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�e Ten Commandments

Sermon Transcript June 5, 2016

My Neighbor’s Good Name Exodus 20:16

�is message from the Bible was addressed originally to the people of Wethers*eld Evangelical Free Church on June 5, 2016 at 511 Maple Street, Wethers*eld, CT, 06109 by Dr. Scott W. Solberg. �is is a transcription that bears the strength and weaknesses of oral delivery. It is not meant to be a polished essay. An audio copy of the sermon on CD is available by request at (860) 563-8286. An audio version of this sermon may also be found on the church website at www.wethefc.com.

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Sermon Text

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

Deuteronomy 17:5-7 5 then you shall bring out to your gates that man or woman who has done this evil thing, and you shall stone that man or woman to death with stones. 6 On the evidence of two witnesses or of three witnesses the one who is to die shall be put to death; a person shall not be put to death on the evidence of one witness. 7 �e hand of the witnesses shall be *rst against him to put him to death, and a=erward the hand of all the people. So you shall purge the evil from your midst.

Proverbs 25:18

A man who bears false witness against his neighbor, is like a club, a sword, a sharp arrow.

Ephesians 4:25-32 25 �erefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another. 26 Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, 27 and give no opportunity to the devil. 28 Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need. 29 Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as *ts the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear. 30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. 31 Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. 32 Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

James 3:5-6 5 So also the tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great things. How great a forest is set ablaze by such a small *re! 6 And the tongue is a *re, a world of unrighteousness. �e tongue is set among our members, staining the whole body, setting on *re the entire course of life, and set on *re by hell.

John 8:31-32 31 So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, 32 and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

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$e Ten Commandments

You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself any idols. You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Honor your father and your mother. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. You shall not covet.

Catechism Q: What is the ninth commandment?

A: �e ninth commandment is: You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. (Ex. 20:16; Deut. 5:20) Q: What does the ninth commandment teach us?

A: To maintain and promote truth and our neighbor’s good name. (Psalm 15:3; Zech. 8:16; 1 Cor. 13:6; James 4:11)

Introduction

“You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.” More broadly speaking, this commandment is telling us that it is wrong to lie. As I was putting this sermon together, I was reminded of a very public incident of lying that took place in 2001. George O’Leary had just landed his dream job. He became the head football coach at the University of Notre Dame. In the college football ranks, it doesn’t get much more prestigious than that. Sadly, he only lasted one day on the job. About twenty years prior to landing this job, applying for a position at Syracuse University, he lied on his résumé. He had indicated that he had played football at the University of New Hampshire and that he had lettered three years. Upon being hired at Notre Dame, a reporter wanted to get the reaction of his former teammates. �e only problem was that no one could remember playing with him. And for good reason. It

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was a lie that was never removed from his résumé. �is lie cost him his job. Perhaps the most telling response came from his brother who came to O’Leary’s defense when he said, “Is anyone trying to tell me that résumés are truthful? In the America we live in, the willingness to lie on a résumé is an indication of how much you want the job.”1 �is really does capture the mixed messages we o=en send when it comes to lying. On one hand, there is this public indignation over having been lied to. And yet, on the other hand, there is the casual admission that everyone does it, and here it is even turned into something that can be used for one’s good. I had to chuckle to myself this week, because of what I discovered when I tried to *nd the origin of the phrase, “Liar, Liar, Your Pants on Fire, Hang �em Up on A Telephone Wire.” A quick Internet search indicated that it came from a poem written in 1810 by William Blake. �e poem is called “�e Liar.” In this poem, the poet expresses indignation over being lied to and warns the deceiver that his lying ways will lead to his own destruction. He even alludes to the fact that the source of these lies come from “the Father of Lies” as he poetically speaks of the “the red devil” and the “infernal serpent” and the “pit of foul deceit.”

