False Witness

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

My commentary mentions that “suppressing the truth when known, by which a person may be defrauded of his property or his good name, or lie under injuries or disabilities which a discovery of the truth would have prevented” is the same as “bearing false witness.” For some reason, it seems we’ve made it acceptable to simply choose “not to get involved” to avoid having to take a stand for the truth when the truth might negatively impact a business or social relationship. The way I see it, if we know the truth and refuse to speak it, we are just as guilty as the person who is perpetuating the untruth. We don’t get to excuse ourselves because it’s a difficult situation.

Enough Already!

“Though they may surround us like lions
And crush us on all sides
we may fall, but we will rise
Not by my might, or my power, or by the strength of swords
Only through, your love, my lord
All we’ve lost, will be, restored”

                         from “Rise” by Josh Garrels

Just received word that a minister I knew from my youth committed suicide as a result of the stress he endured in the ministry. How many casualties will we allow? Unfortunately, the persecution the Bible speaks of seems to be coming from within the church more and more often. We should be ashamed. I am ashamed.

Resistance

“How do good men become part of the regime?
They don’t believe in resistance.”

from The Resistance (Josh Garrels)

Justice & Mercy

 

The Lord God has told us

what is right and what he demands:

“See that justice is done,

let mercy be your first concern,

and humbly obey your God.”

                                                                                                                                                                                                                               - Micah 6:8 (CEV)

Trusting

From Crazy Love by Francis Chan:

“When Jesus sent out His twelve disciples (Luke 9:3), He told them to ”take nothing for the journey – no staff, no bag, no bread, no money, no extra tunic.” Why do you suppose He said this? Why not let them run home and grab a few supplies? Why not allow them to bring some money along just in case?

Jesus was forcing His disciples to trust Him. God would have to come though for them because they had nothing else to fall back on.

This place of trust isn’t a comfortable place to be; in fact, it flies in the face of everything we’ve been taught about proper planning. We like finding refuge in what we already have rather than in what we hope God will provide.”

I Did it Again

Reminds me of a song (of course)…”Oops, I Did it Again”…except there was no “oops” about it. I went to church solely out of guilt…again. Why do I do that? Some might say it’s out of conviction or the prompting of the Holy Spirit. I’ve experienced both and I’m telling you that’s not why I went to church this morning. I went to “set an example" for my children and avoid the guilt that would have shadowed the remainder of my day. I don’t feel like I care that much about what others say or think about me, but clearly church attendance is engrained in me and I do care. I’m willing to go and sit through a service that makes my palms sweat and my stomach ache to avoid feeling…what? Unchurched, disobedient, unChristian?

I know in my heart what could “fix” this, but am I willing to go there?  It might not look acceptable to the Christians around me that I’ve known for years and years. Sitting amongst the “church family”, I wonder if we will ever “put off falsehood and speak truthfully to our neighbor” since we are “all members of one body” ?(Ephesians 4:25) The lack of truth and transparency has been at the root of my struggle with church for many years. I’m not naïve enough to think that all churches don’t have problems and I am well aware that the church is made up of non-perfect people. I can deal with that. What I can’t deal with is the unwillingness of people in the church to admit the presence of problems. It’s as if, by ignoring problems and creating our own reality in our minds, we can continue presenting a united “front” to the world that we’ve got it all under control. It’s crazy! The community knows we’re covering up the truth about who we really are…they’re not fooled.