Difference between revisions of "Sermon for October 1st, 2023"

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Luke 10:25-28

25Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. ‘Teacher,’ he said, ‘what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ 26He said to him, ‘What is written in the law? What do you read there?’ 27He answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.’ 28And he said to him, ‘You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live.’

Deuteronomy 5:15-20

15Remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm; therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the sabbath day. 16Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God commanded you, so that your days may be long and that it may go well with you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you. 17You shall not murder. 18Neither shall you commit adultery. 19Neither shall you steal. 20Neither shall you bear false witness against your neighbor.

Ten Laws, One Love: False Witness

One day, a woodcutter was cutting a branch off a tree above a river, and his axe fell into the river. When he cried out, the Lord appeared and asked, "Why are you crying?" The woodcutter replied that his axe had fallen into water, and he needed the axe to make his living. The Lord went down into the water and reappeared with a golden axe. "Is this your axe?" the Lord asked. The woodcutter replied, "No." The Lord again went down and came up with a silver axe. "Is this your axe?" the Lord asked. Again, the woodcutter replied, "No." The Lord went down again and came up with a rusted old iron axe. "Is this your axe?" the Lord asked. The woodcutter replied, "Yes." The Lord was pleased with the man's honesty and gave him all three axes to keep, and the woodcutter went home happy.

Some time later the woodcutter was walking with his wife along the riverbank, and his wife fell into the river. When he cried out, the Lord again appeared and asked him, "Why are you crying? "The woodcutter replied, "Oh Lord, my wife has fallen into the water!" The Lord went down into the water and came up with Jennifer Lopez. "Is this your wife?" the Lord asked. "Yes," cried the woodcutter. The Lord was furious. "You lied! That is an untruth!" The woodcutter replied, "Oh, forgive me, my Lord. It is a misunderstanding. You see, if I had said 'no' to Jennifer Lopez, you would have come up with Scarlett Johansson. Then if I also said 'no' to her, you would have come up with my wife. Had I then said 'yes,' you would have given me all three. Lord, I am a poor man, and am not able to take care of three wives, so THAT'S why I said yes to Jennifer Lopez."

Today we’re talking about the ninth commandment, which is often rendered in the popular imagination as “you shall not lie.” Of course, that’s not what the commandment actually says, and today I hope to make the case that it’s not anywhere close to what it was originally supposed to mean. Most English versions of the Bible translate Deuteronomy 5:20 as “You shall not give false witness (or testimony) against your neighbor.” That’s actually a pretty decent translation of the Hebrew. The words “witness” and “testimony” in both English as well as Hebrew are LEGAL terms, referring to the things you say when questioned in court, or when making a formal accusation (i.e. a lawsuit) against someone else.

False witness, or false testimony, is a type of perjury, and perjury (in the ancient world as well as today) IS in fact lying while under oath—so we can see how this commandment often gets boiled down to an overly-simplistic “Don’t lie. Ever. Under any circumstances.” Now, to be fair, there ARE plenty of places in the Bible where God DOES condemn the act of lying—quite literally. In the Book of Acts, a married couple, Ananias and Saphira lie about how much money they have given to the church, and God immediately strikes them dead. We’ll talk more about that story next month during our annual pledge drive!

But there are ALSO plenty of places in the Bible where God condones, or even BLESSES acts of lying and deceitfulness. Just in case you don’t believe me…

In the book of Genesis, Jacob (the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham…that Jacob) dresses up as his brother Esau in order to intentionally trick their half-blind, dying father into giving him his brother’s inheritance. He lies to his father three times, and when his deceitfulness is finally discovered, instead of being punished, Jacob is blessed and rewarded by God, who promises to make him (and not his brother) the father of the nation of Israel.

In Exodus, the scriptures celebrate two midwives, Shiphrah and Puah, who are commanded by the Pharoah to kill all the male babies born to the Hebrew women. Exodus 1:17-19: “But the midwives feared God; they did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but they let the boys live. So the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and said to them, ‘Why have you done this, and allowed the boys to live?’ The midwives said to Pharaoh, ‘The Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women; for they are vigorous and give birth before the midwife comes to them.’”

In other words, they lied. They lied to save the lives of the Hebrew children. And how did God respond? Verse 20-21: “So God dealt well with the midwives; and the people multiplied and became very strong. And because the midwives feared God, he gave them families.”

There are many other examples, but you get the point. Lying, in the Bible, can sometimes be a BAD thing, and sometimes it can be a GOOD thing. So how do we know which is which? This is where the ninth commandment comes back into the picture. Listen again to the whole thing:

You shall not bear false witness (in other words, lie)… AGAINST your neighbor, or to your neighbor’s detriment. In other words, don’t throw your neighbor under the bus.

Here’s another example: You are living in Germany during World War II, and the Nazis come knocking at your door. They are rounding up Jewish people, and you happen to be hiding a few in your attic. They ask you point-blank: Are you hiding any Jews? What’s the morally correct answer?

If you have to think too hard about this one, I’ll pray for you. The answer is simple: You lie in order to save, protect, and show love to your Jewish neighbor, even if you are jeopardizing your own life in the process. You see, too often, we get that backwards. We lie in order to protect ourselves, to cover our own wrong-doing, to gain something for ourselves or build ourselves up at the expense of someone else, like our neighbor. That kind of lie is wrong. That kind of ANYTHING is wrong.

The greatest commandment—to love God with everything you’ve got, and love your neighbor as yourself—brings the ninth commandment into focus. It’s not about lying; it’s about loving. With your speech, and sometimes with your silence.

We all know people who use the truth like a weapon, right? “I just tell it like it is, and if you don’t like it, it’s because you don’t like the truth. That’s your problem, not mine!” To those who think that brutal honesty is always best, you’re still throwing the ninth commandment out the window. You’re still throwing your neighbor under the bus, with your words—true or otherwise.

What about “little white lies,” Pastor Neal? “I sometimes fib just a little, but it doesn’t hurt anyone. That’s okay, right?”

The threshold established by the ninth commandment is simply “don’t harm your neighbor,” but I’m not sure that gets you entirely off the hook with the rest of the Bible, or with God for that matter, just because you tell a lie that doesn’t hurt anyone. I think a better rule of thumb would be, “who, primarily, do my words help?” If the answer is “mostly me” and your words are untrue, I’d say it’s probably still a bad idea. It’s a selfish white lie at best.

But if the answer is “mostly my neighbor” you MIGHT be in the clear. When my daughter was little, and presented me with a stick-figure drawing of our family that she was clearly very proud of… I said, “that looks JUST like me, Abby!” And that made her happy, and she kept drawing.