Richard Littledale
Richard Littledale
radio microphone
BBC Radio 2Janice Long Show
Alex Lester Show
Pause for Thought
Richard Littledale: Series 2, Number 5
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Friday 8 February 2008

What is it about sick children that cures them instantly the minute you take them to see a doctor? How many times have you sat in the doctor's surgery with a rosy cheeked, contented child on your knee describing with some embarrassment how unwell they really were until just a few minutes before? And the same thing goes for gadgets ...

A week or so ago I had to return a digital camera to the shop. It had served me well since I bought it, but now it had started playing up. The lens had developed a life of its own, jigging in and out like a mad thing without provocation. Or at least - that's how it was behaving. When I took it to the shop and handed to the assistant how do you think it behaved in the his hands? Just like the manufacturer intended - that's how! No sign of the fault whatsoever - behaving itself perfectly. I felt sorely tempted to throw the wretched thing on the floor and make sure there was something seriously wrong with it.

Thankfully, mine was not the only one of this particular model to develop the fault - so he believed me. The camera was exchanged with only 9p extra to pay, and I went away happy. But I felt so embarrassed - like I was trying to deceive him.

Sometimes living honestly can feel like a really mixed blessing. After all - you can't be honest about some things and bend the truth about others - otherwise even the honest things end up not counting. It's like the man who says "I always lie - I never tell the truth". Was he lying when he said he never told the truth ... in which case he sometimes tells the truth, in which case ... he might have been telling the truth when he said he lied ... What a mess!

Here's a really sound piece of advice from Jesus himself. "Let your yes be yes and your no be no". Honesty really is best, even when it costs you. You might even gain from it.

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© BBC 2008
This talk by Richard Littledale was first broadcast as BBC Radio 2's night time "Pause for Thought"
at 01:30 during the Janice Long show and at 03:30 during the Alex Lester show.
It is reproduced here by permission of the BBC.