Be Wise About Integrity Series

A. Today’s sermon is the final sermon in our series from Proverbs called “God’s Wisdom: More Valuable Than Gold.”

1. I hope this series has been a blessing to you! It’s been a blessing to me.

2. We started this series back in April and since then, we have explored many important truths from Proverbs.

3. We have talked about how God’s wisdom is the most valuable thing in the world.

4. We learned that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.

5. The rest of the sermons have been about learning to be wise about specific things like:

a. Being wise about friendship and self-control.

b. Being wise about sex and alcohol and your tongue.

c. Being wise about money and work and parenting.

d. And last week, we discussed being wise about justice.

B. It seems fitting to conclude our sermon series by focusing on being wise about integrity.

1. In many respects, integrity involves consistently putting all of God’s wisdom into practice.

2. The dictionary defines integrity as “the state of being complete, unified.”

3. When people have integrity, their words and deeds match up.

4. They are who they are, no matter where they are or who they are with.

5. People with integrity are not divided (that’s duplicity) nor are they merely pretending (that’s hypocrisy).

6. People with integrity are “whole” and their lives are “put together.”

7. People with integrity have nothing to hide and nothing to fear – their lives are open books.

C. It seems that there was a time in the United States when maintaining one’s integrity was more important than almost anything else.

1. There was a time when people really guarded their name and their reputation.

2. But I’m afraid most of that has been lost in our day and time.

3. Morals are crumbling around us, Wall Street and business seems to reek with corruption, Washington is full of people who seem less than upright and truthful, the judicial system seems to be compromised, and it seems that we expect that most people can’t be trusted.

4. But it is against that kind of dark background that Christians are called to shine brightly.

5. When living with wisdom and integrity, we can, as Paul wrote, “be blameless and pure, children of God who are faultless in a crooked and perverted generation, among whom you shine like stars in the world, by holding firm to the word of life.”

D. Proverbs calls us to live lives of integrity and to be blessed by it.

1. Proverbs 2:7 says: He stores up success for the upright; He is a shield for those who live with integrity.

2. Proverbs 10:9 says: The one who lives with integrity lives securely; but whoever perverts his ways will be found out.

3. Proverbs 11:3 says: The integrity of the upright guides them, but the perversity of the treacherous destroys them.

4. Proverbs 13:6 says: Righteousness guards people of integrity, but wickedness undermines the sinner.

5. Proverbs 28:18 says: The one who lives with integrity will be helped, but one who distorts right and wrong will suddenly fall.

6. I’m sure that all of us want the good and positive blessings of living with integrity: being successful, being shielded and guarded, being guided, being secure, and receiving assistance.

7. And I’m sure that all of us want to avoid the negative consequences of not living with integrity: being unsuccessful, being unshielded and unguarded, being unguided, being undermined, being found out, being without help, and being destroyed.

E. Integrity is a very practical and personal thing.

1. Before Adam Clarke wrote his famous commentary on the Bible, he worked in a dry goods store where he sold fine silks and satin fabrics to a very cultured clientele.

2. One day, Clarke’s employer pulled him aside and encouraged him to try stretching the materials as he rolled them out for measuring.

3. Such a tactic would increase sales and profits.

4. As the story goes, Clarke looked at his boss straight in the eye and courageously said: “Sir, your silk my stretch, but my conscience will not!”

5. That’s what integrity is all about – it is holding to God’s principles with a clear conscience.

F. In a similar story, I read about a teenage boy who was thrilled to get his first job in a store.

1. When he showed up for the first day of training, the manager explained to him: “Wisdom and integrity are essential in the retail business. By ‘integrity’ I mean if you promise something you have got to keep that promise – even if it means we lose money.”

2. Then the boy asked: “And what is wisdom?”

3. His boss answered: “Wisdom is never making a promise you don’t want to keep.”