Deceiver, dissembler Your trousers are alight From what pole or gallows Shall they dangle in the night? When I asked of your career Why did you have to kick my rear With that stinking lie of thine Proclaiming that you owned a mine? When you asked to borrow my stallion To visit a nearby-moored galleon How could I ever know that you Intended only to turn him into glue? What red devil of mendacity Grips your soul with such tenacity? Will one you cruelly shower with lies Put a pistol ball between your eyes?

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What infernal serpent Has lent you his forked tongue? From what pit of foul deceit Are all these whoppers sprung? Deceiver, dissembler Your trousers are alight From what pole or gallows Do they dangle in the night?

If you do an Internet search, you will *nd many sites that attribute this poem to William Blake. �e only problem is, he probably didn’t write it. �e word “alleged” had one time been attached to the claim that this poem came from Blake. Some of those who reposted the poem removed the word “alleged” and as a result “this lie” about the source of “Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire” has been perpetuated. I found it a bit humorous that there is a “lie” behind the origin of “Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire.” On a more serious note, this does convey the pervasive nature by which we break the ninth commandment. I know it has been our common discovery with each of the commandments that there is far more here than what initially meets the eye. So it is with this commandment. Trevin Wax confesses, “most of us are perpetual liars, even when we don’t intend to be.”2 For example, Hugh Coyle, reLecting on how this poem has been falsely attributed to William Blake, asks us to consider the word hearsay. “We hear something. �en we say it. From ear to mouth with almost a direct line that bypasses the brain.”3 And so hearsay, the un*ltered passing of a morsel of gossip, is a form of lying. Making and passing rash judgments on people based on hearsay is a form of lying. It happens all the time now electronically when you automatically repost something, not having taken the time to even discern whether or not it is true. �e word hearsay has now become readshare or seetweet. You hear it. You say it. You read it. You share it. You see it. You tweet it. But unwittingly, you very well may be breaking the ninth commandment. With this in mind, I would like to make several observations about the ninth commandment.

$e Good Name of my Neighbor

I am struck by the focus this commandment puts on my neighbor. You are not to bear false witness against your neighbor. As we are learning what it means to love others through the second portion of the Ten Commandments, we discover with the ninth

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commandment that we love others by protecting the good name of our neighbor. �e third commandment warns us about taking God’s name in vain. �e ninth commandment warns us against the misuse of our neighbor’s good name. �e immediate context of this commandment is the courtroom. �e obvious application of this commandment is that if you are called to bear witness in a courtroom, you must swear to tell the truth and nothing but the truth. �e process of justice among the people of Israel was rather uncomplicated. �ere were no *nger prints or DNA testing that would be submitted for evidence. Rather, the whole system of justice was dependent upon the testimony of the witnesses. We discover some of the rules for the courtroom in Deuteronomy 17. Here a capital oMense would be dependent upon the testimony of two or three witnesses. One witness was not enough to condemn the one on trial. Furthermore, if it was determined that the person was guilty of what was being accused, the witness was required to throw the *rst stone. To protect the integrity of the judicial process, according to Deuteronomy 19, if the witness was found to be a false witness, whatever the punishment was for the one being accused would now become the punishment of the false witness. �is was very serious. �ere is a tragic story that unfolds in 1 Kings 21. �ere was a man by the name of Naboth and he owned a vineyard that had been in his family for a long time. King Ahab coveted Naboth’s vineyard and approached him about selling it. Naboth had no interest in selling his coveted vineyard. King Ahab went home and he sulked because he couldn’t get what he wanted. Like a spoiled boy, he lay down on his bed and turned away his face and would eat no food. When Jezebel, his wife, discovered why her husband was lying there sulking, she took matters into her own hands. She arranged for Naboth to be seated at a banquet opposite “two worthless men.” �at is what the text calls them. �eir assignment was to bear false witness that they heard Naboth curse God and the king. Upon the false testimony of two men, the men of the city took Naboth outside the city and stoned him to death and King Ahab got his vineyard. �e whole system of justice was dependent upon the ninth commandment. Just think of the three commandments that come before this commandment. “You shall not murder.” “You shall not commit adultery.” “You shall not steal.” Life, marriage and property were protected with these commandments. Given the heart of man, the legal institution was established to protect society. �e prophets are o=en heard crying out against the lack of justice in the land. Douma says that “society totters on the edge of collapse” when the system of justice no longer protects “human honor, life, marriage and property.”4 It says in Psalm 11:3, “If the foundations are destroyed, what can the nations do?” And so this

