Summary: Integrity is becoming a lost art.

INTRODUCTION

 SLIDE #1

 Paul Harvey told a story of some young men who were late to class.

 Four high school boys were late to their morning classes one-day. They entered the classroom and solemnly told their teacher they were detained due to a flat tire. The sympathetic teacher smiled and told them it was too bad they were late because they had missed a test that morning. But she was willing to let them make it up. She gave them each a piece of paper and a pencil and sent them to four corners of the room. Then she told them they would pass if they could answer just one question: Which tire was flat?

 When you look around you see something missing in our society.

 Wall Street is reeking with corruption; Washington is full of politicians who are less than upright, the judicial system many times is compromised, and even athletics is loaded with people who are chemically enhanced.

 Once again Jesus brings up a subject that is still an issue to this day. INTEGRITY.

 The word “integrity” means: uprightness of character, honesty.

 In our country today we have been suffering from a lack of integrity. It has gotten to the point where we expect the worst of people.

 We just do not expect people to keep their word anymore. Politics has gotten to the point where we EXPECT our leaders to have a lack of integrity. If reminds me of the farmer who saw a busload of politicians crash.

 A busload of politicians were driving down a country road when, all of a sudden, the bus ran off the road & crashed into a tree in an old farmer’s field.

The old farmer, after seeing what happened, went over to investigate. He then proceeded to dig a hole & bury the politicians. A few days later, the local sheriff came out, saw the crashed bus & asked the old farmer where all the politicians had gone. The old farmer said he had buried them. The sheriff asked the old farmer, "The coroner wasn’t here. Are you sure they were all dead?" The old farmer replied, "Well, some of them said they weren’t, but you know how them politicians lie."

 Jesus says that if our righteousness is going to exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees, we must be people of integrity.

 Today let us look at the issue of “Integrity.”

 SLIDE #2

 Matthew 5:33-36 ( ESV ) “Again you have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn.’ But I say to you, Do not take an oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. And do not take an oath by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black.

 Let’s begin by looking at the concept of the day as it pertained to integrity

 SLIDE #3

SERMON

I. READ THE FINE PRINT!

• What do I mean with this?

• Let’s look at what the Old Testament said concerning your word which is a BIG part of integrity.

• History of the Old Testament

 In the Old Testament it was forbidden to make false vows. Here are a couple of the passages.

 SLIDE #4

 Leviticus 19:12 ( ESV ) You shall not swear by my name falsely, and so profane the name of your God: I am the Lord.

 Deuteronomy 23:23 ( ESV ) You shall be careful to do what has passed your lips, for you have voluntarily vowed to the Lord your God what you have promised with your mouth.

 God’s premise in the Old Testament is if you made a vow before God, that you were obligated to keep that vow.

 An oath or a vow is a serious statement or declaration, made with an appeal to God for truth of what is affirmed.

 You took a vow if you wanted to be taken seriously. God said if you make one, you keep it. If you invoke God’s name in a vow and do not keep it you would bring dishonor upon God.

 Now when you look at the verses projected and if you do a study of the subject in the Old Testament, it seems pretty simple. Make a vow and keep it, make a promise, keep it. Swear to do something, do it.

 Well that is not quite how it worked in real life, you had to read the fine print of the promise, the vow, etc..

 The Practice of Jesus’ day

 The religious leaders being who they were found ways to “get around” the keeping of vows.

 Let’s look at Matthew 23:16-22

 SLIDE #5

 Matthew 23:16-22 ( ESV ) “Woe to you, blind guides, who say, ‘If anyone swears by the temple, it is nothing, but if anyone swears by the gold of the temple, he is bound by his oath.’ You blind fools! For which is greater, the gold or the temple that has made the gold sacred? And you say, ‘If anyone swears by the altar, it is nothing, but if anyone swears by the gift that is on the altar, he is bound by his oath.’ You blind men! For which is greater, the gift or the altar that makes the gift sacred? So whoever swears by the altar swears by it and by everything on it. And whoever swears by the temple swears by it and by him who dwells in it. And whoever swears by heaven swears by the throne of God and by him who sits upon it.

 Verses 34-36 sound a bit familiar. Jesus speaks of making vows or oaths heaven, earth, Jerusalem and your head (your life as the gentiles did).

 What was happening was that whenever a person made a vow they did not intend to keep, they would swear by one or more of the above to impress or convince the person they were making the vow to that they would keep it.

 When an oath was made and it was broken, there was an elaborate system by which the religious leaders would judge how close the oath came to God as to whether it was a valid oath that needed to be kept. There were whole sections of the Jewish teaching that dealt with which vows were valid and which ones were not.

 Swearing by heaven or earth was not binding, nor was swearing by Jerusalem, BUT swearing TOWARD Jerusalem was!

 The idea behind this was that, if God’s name was used, God became a partner in the transaction, whereas if God’s name was not used, God had nothing to do with the transaction.

 This all boiled down to a lack of integrity on the part of those who participated in this practice.

 This mindset was being passed on from generation to generation.

 Abraham Lincoln said that for a man to train up a child in the way he/she should go, he must walk that way himself.

 Do we still do the same thing today? Do we make promises that we do not really intend to keep? Do we say yes to things just to get people off our backs, with no real intention of carrying out what we said?

