A kindness

 Feel free to correct me if I'm mistaken -

I don't think in Leviticus and Deuteronomy there is a single unilateral command against lying / dishonesty. He uses a lot of illustrations / examples of dishonesty but He doesn't ever outright say "Don't lie!". He says a lot of other things, some of them are a bit difficult to read. There's a chunk of text that explicitly lists a bunch of sexual sins to be avoided. But he seems a bit uneasy telling the people that lying is all around abhorrent.

 Now, later on, in Proverbs and the different bits of text where God is declaring judgement, He speaks vehemently about the evil of lying.

I personally think God didn't tell Israel "don't lie", because the people of Israel, at that point in time, were not known for being blatantly dishonest. Telling someone not to do something comes from the knowledge or the assumption at least that you think they're prone to that. And God does seem to have a degree of empathy for things like covetousness, since He gives the possibility of atonement for such sins, rather than the death penalty, and I think God was giving His laws in a respectful and compassionate manner, in line with His character, and one element of respect is to at the very least not undermine areas where a person is doing alright. He told them not to use false scales and pervert justice because those things are brought on by covetousness, not necessarily idolatry or unbelief. And as you can see later on in The Bible, those laws were so desperately needed yet ignored, which, of course, IS idolatry. Covetousness is feeling like you don't have enough. I think we've all been at the place where we don't have enough. We are commanded to be content with just enough, but that is not the life God ultimately wants for us. We are living here, on earth. The earth is cursed, because of our ancestor's sin, which we have been known, collectively, to unashamedly partake in. If we cannot accept this relatively light consequence of our sin, how can we even honestly say that we believe God is good, even in His judgements? There are people who are and will be in Hell for eternity. Let's not grumble about the fact we don't have everything we (think we) want. That will come later.

But anyway... just ruminating... maybe I'm totally off base on this... Idk.  Seems like I was going to add another paragraph but I can't think of what it might have been 

mudstruck ( fiction )

 As midnight approached and I felt the weight of my doom sinking into me more and more so, I prayed to The LORD Almighty, and asked that He would save me, rescue me, from this callousness of mind, this flippancy toward His commands, the coldheartedness with which I looked at the atonement of my sin, the life and death of Christ Jesus.

As the dawn approached, I felt my flesh cool.  A last minute nighttime breeze passed through me, and the 95 degree heat abated.

A few hours later, I heard my mother, approaching 70, wailing in agony.  I stood at the bedpost looking upon her, sobbing myself, and figuring this was bound to happen.  I wanted to hug her and comfort her, but the reality she was facing was simply of no comfort.  Her son was dead.  She spent many days trying to persuade me to join the Faith, and not stay stuck in a life of meaninglessness and faithlessness.  A decade ago, as I was about 30 years old, her gentle persistency had paid off, and I came to the Faith.  Now, the fruits of my labor, if one could even call it that, mostly hers, her evangelism, sharing the Truth that she cherished herself, had come to fruition.  I was to be Home, taken to the city of my final destination.

As I watched on my all my sobbing family - my mom, sister, and in laws of my sister (I'd never married) - gathered around, my sister also weeping, understandably not as hard as my mom, the rest mostly just standing in dismay, I felt a presence behind me and its' voice protruding:

 "It is time to go."

"Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!"
Romans 7:24