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system of justice rested on the integrity of those who gave witness. �e power of the witness is captured in Proverbs 25:18, where it says, “A man who bears false witness against his neighbor, is like a club, a sword, a sharp arrow.” Now clearly, this commandment has broader application than the courtroom. When the Heidelberg Catechism de*nes what this commandment means, it simply concludes by saying, “I should do what I can to guard and advance my neighbor’s good name.”5 �is is the broad application we *nd for this commandment in the New Testament as well. In Ephesians 4:25, Paul says rather directly, “�erefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another.” It is interesting to me, how much Paul focuses on our speech in this passage. He says that the kind of talk that comes from our mouths ought to be for the “good of building up” and ought to “give grace to those who hear.” He tells us to get rid of things like “slander and malice” but instead, we are to be “kind to one another.” In fact, right in the middle of this passage, he tells us to not grieve the Holy Spirit. I *nd it convicting that what greatly grieves the Holy Spirit is the way we talk about people. It grieves the Holy Spirit when we do not “guard and advance the good name of our neighbor.” ReLecting on this, Kevin DeYoung confesses, “Yikes! Count me convicted. . . How easy it is to assume the worst about those I don’t know, especially people who seem bigger than me (athletes, politicians, celebrities), unlike me (diMerent faith, diMerent color, diMerent politics) . . . How unpopular it is to guard and advance my neighbor’s good name. In our digital age of perverse punditry, instant analysis, and perpetual outrage, surely the breach of the ninth commandment is one of our besetting sins.”6 I could talk about gossip here, but I won’t. I could talk about bold-faced lies here, but I won’t. Lets just settle in on the topic of “making rash judgments.” �at ought to be enough conviction for one morning! I think of the disciples in John 9, who came upon a man who was blind at birth. �ey turned to Jesus and asked, “who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” �ey made a rash judgment of this man’s character or his upbringing based on his circumstances, Jesus responded by telling them, “neither!” We do this all the time. Douma writes, “Rash judgments occur o=en. Anyone who depends on the media—press, radio, and television (we can add Internet) - has seen how the most contradictory judgments can be pronounced as quick as a wink.”7

I think of the incident this past week at the Cincinnati Zoo of the three year old boy who fell into the gorilla exhibit. To rescue him, they had to kill this 450 pound gorilla who

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was hovering over this little boy. As a result, there was a public outcry against the mother of this boy who was widely criticized for her supposed negligence. One woman “rashly” tweeted, “�e mother should be fully charged for negligence of a child. What was she doing at that time?” Dan Abrams, legal commentator for ABC News said on Good Morning America that he spoke to the woman who was standing right there and *lming the whole thing. �is eyewitness said, “this mother just turned around for a few moments to deal with her other kids, and the next thing you know, her three year old was gone.”8 When asked about the “rash judgment” of the tweet, Abrams said, “I don’t know how this woman knows exactly what happened at that moment.” And yet, that is the issue, isn’t it? Douma rightly observes, “too o=en we judge rashly, so that our neighbor’s reputation is harmed. We judge without suPcient knowledge of the situation. Or we judge without being called to render judgment. �e question becomes appropriate at that point: Who made you judge over us?”9 And yet, how o=en do we pass our “rash judgment” on to someone else? In doing this, we break the ninth commandment by failing to “guard and advance the good name of our neighbor.”

