It’s About Integrity
Matthew 27:11-26
April 10, 2005
You are going to think that I made this up, but I promise you that this is a true story. A few years ago, I got a phone call from the father of a fourteen year old boy. He was the father of one of my son’s friends and thought that I should know about an incident that had taken place at their house so that I could be on the lookout in case it happened at ours.
I appreciated his concern at first, but then the conversation got really weird. He had caught his kid smoking and wanted to talk to me about it because mom and dad were terribly distressed about this. I asked dad where his son got the cigarettes since it is supposed to be illegal for anyone under age eighteen to purchase them. It turned out that the kid had been stealing his parent’s smokes while they were out of the house.
“But,” dad said, “it gets worse.” His mother had found some marijuana in his dresser drawer. Over the phone, dad was outraged, using some pretty vile and obscene language about what he ought to do to his son. Then he told me that the kid had found his stash awhile back, but that was no excuse.
It was fairly apparent to me anyway that this boy was saying that if it was alright for his parents to smoke dope, then it was alright for him to do it too.
I knew that this guy was serious, but I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. When I didn’t say anything for a long time – because I honestly was taken by surprise – the guy asked me if my kids had ever found my stash. I told him that I don’t smoke dope. He kept pushing and said, “Well, when you did, did your kids find it?” I said that I don’t do drugs now and had never done them. He was incredulous and the conversation continued. Here is a verbatim of the next couple of minutes, although I’ll leave out the swearing. I still remember what was said, because as soon as I hung up the phone, I wrote it down. I just knew that it would preach some day.
Him – “You mean you never smoked a little dope?”
Me - “No”
Him - “How old are you?”
Me – “44”
Him - “You never smoked dope when you were younger?”
Me - “Nope”
Him - “You must be about the only person who didn’t.”
Me - “You’d probably be surprised.”
Him - “Well, I don’t know what to do about my kid.”
Me - “You know, our actions always speak louder than our words.”
Him - “Yeah?”
Me - “It’s really hard to have integrity around our kids when we don’t practice what we preach. They can see right through that.”
Him - (still not getting it) – “Well, my old man was a drunk, but that’s not the reason I drink.”
Me - “Oh?”
Him - “Yeah. A kid’s got to take a little responsibility himself.”
Me - “If we want our kid’s to learn to be responsible, we need to model that behavior ourselves.”
Him - (still not getting it) “Well, I don’t know what I’m going to do about that kid. I feel like kicking him into next week.”
A really sad note to all of this, in addition to the obvious, is that this fellow was incredibly successful in his business. He lived on the river in a huge house with an eight car garage in which he stores his classic automobiles. In Elkhart, some of the wealthiest homes are on the banks of the St. Joseph River. If you haven’t got $375,000, you can’t even begin to look for a house in that neighborhood. The best places go for a million or more.
Unfortunately, the message that was being sent was that one can use drugs and still be successful. One can be a drunk and still live in a great house. One can have a business and make a lot of money without worrying about personal integrity. The message to the family is that words don’t mean anything. The true message that was being sent was: “You can’t trust me. You can’t believe me. I have no integrity. It’s alright for me to smoke, drink, and use drugs…but I’d better not catch you doing it. Do as I say and not as I do.”
The mother of a thirteen year old girl was talking to a school psychologist about the behavior of her daughter. Mom had found out that the girl had become sexually active with older boys. As they talked, it came out that mom had carried on a relationship with a married man for a long time.
The psychologist asked her how in the world she could expect her daughter to live a moral life when she refused to do the same. It’s about integrity. Mom was saying that it was alright for her to be immoral, but she had better not catch her kid doing it. Do as I say and not as I do. It’s about integrity.
The Gospel lesson we read this morning is one we have heard and read often over the years. Usually we read it on Good Friday as the Holy Week activities come to a close. But I believe that it is such a powerful lesson, that we ought to listen to it more than just once a year.
Jesus had been brought before Pilate early on Friday morning after a night of interrogation and imprisonment in the house of Caiaphas.
