Hope Church LV Sermons
Warnings :: Part 4 Tell the Truth
[Music] This message is your warning. What you are about to hear is a passage of scripture from the most powerful sermon in history. The words we are about to read are from the heart and mouth of Jesus Christ himself. These teachings are radical and are to be taken seriously. This will serve as your warning that the sole purpose of this series is to examine six heart sayings of Jesus. We will examine each saying together as a church and then have a time of personal response. You are about to be challenged. Please open up your heart and mind to what is about to take place. Part four, tell the truth. So for the past three weekends we've been in this series that we said needs a warning label because the sayings we're going to hear from Jesus are very, very challenging. And even though it's not necessarily what we want to hear it's what we need to hear. And in the passage of scripture we're studying Jesus is identifying the false teachings of the Jewish leaders in the Pharisees and he's clarifying what the truth of God really is. And in week one of this series we specifically talked about personal relationships. And here was the principle we drew out. We said this that as a Jesus follower it's impossible for me to be right with God and not be pursuing rightness in my relationships with others. That was week one. And then week two we begin to talk about the marriage relationship. Week two was about adultery and week three was about divorce. And we kind of group those together under this application principle that honoring our marriage is worth whatever it takes. If that's removing something if that's implementing something honoring the marriage relationship is worth whatever it takes. And this week we come to the fourth difficult saying of Jesus in Matthew chapter five and I got to be honest with you. This one is just as challenging as the first three. So take your copy of God's word and turn to Matthew the first book in the New Testament chapter five and I'm going to start reading in verse 33. If you do not have a Bible this morning we're going to put this on the screen for you so that you can follow along with us and just to remind you of the setting. Jesus here is sitting on the side of a hill and he's really instructing his disciples. But because he was such a radical and gifted teacher people had gathered from the community to listen to the teachings of Jesus. So he's speaking to a large group of people as he says these words. Matthew five verse 33 says this again you have heard that the ancients were told you shall not make false vows but shall fulfill your vows to the Lord. But I say to you make no oath at all either by heaven for it is the throne of God or by the earth for it is the footstool of his feet or by Jerusalem for it is the city of the great king nor shall you make an oath by your head for you cannot make one hair white or black verse 37. But let your statement be yes yes or no no anything beyond these is of evil. And every week in this series we've been asking three very simple questions a very simple outline of three questions that we want to answer as we navigate through this text and we're going to do that this morning here's the first question. What's the commandment? What is the commandment that is being alluded to here in this passage? And it is very important that as we read verse 33 we see that Jesus is not quoting the scriptures. He is referencing a teaching that has been laid out by the Pharisees. But what is the actual law here that is being alluded to? Of course the Pharisees took the law and added to it. But what is the Old Testament law that they're adding to? Well in Moses' day way back a lot of people were living very very deceptive lies to a point where you couldn't really trust anybody. They were saying and doing whatever needed to happen in order for them to get what they wanted. So Moses steps up and he has to give a commandment for the Lord to address the deception that's taking place. And this law is actually written about in the book of Exodus numbers Leviticus and Deuteronomy. And I want to read for you very quickly. You don't have to turn there one of the passages of scriptures that speaks on the idea of making vows. And here it is from Numbers chapter 30 says then Moses spoke to the heads of the tribes of the sons of Israel saying this is the word which the Lord has commanded. Here's the commandment. If a man makes a vow to the Lord or takes an oath to bind himself with a binding obligation he shall not violate his word. He shall do according to all that proceeds out of his mouth. You see in this culture when someone made a vow when someone made a promise and they said I'm going to do something or I'm not going to do something it was a binding obligation and if they did not fulfill it they were subject to the judgment of God. But they were not just disrespecting the person they made the vow with if they broke the vow. They were in essence disrespecting the very character of God and as his people they were representing God in a false way. And if you take the law about vows that is written in Exodus Leviticus numbers in Deuteronomy and you kind of put them all together it's really this single statement I want to give you this morning to really clarify what the actual law says about vows and here it is. Every vow you make is important and should be fulfilled for the glory of God. That was the law that that God gave to Moses and that Moses laid out to the nation of Israel. Everything you say every promise you make is important it should be taken seriously and you should fulfill your vows for the glory of God. But the Pharisees heard this standard and said there's no way there's no way we can keep that standard and we can be truthful in everything we say and everything we do. So here's what they did they took the law and they added to it so that they could meet the requirements and here's what they did they said