Don't let your mouth write no check that your tail can't cash.

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.

Cowardice asks the question: Is it safe? Consensus asks the question: Is it popular? Conscience asks: Is it right?

A minister, a priest, and a rabbi went for a hike one very hot day. They were sweating freely by the time they came upon a small lake with a sandy beach. Since it was a secluded spot, they left all their clothes on a big log, ran down the beach to the lake, and jumped in the water for a long, refreshing swim. Refreshed, they were halfway back up the beach to the spot they'd left their clothes, when a group of ladies from town came along. Unable to get to their clothes in time, the minister and the priest covered their privates and the rabbi covered his face while they ran for cover in the bushes. After the ladies wandered on and the men got dressed again, the minister and the priest asked the rabbi why he covered his face rather than his privates. The rabbi replied, "I don't know about you, but in MY congregation, it's my face they would recognize."

"I've gone into hundreds of [fortune-teller's parlors], and have been told thousands of things, but nobody ever told me I was a policewoman getting ready to arrest her."

"Those are my principles, and if you don't like them... well, I have others."

Never... think we have a due knowledge of ourselves till we have been exposed to various kinds of temptations, and tried on every side. Integrity on one side of our character is no voucher for integrity on another. We cannot tell how we should act if brought under temptations different from those we have hitherto experienced. This thought should keep us humble. We are sinners, but we do not know how great. He alone knows who died for our sins.

In 1978 two women began their own business-Wetherill Associates, Inc-in an industry you wouldn't typically associate with women entrepreneurs: automobile parts. Wetherill rebuilds and distributes replacement car parts. The founders (Marie Bothe and Edith Gripton) had the idea to to develop a business based on ethical practices; they wanted their company to be a living example of the maxim: "Right actions lead to right results. Wrong action leads to wrong results." As part of their training, employees were taught to apply ethical standards to all matters of their job performance. For example, sales people were told never to pressure customers, never to discredit competitors, never to use negative sales tactics, and-most of all-under no conditions were they to lie. So, what are the chances a company led by two idealistic women can survive in the dog-eat-dog world of used car parts? Most people who were asked that question in 1978 laughed condescendingly. But they're not laughing anymore. Twenty two years later, Wetherill Associates is still going strong. Sales are in the hundreds of millions; profits are in the tens of millions, and the company is debt-free.

"It is hard to believe that a man is telling the truth when you know that you would lie if you were in his place."

Live so the preacher can tell the truth at your funeral.

** CHURCH'S INTEGRITY WELL RECEIVED FOLLOWING NIGHTMARISH ORDEAL It hasn't been an easy couple of years for J. Lowell Harrup, senior pastor of Northland Cathedral in Kansas City, Mo. Less than a month before Harrup and the Assemblies of God congregation planned to relocate to new $12 million facilities in August 2001, a member called and told the pastor to flip on his television to a local news report. Harrup saw a church council member (name withheld), a pharmacist, being charged with an unthinkable crime: diluting drugs of cancer patients. Eventually, the church member pleaded guilty to 20 counts of misbranding, tampering with and adulterating cancer drugs for 34 late-stage cancer patients. Now 50, he is serving a 30-year prison sentence after being convicted in the worst drug-dilution case in modern U.S. history. Although the pharmacist ultimately admitted greed motivated his behavior, initially he claimed he watered down drugs in part to finance a $1 million pledge for the church building fund. In reality, he never paid $400,000 of the pledge, and he confessed that he had started altering doses a decade earlier. In the aftermath of the consuming nightmare, Northland Cathedral has emerged battered but strengthened. For months, the church received daily calls from media outlets seeking comment. With resolution of the court case, Harrup has broken the silence that he maintained through the ordeal. In March, the church announced that it would donate $600,000 to victims of the drug-diluting scheme. That figure represents the amount of stock the pharmacist liquidated to donate to the building fund, even though the entire amount probably didn't represent tainted money. To avoid the appearance of gaining from the atrocities, Harrup and the Northland Cathedral council decided to relinquish contributions the member had made. The church decision to act with integrity prompted a laudatory editorial in the Kansas City Star plus commendations from U.S. Attorney Todd Graves, who prosecuted the case, and lawyer Michael Ketchmark who represented victims. "From the beginning, the church found itself in an awful situation, not only because he was a member of the church but because of the wide media coverage," Ketchmark, 37, says. "It was a tremendous witness to their faith that they returned the money, which they thought had been rightfully given. For nonbelievers to see a church act in a Christlike fashion was marvelous." After selling two houses, the church has made a $250,000 contribution to an existing $11 million restitution fund for victims and their families. Northland Cathedral also has committed to donating $350,000 to a victim trust fund during the next three years. That money will have to be raised by additional contributions from church members. The dollars the pharmacist donated to the building fund were spent long ago. Harrup, who has been Northland Cathedral's pastor for 14 years, believes he couldn't preach ethically to the congregation if the church somehow had benefited from oncology patients who didn't receive the prescribed chemotherapy dosages. "One wants to be careful how he builds the kingdom of God," Harrup said. "I cannot deliberately build a church with money that I know was illegally gained." The pharmacist led a secret life hidden from even his family members. He began weakening chemotherapy drugs administered intravenously or through injections and pocketing the gains. Authorities seized the two pharmacies he operated, his home and investments. The man's wife and children remain active members of the church, where attendance averages 1,200 on Sunday mornings. Instead of withdrawing, Harrup says the family has allowed others to minister to them. Harrup says he empathizes with those whose loved ones have suffered. "I understood their hurt," Harrup says. "My wife is a cancer survivor. If someone had given my wife watered-down drugs I would have been angry." Still, Harrup has not forsaken his former church member, whom he visits in prison in hopes of bringing restoration and redemption. "The activity was terribly evil," Harrup says. "My job is not to make him feel good; my job is to make him be good. I'm still his pastor. Pastors do not wash their hands of people." --John W. Kennedy

