What If They’re Wrong Series Exodus 20:16 "Truth or Consequences"
We’ve been looking at the Ten Commandments for the past few weeks.
We’ve compared each of them to the wisdom of our day and found that in every case, our conventional wisdom falls woefully short in providing us with any sort of truth.
In fact, we have seen in many cases how our culture blatantly lies to us.
We’ve seen how our culture has shown us that:
• it’s o.k. to steal,
• it’s o.k. to engage in premarital and extramarital sex,
• it’s o.k. to kill a human being if it’s going to be an inconvenience,
• it’s o.k. for children to be undisciplined and disrespectful,
• it’s o.k. for us to work long hours without a day off,
• it’s o.k. for us to make a mockery out of God’s name,
• it’s o.k. to make and worship our own idols, and
• it’s o.k. if everything is relative and we aren’t tied down by absolutes.
In fact, our culture not only says it’s o.k., it says these things are normal; even required if we’re going to make it in this crazy world.
But we’ve seen how destructive and painful it can be when we buy into those cultural lies and stray from God’s standard.
Today, we’re looking at the 9th Commandment: "You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor."
It’s a specific warning against perjury (lying in legal proceedings) but there’s a principle in this commandment that we often overlook: that we are to be men and women of integrity.
We are to be sound in moral principle and character.
We are to be upright and just in our dealings with others.
The cultural lie associated with this commandment is, "Everybody lies, might as well make it advantageous for myself."
And that’s true.
Everybody lies.
• In Boston, a minister noticed a group of boys standing around small stray dog. "What are you doing, boys?" he asked. "Telling lies." One of them replied. "The one who tells the biggest lie gets this dog." The minister was shocked and said to them, "When I was your age, I would never have thought of telling a lie." The boys looked at each other, seemingly a little crestfallen. Finally, one shrugged and said, "I guess he wins dog."
There is a biblical prohibition against lying.
People lie for a number of reasons: self-preservation, pride, fear.
Lots of people in the Bible were caught in lies. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Rahab, David - all lied.
But this commandment isn’t just about lying.
It runs deeper than that.
It addresses our propensity to be dishonest and untruthful in our dealings with other people to the point that we hurt them.
One version of the Bible translates it this way, "Do not lie about your neighbor." (NCV)
It’s more about trashing a person’s reputation by what John Gill refers to as whispering, tale bearing, backbiting, slandering, telling lies of him, traducing his character by innuendos, sly insinuations, and evil suggestions, whereby he may suffer in his character, credit, and reputation, and in his trade and business.
Politicians notoriously violate this commandment.
Are you familiar with a T.V. show called "Spin City"? It used to star Michael J. Fox.
It’s a satire on our political process.
Our political leaders lie and it is called "spin."
Hence the title of the show.
Political "spin" is revered as an art form.
If politician can successfully "spin" a version of truth so as to either soothe his listeners or deceive them, he’s considered to be an exceptionally good politician, someone worth looking up to; a leader.
When was the last time you heard someone running for office say of his opponent, "He’s a good man with excellent qualifications. Even if I lose the country or the state or the city or the ward will be in good hands"?
No, we don’t hear that sort of thing.
We hear politicians trying to trash the reputation of their opponents to make themselves look better.
And we hear them trashing the reputations of innocent people whom they fear will get in the way of their agenda.
• One recent example of this type of behavior is the slamming of Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris. If you’ve been keeping up, and I’m sure most of you have, then you’ll note that she has been bashed not only by Democrats, but also by the press and uninformed Americans as well. Her crime: certifying the election results in accordance with the laws of the State of Florida.
I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not, but if you want both sides of the story you really have to search.
Politicians tend to take a calculated risk that you won’t take the time to search; that you’ll believe what they tell you.
But, politicians aren’t the only ones taking that chance.
Well meaning people do the very same thing!
It might sound like this: I heard that so-and-so did or said such-and-such."
Or it might sound like this: "I don’t like what so-and-so is doing" or "Well, what he’s doing is o.k. but I don’t like the way he’s doing it."
Coming from a Christian it might sound like this: "She can’t head up that committee. She’s not doctrinally sound" or "He can’t teach that class. He’s got some strange theology."
Then the whispering starts; the tale-bearing.
One person might have heard the tail-end of a conversation, or, worse yet, eaves-dropped on a conversation and taken some totally innocent remark or question out of context.
And instead of searching for the truth behind a particular statement or question, rumors begin to be passed around.
The rumor becomes the "truth" and false testimony devours yet another person’s reputation.
The Bible says, "Have nothing to do with a false charge, and do not put an innocent or honest person to death, for I will not acquit the guilty." (Exodus 23:7)
It’s easy to get sucked into all of this, especially when the person behind it all is a person of influence.
And it’s easy to justify this sort of behavior because it’s often started through the use of half-truths.
You know what those are - statements that say one thing but imply another.
They contain some truth but are designed to cause people to question the character of another person.