to the people of Israel and people who were listening they said listen if you swear by God's name then you have to keep that vow you have to keep that promise if you swear by God but if you swear by anything other than God's name you're not required to keep that vow and in essence here's what they did they created an avenue where it was okay to lie they created an avenue where it was okay to be deceitful and feel that there was no consequences for your actions and you can just imagine what this did to the society there what it did to people socially economically and even spiritually John MacArthur says this about what was taking place through the rabbinic tradition God's standard was lowered to a level that accommodated the sinful selfish capacities and purposes of the people they wanted to lie and they did not want to be hampered by God's absolute standard of truth instead of calling on the Lord to help them live up to the divine standard they reduced that standard to suit their own carnal abilities and interests that was the commandment that is being alluded to here in Matthew chapter 5 verse 33 that was the mindset of the crowd that Jesus was speaking into second question for us this morning and where we're going to spend the most of our time how did Jesus unpack this commandment how did Jesus explain this commandment to the people that he was teaching to well Jesus very very quickly takes the conversation from the lie that the Pharisees had laid out that created an avenue for deception and he takes it and puts it in a place where he challenges them in the area of integrity he says it doesn't matter if you include God's name in your statement if you swear by God or you swear by anything else that does not exclude God from knowing seeing and hearing exactly what's going on in your life because they thought they really believed that they held the keys to control the parts of life that God was involved in and the parts of life that God was not involved in and Jesus says that's wrong and there are really two realizations that I think Jesus wanted those people listening in that day to understand and that he wants us in this day to really get our hearts around and so to unpack these verses right here I want to share with you two realizations two realities of Jesus and here's the first one that I believe that was on his heart as he addressed this issue the first one is at a relationship with God cannot be reduced to one compartment of your life a relationship with God cannot be reduced to one compartment of your life look at verse 34 through 36 he says you've heard this said but here's what I say make no oath at all either by heaven for it's the throne of God or by the earth for it's the footstool of his feet or by Jerusalem for it is the city of the great king nor shall you make an oath by your head for you cannot make one hair white or black what does that mean well that's God saying listen it doesn't matter what you swear by you can't minimize God down to a place where he just fits in one specific compartment of your life you don't have that ability you cannot shrink God down and put him in this area of your life and exclude him from other areas of your life he says it doesn't matter what you swear by because in this day unless you swore by something you couldn't be taken serious there have been so many lies and so much deception that unless you swore by something you cannot be taken seriously and so they had tried to figure out a way to minimize God to reduce God down to one area of life and let him live there and live their life apart from him and everything else that they did and that's just wrong God Jesus says here listen he's God he knows all he sees all and he's in everything and there is nothing that you say or that you do that is hidden from him when I was in high school I was you know kind of in the social scene just like everybody else and when I was in high school we didn't have Facebook and Twitter and YouTube and all of these social media networks here's what we had we had AOL instant messaging amen anybody know that stuff and we had three-way phone calls and that was a huge technology breakthrough when I was in high school and I wore out the three-way calling I would talk with my friends and I'd get a beep I double click it and I'd be on the phone with both of my friends at the same time we thought that was awesome and I remember one time I was on the phone with a friend named Daniel and a friend named Lindsey and we were just talking about life and we were talking about the drama at school what we were doing that weekend how we were glad to be friends with each other and just talking through different stuff and then Daniel said hey guys I have an emergency and I've got to go and me and Lindsey just continue to talk and I started my tone kind of changed and I begin to tell Lindsey man Daniel is annoying and I don't even like him I just hang out with him because I feel sorry for him and I wish boy would get some more friends so he wouldn't hang around me so much and I kind of went on my spill for about three or four minutes and all of a sudden I hear Daniel's voice exactly and he said hey Travis I said hey Daniel he said I heard everything you just said because I never hung up the phone he said man this is not what a friendship is supposed to look like and here's why I tell you that story because I believe both in our country and in our church there are people who really believe that you can come to a place like hope or you can go to a small group and you can have a dialogue and a conversation with God and things are good and you are passionate and you are excited about your relationship with him but then when you leave this campus or you leave your small group that God hangs up the phone and is no longer listening is no longer seeing and no longer knows what's going on in your life and I want you to hear me very very clearly this morning that is not what a relationship with God is supposed