I have visited the site of the house of Caiaphas. There’s a church on that site now. On the outside of the church, you can walk up centuries old steps leading up the hill. Scholars speculate about many of the actual physical places Jesus walked, but they are pretty sure that these were the same steps that he walked up that night of his arrest. It was one of the more powerful experiences I have ever had to stand on those steps and recall that night so long ago.
In the basement of the church, which used to be the courtyard of Caiaphas’ house, the place where Peter denied Jesus, is a large cistern-like dungeon cut into the rock. It is 15 or 20 feet deep and now there are steps along side and a door at the bottom so tourists can walk into it. But then it was a holding cell for condemned prisoners. Ropes would be tied around a person’s arms and he would be lowered down to the bottom. Scholars are pretty sure that this was the place where Jesus spent his last night on earth.
So, after a night of interrogation, a trial on trumped up charges, and imprisonment, Jesus is finally taken to Pilate, the governor. After questioning by the governor, no evidence was found to warrant his death, but because the crowds cried out for blood, Pilate washed his hands of the whole affair and handed Jesus over to be crucified.
As I see it, Pilate had a choice of four options. Option number one was that he could be a pragmatist and do everything in his power to please the crowds. A pragmatist is one who subscribes to the belief that whatever works is right.
Secondly, Pilate could be a relativist. A relativist is a person who is a situational ethicist. Right action is dependant on the particular situation at the particular time. Actions may change according to the moment.
He could have chosen to be an escapist by refusing to make a decision at all. Or, he could have been an absolutist, one who chooses to do what is right no matter what the will of the majority or the particular circumstances.
Unfortunately, Pilate chose to be a pragmatist and a relativist. He chose to keep both the crowds and Rome happy. He sacrificed his integrity on the altar of expedience.
Years ago, Karl Menninger wrote a book titled, “Whatever Became of Sin?” (New York: Hawthorn Books, Inc. 1973). In that book he asked a very important question. “Has the sense of morality vanished from the people?” I think that would have been a good question to ask Pilate. I think it is a good question to ask ourselves.
It all comes down to one word – integrity. Integrity is not what we do. Integrity is who we are because who we are determines our actions. Unfortunately, integrity has become an endangered quality among us. The questions that haunt many of us are, “How do we keep our integrity intact?” and “How do we prepare ourselves for dong the right thing?” “How do we live so as to have integrity?”
We can find some clues to the integrity questions in Peter’s first letter. (for the following discussion, see (“Word Biblical Commentary,” Vol. 49. J. Ramsey Michaels, Word Books: Waco, Texas, 1988. page 53ff).
I Peter 1:13 says, “Prepare your minds for action. Discipline yourselves.” It is possible that Peter was thinking about one specific teaching moment in the ministry of Jesus. Luke 12:35-36 says:
Be dressed ready for service and keep your lamps burning like men waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet, so that when
he comes and knocks they can immediately open the door for him.
I think that admonition still retains its urgency because the time is known only to God. We don’t know when our lives will be held accountable. Watch. Be ready. Never let your guard down. Never grow weary of maintaining your character. Never grow weary of safe guarding your integrity.
Peter then encourages his readers to be obedient to God. He reminds them that before they became Christians, they had a predisposition to live in ways opposite of God’s ways. Now that they are Christians, it should be obvious that their behavior and attitudes have changed.
He then tells them to love one another deeply from the heart. This is genuine, mutual love…love which wants only the best for the other person, love which doesn’t take shortcuts, love which is honest in everything, love which is trustworthy, love which never ends.
Finally, Peter reminds them of who exactly they are. “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you might proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people…” (2:9-10).
Integrity is about living what we profess. Our professions of being God’s people mean something…in our attitudes and our behavior. It’s about being honest…with ourselves and with others. It takes character and integrity to do the work of God.
Our character and integrity are tested each day. In little ways and in big ways, God tests us to see how we rate on the integrity scale. Developing our integrity and living as people with integrity seems to me to be one of the most important issues facing the church today. But God offers us the best example of integrity in the person of Jesus. May Jesus be our guide. May our lives be molded after his example. May we find integrity in the face of our Savior.