 How many times have we promised our children to do something as simple as playing catch with them, only to let them down? We do this because we feel that breaking a promise to our children is not as important that the other activities we planned to do.

 How many times have we promised to do things for God’s kingdom, the church or in the name of Jesus, only to fall short because it was a bit inconvenient?

 Here’s one most of us struggle with. How many times have we said we would pray for someone only not to have done it?

 How about the preacher that told everyone to read Joshua 25 for next week’s sermon. When Sunday came, the preacher asked the congregation how many of them read Joshua 25 to raise their hand. A bunch of hands went up. The preacher told all who did not raise their hand that they could go home because today’s sermon was about lying. He went on to inform the church that Joshua only had 24 CHAPTERS.

 Now I will go from preaching to meddling. Here is another one a lot of us struggle with, when we tell someone we are going to be at a certain place at a certain time, are we there?

 What if we were going to get ten million dollars if we were on time for 30 days, do you think we would be on time?

 Many of the people of Jesus day would find technicalities so that they could avoid keeping a promise or vow made. We must be careful not to do the same thing.

 Now let’s look at the Kingdom standard of righteousness. What does Jesus expect out of those who call themselves by His name?

 SLIDE #6

II. YOUR WORD IS TO BE YOUR BOND VERSES 33-34

 Jesus tells us not to make an oath at all.

 The people of Jesus day and even today feel that they can separate God from certain areas of life.

 Jesus is saying that since God owns everything, if we swear by Jerusalem, the temple, the heaven, the earth, or whatever, that we are making an oath before God.

 The reason that we are not to swear is because there is nothing that we actually control or own, so there is nothing by which we can rightfully swear by.

 This does not prohibit legal proceedings- Jesus did not protest when asked to swear by the living God as to who He was in Matthew 26:63

 We are to show integrity by our words.

 SLIDE #7

 James 5:12 ( ESV ) But above all, my brothers, do not swear, either by heaven or by earth or by any other oath, but let your “yes” be yes and your “no” be no, so that you may not fall under condemnation.

 Integrity is doing what you said you would do. It means you keep your promises.

 When you promised to be faithful to your mate, integrity says you’ll stay with that person no matter what -- for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health.

 If you promised the Lord that you would give Him the glory, integrity means you keep on doing that whether you’re reduced to nothing or exalted to the highest pinnacle on earth.

 If you promised a friend that you would return a call, integrity means you return it.

 If you promised your child that you would spend Saturday together, integrity means you keep that appointment. A promise is a holy thing, whether made to a chairman of the board -- or to a child.

 We are to show integrity in our actions

 Paul told Timothy in 1 Timothy 4:12 that we are to show ourselves as example in our conduct.

 A rather pompous-looking Sunday School teacher was endeavoring to impress upon a class of boys the importance of living the Christian life. "Why do people call me a Christian?" the man asked. After a moment’s pause, one youngster said, "Maybe it’s because they don’t know you."

 Our actions are what back up our words, it words are worthless without the actions.

 You show what is important to you by what you do and what your priorities are. If you kids are important to you, your actions will back that up. Rachel is important to me and she knows it because I make her a priority.

 SLIDE #8

 Let us look at verse 37

 Matthew 5:37 ( ESV ) Let what you say be simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything more than this comes from evil.

III. NO LAWYER REQUIRED. VERSE 37

 What can we do?

 In verse 37 Jesus tells us to let our yes be yes and our no be no.

 Christians should have the reputation of being truthful people- people whose “yes” always means “yes” and their “no” always means “no”. We should not be people who have to swear by some oath in order to be believed.

 If we are going to be people of integrity, we have to take our position in Christ seriously first of all.

 I realize at times there will be unforeseen circumstances that arise, but that should be the exception and not the rule of our lives

 Here are just a few practical things; these ideas are not rocket science or some new revolutionary way to help.

 Set your priorities. If God is important to you, make sure that you do not commit to things that will get in the way of you doing for God what you have promised. Keep the main thing the main thing in life.

 Do not let everything under the sun come before what you have promised to God or your family.

 When you are getting married, you have made a VOW or taken an OATH before God, make sure you go into it realizing that and the importance of that. Make sure you do not do things that jeopardize that vow, like cheating or substance or spousal abuse.

 If you are one who has trouble with being timely, get a watch, or a PDA Phone so that you can keep a schedule.

 If you say that you will pray for someone, WRITE IT DOWN.

 If you tell someone you will do something, write it down. If your answering machine says you will call people back, call them.

 Integrity is an attitude and it takes commitment to maintain it.

CONCLUSION

 People will judge our God by the way we act toward others. We must be people of integrity when we deal with all people. Jesus should affect how we conduct ourselves. When we say we are going to do something, it is as good as done!

 SLIDE #10

 Proverbs 20:7 ( ESV ) The righteous who walks in his integrity— blessed are his children after him!

 Jesus says that if you are going to be a part of His kingdom, that we MUST be people of our word!

 Be a person who people can count on.

 In this part of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus tells us that we should be as good as our word. Are you as good as your word? Do you readily back out of promises made?

 Jesus has ALWAYS keeps His word!