to look like God is not a part of our life he is our life and it is wild and alive from the enemy to think that we could come to a place like this and be passionate about the gospel and act one way and leave here and think that God has no idea what's going on William Barclay addresses this principle with this quote life cannot be divided into compartments and some of which God is involved and in others of which God is not involved there cannot be one kind of language in the church and another kind of language in the shipyard or the factory or the office there cannot be one kind of standard of conduct in the church and another kind of standard in the business world the fact is that God does not need to be invited into certain departments of life and kept out of others he's everywhere all through life and every activity of life he hears not only the words that are spoken in his name he hears all words and there cannot be any such thing as a form of words which invades bringing God into the transaction but we do this we have believed the lie of the enemy that God is involved in the compartment of my life that has to do with church but once I leave church God stays there and I can go and deal with my finances or my job or my family and God's not a part of that because God's just this compartment of my life and only you know if that's happening in your life only you can answer that question but many people have believed the lie of the enemy that God can be reduced that a relationship with him can be put into just one specific area of life and then he influences nothing else and for us this morning that's challenging and the the biblical idea and I really don't like this word I really don't like this word because it's it's all around our culture and it's just really misuse but the word here the idea of trying to reduce God to one area of life and living differently than the others is the word hypocrite and the biblical imagery is this that a person would live their life as normal and then they would go to a theater and when they entered the theater and they walked up on stage they would put on a mask and when they put that mask on they were a different person and they acted differently they taught differently they were an entirely different entity until the play was over and once the play was over they took the mask off and they became the original person again that's the biblical imagery here of the idea of being a hypocrite and I thought about some different ways that flushes out for us because I believe this lie that the Pharisees were telling these people is still a lie that we struggle with today and I got three acts I want to share with you that I think we fall into three traps of the enemy where he fools us here's the first one and we kind of already talked about it there's the church act that we come here and we smile and we have on nice clothes and we communicate and we act to be one way we portray to be one way but then when we leave we are someone totally different and the things that impact us at church don't necessarily impact or dictate anything that happens outside of church and we put on an act we put on a mask another act that I thought about is the family act there are many people who go home and they are a great parent they're a great husband they're a great wife they're a great child and they act one way at home but then when they transition to the office or they transition to school or they transition to traveling for business they are someone totally different and it is even possible and I know this happens I've talked to people who have done it when someone transitions out of their home and they go on a business trip they take their wedding ring off because they're putting on an act for their family that's living two lives that is trying to put God in one compartment of our life and leaving him out of everything else and Jesus says here that is impossible here's another act that I know is is prevalent in our culture it's the social act and that's the person who acts one way around people or in front of people with friends but when it's just you alone with nobody else you are someone totally different you act differently you think differently you operate by a different standard because you truly feel no one knows what's going on but listen in all of those circumstances God knows exactly what's going on whether you include him in the language whether you think he's a part of it he has invited himself into your life because that just goes with being God and you're not fooling anybody and your friends aren't fooling anybody and I'm not fooling anybody for the moments I think I can shrink God down to just be and just influence this one single compartment of my life and leave him there and then operate the way I want to in every other situation and we struggle with this because we are so performance driven and some of us have been deceived to a point that we think we can have a conversation with someone and tell them our marriage is great and convince them our marriage is great and even though our marriage is on the rocks because I've convinced them that everything's okay then then I believe to be I begin to believe that everything's okay same thing goes with your spiritual walk with God same thing goes with you financially and it is a lie from the enemy and Jesus says here that is not what a relationship with God is supposed to look like God doesn't hang up the phone and as Jesus unpacks his text he says it doesn't matter what you swear by God's involved in everything the idea of integrity the biblical idea of integrity is this one-ness sameness that who I am at church is the same person I am at home and at the office and at school and on the business trip and when it's just me all by myself that's the hope that I believe that was the desire of Jesus is that people who follow him would be people of sameness of oneness that their entire life would reflect his character regardless of who they