Is Omission The Same as Lying? || Victory Church [Cafe Convos #3]

JB! What up, man? What's up, dude? How you doing, man? Good to see you, homie. I'm so happy to be here today. I'm glad you're here for a little coffee and conversation. So here's the deal. Everybody who I invite here, friends of mine, right, usually are big coffee drinkers. And I don't like coffee, but in this context, I want to try to like what you like. Yeah. So we have here, what is your coffee of choice? Black coffee with a little bit of creamer. Oh, boy. All right. You know what I'm saying? Walk me through. So you need enough to where you taste it, my guy. Enough to where you taste. So I'm just going to kind of drop the whole thing in there. OK, let's go have it. Get the little stir stick. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's all good. All right. Oh, it changed colors. I'm telling you, if it don't change colors, you don't have enough cream, bro. If it don't change colors. Got it. Cheers. All right. Oh, that's hot. And that'll get you lit, like awake, like wide awake. You like this? Yeah, yeah. It's a delicacy. No, it's not. But I love it. I'm actually happy that it's so hot because it's like burning my taste buds. So I can't really taste how bad it probably is. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that's totally fine. But man, coffee is just, it's an acquired taste, dude. It really is. It is such an acquired taste.

Have you ever seen these guys? Like they literally measure out every little thing. They don't do creamer. The bean has to be a certain freshness or they throw it out. It's like their life. It's intense. Is that not a barista? I mean, it is. But like some of my friends are a little bit more intense than that. I'm like, bro. Could you see yourself being a barista? Because the thing is... Prospects as a barista are varied and exciting. It may be possible to work in a restaurant, cafe, coffee shop or hotel. So you could see yourself being a barista? I could. I would look at every person that came in the door and I would say, I want to make them the best cup of coffee they ever had. So like, what would you do in a situation like somebody's like, you know, they ask for a certain like coffee, you know? And I assume like when you're getting coffee, like depending on what you add, it increases the prices, the price of coffee. Like if you want three pumps or, you know, extra whip, you know? And what if somebody is just like, hey man, go ahead and just throw some extra whip on there. Just hook me up, hook me up. Like how you feel about the hookup? I'd be like... Now, if it costs more for extra whip, I'd have to be like, I can't really do that. I'm going to have to upcharge you a little bit, but I'm going to throw in the extra whip. Don't worry, I got you.

But they're like, bro, ain't nobody going to know. I know. The thing is, is that I'd be like, yeah, I know nobody would know, but I would know. Yeah. I mean, it is just whip cream, right? It sounds super small. It does. But I think I'd feel bad about it afterwards. That's just my personality and like how I operate with anything like that. I think I'd always be like, bro, I just kind of cheated or like lied or stole. Yeah. You know, when I mess up in certain areas, I can feel it. It's like a needle, like a sting. I know right away. And I'm actually pretty hard on myself. So I'm the type of person when I feel that I won't really feel like I can keep moving forward until I kind of correct the situation. So when my wife, I'm like, girl, come here. You know, I got to talk to you real quick. I love the voice. Yeah. You went straight 90s R&B on me. So check it out. And she'll be like, I'll tell her. And she'll be like, oh, that didn't even really affect me. But cool. Thanks for apologizing. I'm like, I just had to do that for me because I know I was wrong. Yeah. So you said something earlier about like you would feel like you were like cheating.

But then you also said like lying. Yeah. Do you think like withholding information is the same as lying? I think if it's something that needs to be shared. Yeah. And you feel it. My wife and I were just talking about this last night because we were working through some business stuff. OK. And we were just talking about like, hey, like, let's do everything with an upright heart. Right. Right. And so what does that look like? Right. Like, we're not going to withhold what something could look like. Right. Right. We're going to be honest and upfront because then you could get into something. Yeah. Leave out that detail and it blow up in your face later. And that's with anything in life. Right. Yeah. Like if I took $20 off your desk. Yeah. And I didn't tell you in the $20 is missing. And I'm like, oh, bro, I hope you found it. No, bro. And I left even a more real example.

The M&M's in my office. The M&M's in my office. Dude, I felt bad about that for three days. I keep that big old, used to keep that big old tub of M&M's on my desk specifically for people who walk past and just want to get something. Yeah. Wrote the little note. Hey, help yourself. You came in my office like, hey, bro, I just got to let you know something. Just like that. Like I'm about to confess. Right. And I'm serious. I'm like, oh, dude, what happened? He's like, bro, I got some of the M&M's and I didn't tell you, man. I was like, it's all good. That's what they're here for. I mean, I know they're here, but you were out of the office. So I kind of felt like I like went in. I actually double take two. Like I was like, anybody looking? Who's watching? And I went in and I did it. I did it fast. I was like, all right, get out, get out, get out. And I tried to put the M&M box right. Oh, God. Yeah, like put it right back, you know, as if I'm measuring like the angle of what's in there. No, but that speaks a lot about your character and like how serious you take that. When I was a kid, shoot, probably like into like my teens. Yeah, maybe almost college.

