Scripture Daily

Context No. 3902 of 4322 · Tobit

Context · Reflection

Tobit 7:6-11: in context

6And Raguel sprang up, and kissed him, wept, 7blessed him, and said to him, “You are the son of an honest and good man.” When he had heard that Tobit had lost his sight, he was grieved, and wept; 8and Edna his wife and Sarah his daughter wept. They received them gladly; and they killed a ram of the flock, and served them meat. But Tobias said to Raphael, “Brother Azarias, speak of those things of which you talked about in the way, and let the matter be finished.” 9So he communicated the thing to Raguel. Raguel said to Tobias, “Eat, drink, and make merry: 10for it belongs to you to take my child. However I will tell you the truth. 11I have given my child to seven men of our relatives, and whenever they came in to her, they died in the night. But for the present be merry.” And Tobias said, “I will taste nothing here, until you all make a covenant and enter into that covenant with me.”

When Tobias arrives at Raguel's house seeking to marry his daughter Sarah, Raguel welcomes him warmly, but before the arrangement is settled, he does something honest and hard: he tells Tobias the painful truth. I will tell you the truth, he says; Sarah has been given to seven men, and each of them died.

He does not hide the danger to gain a son-in-law; he lays the difficult reality on the table. And Tobias, for his part, does not draw back; grounded in the guidance he had received, he presses on and insists that the covenant of marriage be made. Two things are worth noticing. Raguel's honesty. He could have concealed the troubling history to secure the match, but he chose to tell the truth, even when it was uncomfortable and might have cost him. And Tobias's courage, going forward in faith rather than fear. There is a quiet integrity in Raguel that speaks to us. When we could gain something by hiding a hard truth, honesty asks us to tell it anyway, trusting God with the outcome rather than securing our aims by concealment.

When I could gain something by hiding a difficult truth, do I choose honesty as Raguel did, telling the truth even at a cost, and trusting God with the outcome rather than securing my aims by concealment?

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