were around or what they were doing that's the biblical definition of integrity and if you're here today and you would say man I'm I'm there like I thought God lived at church or I thought God lived at home listen God's response to you isn't anger he's not saying well you've messed up your opportunity for an intimate love relationship you need to figure something out no God is saying I want you to understand the relationship with me I don't want you to live your life wearing masks and being a different person in every situation if you will come to me and you will surrender I will fill you with life I will fill you with joy and I will fill you with purpose and I will make you a man or woman of sameness of integrity and you can honor me in the way that you live that's the first realization I believe that was on the heart of Jesus as he spoke these words in Matthew chapter five but here's the second one here's the second reality I believe that was on Jesus's heart that day as he spoke these words speaking the truth should be the consistent practice of our lives speaking the truth should be the consistent practice of your life look at verse 37 he says but let your statement be yes yes or no no anything beyond these is of evil here's the point he's making he's saying for my people oaths promises shouldn't be necessary because the consistent practice of your life is the truth that there's not moments when you would even think about deceiving your friends or deceiving your family because you are consistently living in such a way where the truth is being poured out of you he says there's nothing wrong with oaths it's not a sin but you shouldn't have to go under oath to really be communicating the truth speaking the truth trustworthiness should be the consistent practice in the life of a Jesus follower and here's the good news God hasn't just said speak the truth and just left it up to us when we receive the person of Christ into our life he feels us with his spirit and in the new testament the holy spirit is referred to as the spirit of truth look at this verse from john chapter 16 he says but when he the spirit of truth comes he will guide you into all truth for he will not speak on his own initiative but whatever he hears he will speak and he will disclose to you what is to come it's not dependent on us to figure out how to speak how to live the truth God has given us his spirit and on a daily basis the holy spirit desires to lead us and guide us into all truth and that's why we say all the time and hope it is so critical that on a daily basis when you wake up in the morning you are setting your life you are setting your heart in tune with the spirit of God not just because that spiritual talk or it's what you're supposed to do no we desperately need the spirit of God on a daily basis to lead us into places of truth because left to ourselves on a daily basis we will always compromise the truth and compromise our integrity and i thought about a few ways that we do that a few ways that for us on a daily basis when we are not being guided and led by the spirit of truth that we drift and we deceive people and we lie why do we do that well here's a couple reasons one reason we deceive people is because we want to get something that we want and if we're being honest today i think we can all resonate with that we will deceive people because we want to get what we want here's a couple examples of that sometimes when we want to be treated with a higher status we'll lie to people sometimes when we want to be seen in a different way in a better way we'll deceive people to get what we want we'll lie sometimes when we want a cheaper price on a certain item we'll lie to people to get what we want sometimes when we just want to feel included we'll lie about something that's going on in our life other times when we just want someone to go away we'll lie and we'll tell them something that is not consistent that does not portray a life of sameness or oneness all because we're compromising the truth to get what we want but listen to this there is a greater calling on your life and my life than simply getting what we want and it's the calling to follow Jesus it's the calling to walk with the spirit of truth and be guided into truth and to be men and women of integrity on a daily basis but i think there's another more subtle way that we deceive people and lie to people and sometimes it's because we don't even realize what we're saying stuff just shoots out and it's it's a lie it's not going to happen but we say it anyway because we don't even realize what we're saying here's the example oh really that's going on hey i want to be praying for you and what happens we walk off and we don't pray it's my conviction that's an integrity issue because if we say we're going to do something we should do it so that our lives are one of oneness and sameness not living two different tracks another example of this is when we're unorganized and somebody asked us or follows up with us about a certain issue and we make up some excuse as to why it didn't happen and we just lie why because we don't want to say i just didn't get to it it just didn't happen i forgot rather than that we just blurt out a lie another example of this and this was convicting for me this week another way that we just don't even realize what we say and we compromise the truth is when we say we're going to be on time that really struck home at my house but that's an example of us displaying a life of integrity of oneness when we say we're going to do something that we do it it's us having a life of integrity and that's how Jesus unpacked this commandment he said listen you've heard a lot of stuff from the Pharisees but here's what i'm telling you a relationship with God cannot be reduced down to be one compartment of your life and speaking the truth should be the consistent practice in the life of a Jesus follower you should be men and women of integrity here's the third question