Personal Integrity

Covenant Youth Mission

June 26, 1995

Personal Integrity

“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in them.”

- Henry David Thoreau

What is your plan for this life? What is the song in you? Is it still untapped?

Have you sought it out and written it down?

Have you begun to take any steps toward to getting it out into the world, or have you even thought about it at all?

What do you see yourself doing in the future? Do you have a job in mind, are you planning to live off the welfare system? Do you plan on getting married and having a family or are you going to get pregnant and be a single mom?

Most people imagine some sort of better future for themselves, but dreams do not come true on their own, you have a part to play.

A major key to you realizing your potential in life is personal integrity.

Read Ephesians 5:1-21

Ephesians 5:8-10

For you were once darkness; but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord.

Definition:

Integrity – Adherence to moral and ethical principles; soundness of moral character; honesty

We are a society that has very little integrity. Most people seem to hold to a view that if you are not caught then you are not guilty of wrong-doing.

I am here to tell you tonight young people that there most definitely is a Christian code of conduct. We have received a gift of righteousness by faith that is to lead to holy living that glorifies God.

We need to be people of integrity.

1. Integrity in your relationship with God.

Numbers 23:19-20

God is not a man, that he should lie, nor a son of man, that he should change his mind.

Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill?

I have received a command to bless; he has blessed, and I cannot change it.

God is not a man that He should lie; but you are a man so it’s alright if you lie? Is this an excuse? God has integrity but I am only human so I won’t worry about it?

John 8:42-47

Jesus said to them, "If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God and now am here. I have not come on my own; but he sent me. Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desire. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe me! Can any of you prove me guilty of sin? If I am telling the truth, why don’t you believe me? He who belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God."

Who is your father? What is your native language? Whose voice is your ear tuned to?

Our God and Father is a God of truth, His word is sure; it had better be because our salvation depends upon it.

He does not lie. He has perfect and total integrity.

Ephesians 5:1

Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children.

Ecclesiastes 5:4-7

When you make a vow to God, do not delay in fulfilling it. He has no pleasure in fools; fulfill your vow. It is better not to vow than to make a vow and not fulfill it. Do not let your mouth lead you into sin. And do not protest to the temple messenger, "My vow was a mistake." Why should God be angry at what you say and destroy the work of your hands? Much dreaming and many words are meaningless. Therefore stand in awe of God.

2. Personal Integrity.

This above all: to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.

- William Shakespeare

Be honest with yourself! Wow; that Shakespeare was brilliant, wasn’t he?

He wasn’t the first one to come up with the idea though.

Proverbs 11:3

The integrity of the upright guides them, but the unfaithful are destroyed by their duplicity.

Proverbs 19:1

Better a poor man whose walk is blameless than a fool whose lips are perverse.

I cannot remember where I read this idea but I believe it was from one of John Maxwell’s books or maybe it was from one of his Injoy Life Club tapes.