An old preacher was dying. He sent a message for his doctor and his lawyer, both church members, to come to his home. When they arrived, they were ushered up to his bedroom. As they entered the room the preacher held out his hands and motioned for them to sit, one on each side of his bed. The preacher grasped their hands, sighed contentedly, smiled and stared at the ceiling. For a time, no one said anything. Both the doctor and lawyer were touched and flattered that the preacher would ask them to be with him during his final moments. They were also puzzled; the preacher had never given them any indication that he particularly liked either of them. They both remembered his many long, uncomfortable sermons about greed, covetousness and avaricious behavior that made them squirm in their seats. Finally, the doctor said, "Preacher, why did you ask us to come?" The old preacher mustered up his strength, then said weakly, "Jesus died between two thieves and that's how I want to go.

In the 2001 Tour de France, Lance Armstrong was hotly pursued by the 1997 German winner, Jan Ullrich. In the 13th stage of the race, Ullrich had a bad crash, running off the road and vaulting over his handlebars. Armstrong stopped, halting the race while Ullrich got up and recovered. In that race, Armstrong ultimately was victorious, and Ullrich took the runner-up trophy. Two years later in the 2003 Tour de France, as Armstrong sought a fifth consecutive victory, Ullrich trailed him by a razor-thin 15 seconds when Armstrong's handlebars hooked in the bag of a fan leaning across the barrier to see, and Armstrong tumbled to the street. This time, Ullrich stopped and halted the competition while Armstrong picked himself up and remounted. At the end of that 15th stage, Lance Armstrong had extended his lead to 67 seconds. Waiting for a fallen competitor is part of bicycle road-racing etiquette. However, etiquette is a code and not a rule; Ullrich would have been within competitive bounds to sprint ahead and take advantage of Lance's fall. Armstrong went on to win the 2003 Tour de France.

One sagging electrical line near Cleveland, Ohio, connected with a tree branch at 3:32 p.m. on August 14, 2003, beginning a chain of events which led to the largest blackout in American history. According to the most comprehensive study yet, the failure of this single transmission line caused a utility company in southern Ohio to overload and seal itself off from the now infamous power grid. To the north, this created a huge need for power, and Cleveland began sucking an unsustainable amount of electricity from Michigan and Ontario…knocking out more transmission lines and generating plants. When the need for more power reached New York, power plants there sealed themselves from the grid in order to protect their own systems. This, however, created a new problem when New York, ironically, had too much electricity and overloaded its own system. The result: history's largest shutdown. Similarly, seemingly small actions and choices can end with devastating personal consequences. Sin often starts with one small choice, but the end result is ruined families, ruined churches, ruined lives. Citation: Robert Daneker, Jr., Allentown, PA

Number of Wisconsin accounting students given take-home tests to accommodate an Enron whistle-blower's April speech: 78 Number later found to have cheated: 40

"The man who tries to walk two roads will split his pants."

Integrity is keeping my commitment(s) even if the circumstances when I made the commitment(s) have changed.

