Yesterday, I wrote about taking credit and boasting where neither is warranted. It is a part of being dishonest at work. There is another dishonesty that happens at work and that is when things aren’t going so well. This is when there is blame to pass around for something that went wrong like when the customer is upset, a report was incorrect, a sale fell through, a person quits because he/she was upset with how they were treated, a part fails, or a presentation wasn’t ready in time. You know the drill. The boss or person of authority comes looking for rear ends to kick and chew. And we all know certain people who no matter the problem, they will not stand up and take accountability for themselves and instead will pass it off on someone else. They look like Teflon on the surface but inside they are being dishonest and falsely accusing others for blame when they should be standing up and taking it themselves. This is almost such a common decency and baseline treating of others that it doesn’t need a Biblical reference to convince the point, but the reference is there when Luke in Chapter 3 of the same named book, describes what it was that John the Baptist came to preach as he was preparing the way for Jesus. In verse 14 of Chapter 3, John the Baptist responds to a group of soldiers who were asking how they should live their lives. He said to them to be sure that they were fair financially and not extort others and also “don’t accuse people of things you know they didn’t do”. In that time, if a soldier was to falsely accuse someone of something they didn’t do it could lead to death. Fortunately, in our country that doesn’t happen at work, but there can certainly be a deathly emotional outcome each time someone is falsely accused at work. It doesn’t take but a few times to have the false blame come your way that you don’t want to be at that job any longer and you feel “run out”. For that reason alone, we all need to choose our words carefully and be very, very sure before we pass along any blame on anyone so we not take the chance that we are falsely accusing. Better yet, it is better to stand up and take a part of the blame and instead of allowing the witch hunt to continue, change the conversation to how we ensure it never happens again, before someone else gets dragged in rightly or wrongly. When we are willing stand tall for our actions and results, we stand along with the example of one who was willing to give His all when He was wrongly accused.

Reference: Luke 3:14 (New Living Testament)