• A captain on a ship once disciplined a certain sailor for an infraction of the regulations. This sailor held such a deep grudge against the captain that he vowed to get even. One day the captain was sick and this sailor with a grudge was in command of the watch. On this particular ship, it was duty of the person in command of the watch to record the daily entry into the ship’s log. That day, the sailor with the grudge entered one statement into the log: "The captain was sober today." Now, that was a true statement, but it was only a half- truth. It implied that the captain was sober ONLY today. The whole truth was that the captain was sober everyday-he didn’t drink.
However, noting that he was sober that day was a selective truth.
The sailor said it because he wanted to hurt the captain’s reputation.
That half-truth was really a whole lie.
Folks do that sort of thing all the time, and they take pride in the fact that they didn’t lie when, in fact, they did.
There are some dangers involved in disobeying this commandment other than the fact that it has the potential of causing irreparable damage to a person’s reputation.
A. First of all, it pushes us away from God.
We’ve all heard the saying, "God is love."
That’s a true statement, right out of the Bible.
But, some make the mistake of thinking that God is only love.
That’s why so many unchurched people have a problem with the concept of hell.
"How could a loving God send innocent people to hell?"
But, you see, love is only one of God’s many characteristics.
God is also just.
And the Bible says his justice is without mercy.
We could also say "God is truth."
He is described as "the only true God" (John 17:3).
Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and
the life ..." (John 14:6).
The Holy Spirit is called the "Spirit of Truth" (John 16:13).
Just as God defines what it means to be good, holy, and pure.
He also defines what means to be true.
Satan, on the other hand, is described as "a liar and the father of lies" (John 8:44).
Satan is also referred to as "the accuser."
(Revelation 12:10)
So, when we lie and give false testimony against our neighbor, we actually become an innocent person’s accuser.
We aren’t acting like God - we’re acting like Satan -His moral opposite.
Even though it may not feel like it to us, every time we do or say something with the intent to trash the character of another person, we are moving further away from God and acting less like Him.
And you don’t get let off the hook by saying, "I didn’t mean to ruin his reputation."
The Bible goes on to say, "If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless." (James 1:26)
B. It also separates us from each other.
• A wife once asked her husband, "Why don’t you play golf with Ted anymore." Her husband replied, "Would you play golf with a man who moved the golf ball with his foot when you weren’t watching?" His wife said, "Well, no. I wouldn’t." Her husband said, "Neither will Ted."
Not only does lying about someone push us away from God, it hurts our relationships with other people.
And it doesn’t only affect the person we’ve lied about.
It has the potential to adversely affect all of our relationships - friends, family, and even our spouse - because trust has been violated.
If you can’t trust somebody to tell you the truth then your relationship with that person will suffer.
• Dr. Laura Schlessinger, in her book on the Ten Commandments, tells of a time she caught her 6-year-old son in a lie. She’d given him the standard lecture many times before, so this time she tried something different. She told him that he would not know whether she was lying or telling truth for one week. Her boy wasn’t very bothered by this prospect, initially. The next day, while driving him to school, she told him that she would take him for a treat after school that day. After school, while they were driving home, her son reminded her of the promise she had made to take him for a treat. She turned to him and said simply, "I lied." You can imagine the boy’s reaction - he cried, yelled, and told her that this was "not nice and no fair." After two days of sporadic lying, her son got the message. I’m not sure I would have tried that approach, but it made the point very well.
You see, when truth is not a "given" factor in a relationship, disappointment, heartache, and insecurity are the inevitable results.
Conclusion
• A woman once wrote and told about a day when she and her husband were driving on a road so thick with trees that they couldn’t see the sun. Their 4-year-old grandson, Luke, was with them. He said, "There are so many trees here, I think I’m in Eden." The woman said, "Eden?" "Yes," said Luke, "Do you know about Eden?" "Why don’t you tell me about it?" said Grandma, wanting to hear how he would relate the story. "Well, there were lots of trees in the Garden of Eden, and in the middle of the garden was a fruit tree.
God told Adam and Eve not to pick fruit from that tree. But then a snake came along, and the snake said, ’It’s okay, you can eat fruit from that tree.’ And they did." Then Luke said, "I would never listen to a snake. I would listen to God. Grandma, why would anyone listen to a snake?" Luke’s grandma wrote: I never told Luke that I had ignored God many times and listened to a snake.
Our goal in life should be to embrace the truth.
This includes not only being people of integrity and honesty, but also embracing Jesus Christ, who embodies Truth.
Our culture tells us that truth is subjective, that it’s dependent on the circumstances of the time and upon the views and beliefs of the individual.
The phrase, "my truth" is popular in many circles, as if "my truth" could really be any different than "your truth," or "their truth."
Often, that phrase is just a euphemism for a lie, for an untruth tailored to fit the circumstances.
If we’re truly God’s people, we won’t listen to that snake that tells us we don’t have to qualify or feel guilty about what we say about other people.
Instead, we’ll listen to God, who cherishes truth.
“Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." (John 8:32)