World War II produced many heroes. One was Butch O'Hare. He was a fighter pilot assigned to an aircraft carrier in the South Pacific. One day while on a mission, he looked at his fuel gauge and realized someone had forgotten to top off his fuel tank. Unable to complete his mission, he turned around and headed back for the aircraft carrier. As he headed back, he saw a squadron of Japanese Zeroes heading straight for the American fleet. All the American fighters were out on a sortie, leaving the fleet virtually defenseless. He dove into the formation of Japanese planes in a desperate move to divert them away from the fleet. After a frightening air battle, the Japanese airplanes broke off their assault on the fleet. Butch O'Hare's tattered fighter limped back to the carrier. He was recognized as a hero and given one of the nation's highest military honors. O'Hare International Airport in Chicago is named after him. Some years earlier, there was a man in Chicago called Easy Eddie. In those days, Al Capone virtually owned the city. Capone's mob was involved in bootlegging booze, murder, and prostitution. Easy Eddie was Al Capone's lawyer and kept Big Al out of jail. In return, Easy Eddie earned big money and lived like a king on an estate so large it filled an entire city block. But Easy Eddie had one soft spot—a son whom he loved dearly. Eddie saw that his son had the best of everything: clothes, cars, and a good education. Despite Eddie's involvement with the mob, he tried to teach his son right from wrong. Eddie wanted his son to be a better man than he was. But there were two things Eddie could not give his son—a good name and a good example. Deciding that giving his son these two things was more important than lavishing him with riches, Eddie had to rectify the wrong he had done. He went to the authorities and told them the truth about Al Capone. Easy Eddie eventually testified in court against Al Capone and the mob. He knew the cost would be great, but he wanted to be an example to his son and leave him with a good name. Within a year of testifying against the Mob, Easy Eddie's life ended in a blaze of gunfire on a lonely Chicago street. He had given his son the greatest gift he had to offer at the greatest price he would ever pay. What do these stories have to do with one another? Butch O'Hare was Easy Eddie's son. Citation: Bruce Cecil, Coachella, California

During the time of the twelve Caesars, the Roman army would conduct morning inspections. As the inspecting Centurion would come in front of each legionnaire, the soldier would strike with his right fist the armor breastplate that covered his heart. The armor had to be strongest there in order to protect the heart from the sword thrusts and from arrow strikes. As the soldier struck his armor, he would shout "integritas" [in-teg-ri-tas], which in Latin means material wholeness, completeness, and entirety. The inspecting Centurion would listen closely for this affirmation and also for the ring that well kept armor would give off. Satisfied that the armor was sound and that the soldier beneath it was protected, he would then move on to the next man. At about the same time, the Praetorians or imperial bodyguard were ascending into power and influence; drawn from the best "politically correct" soldiers of the legions, they received the finest equipment and armor. They no longer had to shout "integritas" to signify that their armor was sound. Instead, as they struck their breastplate, they would shout "Hail Caesar," to signify that their heart belonged to the imperial personage—not to their unit—not to an institution—not to a code of ideals. They armored themselves to serve the cause of a single man. A century passed and the rift between the legion and the imperial bodyguard and its excesses grew larger. To signify the difference between the two organizations, the legionnaire, upon striking his armor would no longer shout "integritas," but instead would shout "integer" [in-te-ger]. Integer means undiminished—complete—perfect. It not only indicated that the armor was sound, it also indicated that the soldier wearing the armor was sound of character. He was complete in his integrity…his heart was in the right place…his standards and morals were high. He was not associated with the immoral conduct that was rapidly becoming the signature of the Praetorian Guards. The armor of integrity continued to serve the legion well. For over four centuries they held the line against the marauding Goths and Vandals, but by 383 A.D., the social decline that infected the republic and the Praetorian Guard had its effects upon the legion. As a 4th century Roman general wrote, "When because of negligence and laziness, parade ground drills were abandoned, the customary armor began to feel heavy since the soldiers rarely, if ever, wore it. Therefore, they first asked the emperor to set aside the breastplates and mail and then the helmets. So our soldiers fought the Goths without any protection for the heart and head and were often beaten by archers. Although there were many disasters, which led to the loss of great cities, no one tried to restore the armor to the infantry. They took their armor off and when the armor came off—so too came their integrity." It was only a matter of a few years until the legion rotted from within and was unable to hold the frontiers. The barbarians were at the gates.

S. I. McMillen, in his book None of These Diseases, tells a story of a young woman who wanted to go to college, but her heart sank when she read the question on the application blank that asked, "Are you a leader?" Being both honest and conscientious, she wrote, "No," and returned the application, expecting the worst. To her surprise, she received this letter from the college: "Dear Applicant: A study of the application forms reveals that this year our college will have 1,452 new leaders. We are accepting you because we feel it is imperative that they have at least one follower." Citation: J. R. Love, Ruston, Louisiana

When an F117 pilot complained about vibrations, the flight crew inspected the aircraft, but didn’t find any problems. The pilot ejected safely on September 14, 1996 when vibrations became extreme. Subsequent investigations showed that four of five 1 inch diameter bolts holding a wing to the airplane were missing! A cover plate not removed during inspection concealed the missing bolts. The $42 million dollar plane was destroyed.