$e Father of Lies

Where does this come from? Why is there such a propensity to not guard and advance the good name of our neighbor? Why does lying come so easy to us? I know that in looking at all the other commandments, we found ourselves confessing the many ways we break each commandment. But for some reason, this one seemed even more pronounced and present in my life than the others. It just seemed to run a little deeper. It almost felt like to me that the past eight weeks we have been slowly peeling away at the sin of our hearts like peeling an onion one layer at a time. But this week, it felt like we *nally made our way to the center of our problem in life. I wonder if it felt like that to me because at the heart of man’s basic problem in life stands . . . a lie. It all started with a lie. Actually, it all started with “a liar and the father of lies.” �at is what Jesus calls Satan in John 8:44. It was with a lie that Satan contradicted the word of God and said to Eve regarding the forbidden fruit, “you will not surely die.” �is was not just a lie that deceived and de*led man. Rather, it has become a lie that has dominated man. In Romans 1:25 it says that man has “exchanged the truth of God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator.” �is takes us all the way back to the *rst commandment and who we worship. Once the *rst commandment is broken, all the other commandments fall like dominoes. Why is that? It is because living life under God looks very diMerent than a life lived without God. One way of life is a way of truth. �e other way is living a lie. �e truth leads to freedom, while living

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under a lie ends up being both enslaving and exhausting. It is not reality. What you do with God, one way or the other, does set the course for the rest of life. When you tell a lie, you are concealing the truth. When you catch a child in a lie, you say to that child, “tell the truth.” �e truth is reality. �e lie creates an alternate reality. In Ephesians 4:17-18, Paul describes the mind of fallen man as being darkened, alienated from life with God and consequently the heart of man becomes hardened against God. As a result, man not only becomes deceived, but man actually become deceitful. We perpetuate the lie. We don’t just tell the lie, we live the lie and we become the lie. James says in James 3:6 that “the tongue is set among our members, staining the whole body, setting on )re the entire course of life, and set on )re by hell.” So really when it comes to “guarding and advancing my neighbor’s good name” it is not just a matter of being careful of what we say. No one can tame the tongue. Rather, there is a deeper issue at stake. What is really needed is a true conversion of the heart. You need to move from living under a lie to living under the truth. Does not the Ten Commandments embody this truth? As we live our lives under God and his love, we are able then to love others. It is through God and through faith in Jesus that we have the grace to “put away falsehood and speak truth to our neighbor.”

$e Truth Shall Set You Free

As with all the commandments, there is a negative and a positive associated with this commandment. �e negative here is the command to not lie. �e positive is the call to tell the truth. Truth is anchored in God because God is truth. Philip Ryken has assembled a nice summary of verses that speak to the Triune God being a truth-telling God. He writes, “God the Father is true. �e Bible says, ‘Let God be true, and every man a liar.’ (Rom. 3:4). God the Son is true. �e Bible says that he ‘came from the Father full of grace and truth.’ (John 1:14), ‘nor was any deceit found in his mouth (Isa. 53:9), for he is truth personi*ed. Jesus said, ‘I am the truth’ (John 14:6) and ‘Everyone on the side of truth listens to me’ (John 18:37). God the Holy Spirit is also true. In fact, the Bible calls him ‘the Spirit of truth’ (1 John 4:6). If God is true—Father, Son and Holy Spirit—then he must be true to his word. And so he is. Everything that God has ever said—including every word on every page of the Bible—is absolutely, unmistakably, and entirely true. �erefore, we can always take God at his word: ‘Your word is truth’ (John 17:17). 10 �is is what enables us to be people of truth. “�e truth shall set you free.” Have you ever heard the honest confession of someone

