What is your relationship to the truth?

I can see it in my memory as if it happened yesterday.

I was going down and he was coming up. The stairwell was in a narrow hallway, and there was hardly enough room for us to pass each other even though I was a very small child. When I saw him, my eyes were as full of terror as my hands were full of the money I had taken from his bureau.

"What are you hiding?"

"What are you hiding?" This was the question my father asked me when he encountered me in the narrow stairwell. Up until then I had rationalized my acquisition of my father's pocket change; after all, I was to young to even spend it. I was just transferring it from his bureau to my pockets.

"Tell the truth. Did you take my money?"

When my father asked me these questions, he was also confronting me with the truth. As long as I could hide what I was doing from my father, I could justify my theft. My father's question brought me to a place where I could confess what I had done. I repented, and I never again stole from my father. My father forgave me and never introduced me as "Sarah, the family thief."

"Where are you?"

This was the question God called out in the garden. In response, Adam admitted he was afraid because he was naked. God's next question was, "Who told you that you were naked?" But God didn't stop there. He went on to ask, "Did you eat from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?" In response to these questions, Adam laid the blame on God, because it was the woman He had created that invited him to eat the forbidden fruit.

"What have you done?"

This is the question God asked Eve. With this question God invited Eve to confess her sin. She chose to confess that the serpent had sinned. The serpent had deceived her.

During this season of Lent, God invites us to ponder the questions He asked in the garden when He came in the cool of the evening seeking fellowship. "Where are you?" "What have you done?" Maybe it might even be helpful to ask the question my father asked me, "What are you hiding?" Lent is a good time to take a look at our relationship with the truth.