for us this morning how does this apply how does this impact us directly this morning well i want to give you a life-changing principle that i think is very very important it's going to be on the screen for you a life of integrity honors god protects me and protects you and it blesses other people you see the enemy will lie to us and tell us that integrity is just a small thing that a lie here a lie there it doesn't impact a lot no if it impacts our integrity it impacts everything and here are three great results of what happens as a result of you and i walking in such a way that we live a life of sameness it honors god that's why David prayed in Psalm chapter 19 god let the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart please you let my life be one of sameness because i know that's the design you have it for a relationship and i want to honor you with my life but it also protects us in proverbs chapter two it speaks very clearly that god is a shield for those who walk in in integrity he is a protector he is a glider for those who choose to walk in righteousness many people have lives that are just going all over the place and they don't understand their circumstances and one of the reasons that's happening is because they're not walking in integrity and god promises us that if we will if we will be men and women of sameness he'll protect us but lastly it blesses other people the bible says in proverbs chapter 20 for the man who walks is in in integrity how blessed are his sons after him and you got to know today as you and i walk with integrity it honors our heavenly father it protects us and it blesses other people the enemy may say to you it's not a big deal it's just a small thing no one has to know about it but understand this when it impacts your integrity it affects your entire life we say all the time at hope that following jesus is all about relationships and the thing that compromising our integrity directly impacts the most is guess what our relationships look at this quote from Andy Stanley in a book he wrote called louder than words wherever there is a deficit in character or integrity we pay the price in our relationships there is no clearer measure of our character than the health of our relationships healthy long-term relationships are evidence of the presence of strong character conflict-ridden short-term relationships are evidence of character deficiencies it doesn't take a great deal of observation to recognize that God's standard of character was designed for the preservation of relationships so in closing i want to give you three application statements that show how integrity infects your relationships first of all your integrity and my integrity directly impacts the relationship we have with God our integrity directly impacts our relationship with God how do i know that because when i'm compromising the truth and you're compromising the truth what's the last thing you want to do spend time with God you don't want to deal with it you know if you go before God with an open heart and a pure heart he's going to make you deal with the act that you're putting on and you don't want to do that and so what do you do you compromise your integrity and it impacts your relationship with God secondly our integrity directly impacts our relationship with other believers when we're not walking in the truth we don't want to be around people who are speaking the truth because we're so convicted we're so embarrassed over our sin that we don't want to deal with it and it directly impacts the relationship that you and i have with God's family when we're not walking in integrity but thirdly our integrity directly impacts the relationship we have with the world when i'm compromising the truth i don't care about the mission of the church i'm focused on me i'm thinking about what's going on in my life only and i'm not concerned with God's a global mission of what he's called me and invited me to be a part of because my integrity integrity directly impacts the relationship i have with the world it impacts everything Jesus here is calling us to a life of sameness a life of oneness a life of integrity he says because integrity impacts everything about your life it will make or break your relationships and it will be the determining factor if you represent Christ in this world in a way that honors him or a way that represents his name falsely let's pray this morning as you sit there i just i want to challenge you would you just ask the spirit of truth right now to speak to you would you ask the spirit of truth to allow you in the next few moments to respond to God in whatever way he is dealing or impressing on your heart our praise team is going to come and we're just going to have a time where we listen and respond to God and if you're here this morning and you don't have a relationship with God the fact that he sees and knows and hears everything about your life just makes the gospel that much greater because he loves you despite all that stuff we're going to have some pastors and prayer volunteers around the room and they're there because they love to talk to you about a relationship with God if you've been chasing and you've been trying to figure out what is this whole thing about i want you to hear me God loves you he wants a relationship with you i want to challenge you church in the next few minutes to respond i want to pray for us then we're going to stand and our praise team is going to lead us you may want to sit and pray you may want to stand and sing whatever it looks like for you to respond to God in the next few minutes depending on how he's spoken to you through his word i want to challenge you to do that so god we are listening we long to be men and women of integrity holy spirit would you guide us into all truth over the next few moments may we take this series lord knowing that our integrity impacts everything about our life we love you this morning jesus and we're listening to you