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who has been hiding some kind of sin? It takes a lot of work to conceal a lie. It is exhausting. But once the truth is out, it is almost like the person is *nally relieved because the truth sets you free. �at is exactly what happens when one comes to know Jesus. I like the way Douma describes the transformation that Jesus, the truth, brings to our lives. He says we move from a spirit of “self-preservation” to a spirit of “self-denial.”11 In other words, instead of trying to safeguard ourselves by twisting the truth or exaggerating the truth or by putting others down so that we can feel secure, we can deny ourselves and embrace the path of humility. In other words, we gain a true picture of ourselves before God and our fellow man. Philip Ryken was once accused by another pastor of being a legalist because he failed to show grace. Ryken felt that the pastor was a bit forward and not completely fair in his rebuke. At the same time, Ryken confessed, “He was right, of course. I am a Pharisee at heart. And that’s not the worst of it either. I am a lawbreaker who likes to follow other gods. Even though I have a sacred ministry, I profane God’s name. I am guilty of murderous intentions, lustful thoughts, covetous desires. And yet I am able to cover most of this up most of the time (or at least I think I can). But that’s the real truth about me, the truth that people would be able to see if it weren’t covered up by so many lies.”12 When I read that humble confession, I was struck by how that is what it means to live by the truth. �e biggest lie Christians tend to tell this world is that we make ourselves out to be more righteous than we really are. �is self-righteousness shows up when we fail to “guard and advance our neighbor’s good name.” It shows up when we make rash judgments about others. What this reveals about us is that we forget that apart from Jesus Christ and his death on the cross, we would not be able to stand before God. Perhaps the remedy to a lying tongue that fails to guard and advance the good name of our neighbor” is continual confession of our sins to one another. In doing so, we quickly lose that haughty spirit and we look at our neighbor with eyes of grace that causes us to do all we can to “guard and advance their good name.” �at is what the truth of Jesus does in us.

Conclusion

I am simply going to close by reading Ephesians 4:25-32. If you want a good passage to memorize this summer, this would be good one to choose. “�erefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another. Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil. Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing

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honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need. Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as )ts the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.” “May the words of my mouth and meditation of my heart be acceptable to You, LORD, my rock and my Redeemer.”

__________________________ 1O’Leary’s tragic downfall is documented in Gary Smith, “Lying in Wait” Sports illustrated (April 8, 2002) 70-87 2Trevin Wax “Do Not Lie” blog post September 2007, www.gospelcoaltion.org 3Hugh Coyle “Liar, Liar, Your Pants on Fire, Hang �em Up on A Telephone Wire” blog post �e Vivid Ellipses, February 2012 www.hughcoylewordpress.com 4J. Douma �e Ten Commandments: Manual for the Christian Life (Philippsburg: P&R Publishing, 1992) 315 5Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 112 6Keivin DeYoung “�e Ninth Commandment is About Much More �an Lying” blog post, September, 2014 www.thegospelcoalition.org 7Douma, 317 8Dan Abrams, Interview on Good Morning America June 1, 2016 9Douma, 318 10Philip Ryken Exodus (Wheaton: Crossway Books, 2005) 659 11Douma, 323 12Ryken, 664

© by Dr. Scott Solberg - All rights reserved

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Sermon Title: My Neighbor’s Good Name Sermon Text: Exodus 20:16 Sermon Date: June 5, 2016

1. What is your favorite thing to do when taking a vacation? 2. As a community group, how would you like to stay connected this summer?

3. Recite the Ten Commandments. Which commandment stands out the most to you? Why?

4. What did you take with you from Sunday’s sermon?

5. Recite the ninth commandment and identify several ways we are given to break this commandment. 6. Read 1 Kings 21:1-16. Using the story of Naboth as an illustration of the destructive force of lying, how do the examples of lying from the previous question fail to “protect and advance the good name of our neighbor?” 7. Read Ephesians 4:25-32 and take note of the emphasis this passage makes on our speech. Why do

you think the devil gets a foothold and the Holy Spirit is grieved through the misuse of our speech?

8. Read Romans 1:24-25. What is the eMect of living life under a lie? What is the eMect of living life under the truth?

9. Read John 8:31-32. How does truth set us free?

10. Based on your conversation, what is one thing you want to work on this week when it comes to “protecting and advancing the good name of your neighbor?”

Getting To Know Me Questions

Diving Into The Word

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