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I have always been Coocoo-for-Cocoa-Puffs over animals. I'm not sure what attracts me to them, but I love animals. Cats are my favorites, but I have a dog, and have had guinea pigs, rabbits, mice, rats, and fish, too. I thought about raising goats and chickens and rabbits for food, but it wouldn't work. I don't like goat milk and could never kill any animal to eat it.
I think that one of the things that I love about animals is that they are truly consistent with what they were designed to be. A cat is always a cat; it always acts like a cat; it's instincts are "cattish". A cat can't be a dog; which can't be a fish; which can't be a rabbit.
Animals, because they are instinctual creatures, can only be true to their animal natures.
I looked up the word "guile" in Websters. One of the definitions was "DUPLICITY". Being curious, I looked up that word, too.
In a nutshell, "duplicity" means double-natured. To have one thing hidden in you while you say or do something else. False.
Blessed (or happy) is the man in whom there is no duplicity - no double-nature. Happy is the man who is consistently true to himself.
It's hard to keep up an act for long. It creates an edginess within you. It is unsettling. It's false - you know it, and if the truth were told, you don't like it.
So, why are we false? Why do we lie about our hidden feelings?
1) we're afraid
2) we don't want someone to dislike us
3) we are angry and don't want it known
I'm sure there are other reasons, and maybe you can think of some. One thing I know, anything that isn't the truth is a lie and was planted by the father of lies. Jesus said, "I am the Way, the TRUTH and the Life, no man cometh unto the Father but by Me."
God will never cast out anyone who comes to Him, but He says "If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me" (Psalm 66:18). We can't be false with God because He knows the secret places of us. Getting real with God is freedom. Getting real with ourselves is liberating. Getting real with others is friendship.
A new word going into the Websters Dictionary this year is "Truthiness" - it means "Knowledge that you KNOW without reading it in a book". Let me ask you....what's going on in the "truthiness center" of you? Are you blessed? I hope so.
| Psalm 32:2 - "Blessed is the man unto whom the LORD imputeth not iniquity,
and in whose spirit there is no guile."
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Father, please give me the courage to be real. Give me the wisdom to allow what's on the inside of me be the same as what's going on on the outside, too. Please, let me be true to others, true to me and true to You. Let YOUR light inside me be what is shining outside me to draw others to You. Create in me a clean and true heart - one with no guile. In Jesus' name I pray, Amen
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