I used to be a terrible liar. By terrible, I mean like a good liar. Like I would always lie about the dumbest stuff. Like, I mean, I got so many spankings and whoopings and lost so many friends when I was a kid, just lying about just dumb stuff. But as I got older, I just realized, man, if somebody is going to be mad at me, I would rather than be mad at me for telling the truth than than lying. Yeah, because with a lie, you got to cover it. You got to cover it. You got to figure out how to make it work. And then you got to try to tell the same story to so many different people. But with the truth, it just is what it is. And that's where it lives. And I've just built my adulthood around that in your same character. I mean, I think that's just a showing just of the type of integrity that we have tried to build as adult men. Yeah, you know, absolutely. I wasn't always like that. But here's another reason why I live that way is I want to be a good representation. Number one for the Lord. Right. My wife. Yeah. And then I know my kids are watching everything. Absolutely. They ain't listening to nothing we say, but they watch it. Everything. So if I'm out here tripping and slipping, yeah, like more than likely they will, too. There is funny. So sometimes I'll go up to my my son, like my older one, Zeke, and I'll apologize for something, you know, just because I did something. He might not have thought anything of it, but I knew I did it. I was a little angry. Right.

Or, you know, I didn't say it the right way. And, you know, I go in and I'm like, hey, man, I'm sorry. And he's like he's like, oh, thanks, Dad. It's all good. And I leave that moment going, that's how I want to leave my kid. I don't want I don't want him to ever grow up thinking that I'm this perfect man. This got it all together. And he's looking at me like if he ever makes a mistake like. Now he's like the worst kid ever. Right. So I just I want really them to see how I lead more so God. Right. But I just always want to lead from a place of integrity. And so that's like my goal. Right. And so integrity is doing the right thing when no one is watching. What's right. We know. Right. And we can choose not to let people know. But at the end of day, who will live with it? Yeah, we will. Yeah. Has there ever been a time where like you you've seen someone who has not been as integral of a person and you had to like you had to call them out? You had to pull a snitch card. Yeah. How did I did that? And I've had people do that to me. Oh, tell me the latter. I want to hear about that. What was that? There was just one time I wasn't like being integral in a certain area of my life. Yeah. And someone saw it playing out. And they actually like went and told because I was in ministry. Yeah. And they went and told like one of the pastors, because I was serving in this ministry. Yeah. And then the pastor came and talked to me.

He's like, hey, bro, like, did you do X, Y and Z? And I was like right away. I was like, yes, I did. Like because I couldn't lie. Right. Yeah. And so it was tough. But I had to like face that. I learned. I learned something from what I learned from that is if I mess up. Let me have the integrity to go tell whoever I need to tell to clear me because it's going to come better for me than it is somebody else. Bring it to them instead of letting them find out about it. Being able to listen, being teachable, being being coachable is like the key to like being a person of integrity. One of the keys to being a person of integrity, because when you are in those situations, when you're learning how to be a person of integrity, sometimes you're going to take that shortcut. Sometimes you're going to tell that lie. Sometimes you're going to not divulge all of the information. But when you are called on it and you accept it and you learn from it, that starts to shape our character. That starts to change what our behavior and our decision is going to be. The next time we're met with, hey, should I put some extra froth on that? Maybe it's coffee, you know, for the free or whatever. It changes our heart posture towards that. I think here's here's my thing. Anything that you're going to that you're doing in life, if it's going to disrupt your relationship with the Lord and you're going to have to live with it, you know, and it's constantly putting you in a place where you feel like you have to like kind of re-get your heart right with the Lord in the air of integrity. Yeah, man, you just got to face that head on.

Yeah. Ask God, like, what are you trying to do in my life? And like, let him do it. But then you have to walk it out. Yeah, you have to be the one that's saying, hey, I'm going to stop doing X, Y and Z, or I'm going to learn how to listen. Or like, I'm going to be forthcoming in everything that I do. And so these are the these are like the sounds small. I'm going to leave out this detail. I'm going to put a little extra whipped cream. I'm going to give you what you want. It will cut our legs off in discipleship. It will literally, and we'll always wonder, why am I still here? And I feel like the Lord, He will keep taking us around. I say this a lot. He'll take us around the same mountain until we learn. We'll just be circling that thing, and we'll be like, why ain't I going up? And He's like, I'm trying to show you why. Hey, listen, next time we hang out, you're gonna have to put me onto another coffee drink because this ain't it. So I got you. I'm gonna do an ice latte, bro. Do you like vanilla, caramel, hazelnut? I like all three of those things. I got you. Let's do it. That's what we're gonna do next time? Yep, absolutely.

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