still want to be full of mercy.

I am very strong in what I believe and sometimes THAT honesty offends people.  I don't like that.  I don't like offending people.  So this has been a struggle of mine with blogging.  I think differing viewpoints are good - they make us dive deep into searching out why we believe what we believe.  I know what it is I believe and I know why I believe it and I can stand firm in God's Word.

So with that being said, I will be honest in what I write, but I will strive to be covered in grace and mercy.