Do Not Lie Because God Is Truth

10 Commandments • Sermon • Submitted 2 years ago

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Pilate asked Jesus, "What is truth?" From the Garden, truth has been undercut and under attack so that the world doesn't know what truth even is. So what is truth? Jesus. He is the Way and the Truth and the Life.

Notes

Transcript

Dismiss Kids (2nd service only)

Student Ministry Summer Interns

Talking about for years

Excited this year to bring in a young man and a young woman as summer interns to work with our Student Ministry

Need housing for each of them for the summer (late May through 2nd week of August, approximately)

Spare room, empty house - need your help as a congregation

Pray

Opening Illustration - Lying in Pop Culture

This morning we come to the 9th Command

Exodus 20:16 ““You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.”

Thinking about examples of truth vs lying in pop culture and in the world around us

I mean, the easiest example is A Few Good Men

“You want the truth? You can’t handle the truth!”

Said in a way that on Jack Nicholson can

Liar Liar with Jim Carrey

“I can’t lie”

Whole premise is an attorney who lies for a living until his son, feeling lost and neglected, makes a birthday wish that his dad would not be able to lie for one whole day

The Good Lie based on premise that lying for a good purpose as a sacrifice makes it ok

Little white lies or fibs are those “small lies” that really don’t hurt anything and are done to make someone feel better

"Oh, it’s delicious” about the meatloaf you are trying to figure out how to spit out without making a scene

Stretch the truth or half-truths which contain some nugget of truth but are presented or distorted in such a way to lean away from the actual meaning

Disinformation = not real, true information

Fake news = “piece of news which has been distributed by a news organization which contains some form of dishonesty, typically to promote a political agenda. Fake news can be broken down into a number of categories, which are:”

Outright lie

Lying by omission: excluding information needed to properly understand a story

Lying by structure: intentionally burying critical information at the end of a story so that people don’t get the full story

Selective outrage: only telling stories which support the desired narrative and ignoring stories to the contrary

Emotional appeal: structuring news in a way to emotionally manipulate audience

Hidden retraction: burying a correction to story that was major news

From urbandictionary.com

“My truth” or “Your truth”

“Share your truth”

Never quite figured this one out except we live in a world that has devalued truth and whatever you believe is the same as it being true

Then, of course, there is the ever popular rhyme that nearly every kid learns though none of us know how: “liar, liar pants on fire”

“I’ll pray for you”

unfortunate one we as Christians are often guilty of!

Friends Christmas agreement

No lying in their family

Except at Christmas where it was ok in their family to lie about Christmas presents

I always found that weirdly ironic

Certainly, truth has never been less valued and dishonesty couched in more ways that make it seem palatable and, even more, morally right

Transition

Exodus 20:16 ““You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.”

One of the first books I had to read in my doctoral program was called Evaluating Information and I’m pretty sure that is a concept that all of could benefit from

With truth under attack, hidden and obscured and outright falsehoods and deceit celebrated, we need to understand the place of truth and the value of truth

This morning, as we look at the 9th commandment, we want to understand what it means, how to apply it and how it fulfilled in Christ

What is truth?

John 18:36-38 “Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.” Then Pilate said to him, “So you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world—to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.” Pilate said to him, “What is truth?” After he had said this, he went back outside to the Jews and told them, “I find no guilt in him.”

Fascinating question, right? Pilate asks Jesus, “What is truth?”

Really, that’s where we need to start because it is truth that has been under attack from the beginning in the Garden

Core to the serpent’s temptation of Eve was an attack on truth

“Did God actually say” (Gen 3:1)

Truth defined: sincerely believed and in accord with reality

Can’t really say something is truth is the person saying it doesn’t believe it

But also can’t say it is truth no matter how much the person believes it if is it out of accord with reality

And, I might add here, if it is out of accord with the Scriptures as God’s Word

So for our purposes here this morning, we will define truth as that which is sincerely believed and in accord with reality

What truth is not

Quick aside here on what truth is not

Truth ≠ telling everything as that can cause harm

Truth ≠ full transparency as not everyone needs to know everything at least not at that point

Lying is always a sin

So natural question when we run through list like

little white lies

lies of omission

half-truths

Are they are wrong?

Answer here is pretty simple: yes

There are no times when lying is morally good - it is always a sin

This includes times when there is a positive outcome such as with Rahab and the spies

God’s sovereign ability to use lies and deception for his good purposes does not in and of itself make those lies morally good

And, and this is important, sometimes lying is more heinous than others when it causes harm to someone

More than just lying

Which leads us to the next important consideration on the 9th commandment

It is more than just a prohibition on lying

Exodus 20:16 ““You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.”

Think back over the last few commandments

Do not murder

Do not commit adultery

Do not steal

God could have said “Do not lie” here

But he didn’t

The 9th commandment goes beyond a call to truth to emphasize the responsibility to one another

Matt 22:39 “And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

Consider the words of the Westminster Shorter Catechism here

The ninth commandment requires us to tell the truth and to maintain and promote it and our own and others’ reputation, especially when testifying.

The ninth commandment forbids anything that gets in the way of the truth or injures anyone’s reputation.

We break the 9th commandment when our words harm others whether by

sharing with someone we shouldn’t (yeah, that’s just gossip)

sharing unverified/inaccurate/incomplete information

I read this quote this morning on Twitter

“The allegations have been debunked by 1st-hand witnesses. Yet in current climate, truth doesn’t matter”

When words harm people - especially false words - we are violating the 9th commandment

This includes retweeting or posting an article without verifying if its claims are accurate or fair

We break the 9th commandment when we stay silent

Not telling what is true and good

Not speaking up when you can protect the reputation of another

The 9th commandment fulfilled in Christ

John 17:17-19 “Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.”

John 8:32 “and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.””

John 14:6 “Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”