The Honest Answer

We’ve been in James for a while.

It’s often spoken of as a book about doing.

But I think it’s really a book about faith.

It’s a book that teaches what that faith looks like.

We live in a culture, where people say they have faith, but you don’t see that faith.

People say that faith is a private matter.

James on the other hand explains that faith is not private.

It’s to be seen.

It’s to be lived out.

If you have faith, and if you are indwelt with the Spirit, there is evidence in the person’s life.

That faith becomes visible.

And in today’s text, faith is heard.

And today we come to James 5:12.

Go ahead and open your Bibles to James 5:12.

Read James 5:12.

This marks the conclusion of little book.

And James concludes with the Christian’s relationship to truth.

There are 4 elements to a Christian’s faith that lead to a life of integrity.

First, the Christian is to live in the Pursuit of Truth.

James says, “But above all ...”

This isn’t necessarily related to the previous 11 verses, or to the following verses.

The above all is looking at the book as a whole.

Out of all the things he has said and he will say, above all, here’s the big truth.

The rest of this sentence is about truth, and speaking clearly.

And your pursuit of speaking truth, and speaking clearly, without wavering is the above all.

Above all you pursue truth.

Why do we need this?

Because we lie.

We are surrounded by lies.

You don’t have to teach your children to lie.

They do it.

And if they don’t lie to your face … they lie when they hide their sins from you.

They do it when you’re not watching.

Why?

Because they are deceiving you.

They don’t want you to be angry at them.

So they hide their sins.

Amanda and I love our little boy Ben, and we find ourselves watching a lot of nursery rhyme sing along videos.

There’s a nursery rhyme that I’ve never heard of before, but repeated in these videos.

Apparently, this rhyme is over 60 years old.

It tells of a father, catching his son eating sugar.

Johny, Johny, Yes papa? Eating sugar? No papa. Telling lies? No papa. Open your mouth Ha ha ha!

The father catches his son eating sugar.

He questions his son.

The son lies to his face.

The father tells the son to open his mouth to show the evidence of his crime, and the son simply laughs.

That’s the whole rhyme.

The nursery rhyme is all about lying to your parents, then laughing about it when caught.

But it’s not just children who lie.

Politicians lie.

Governments lie.

Media lies.

Headlines lie.

Lying is everywhere.

We live in a world filled with lies?

Because it’s a world where the majority of the people in it are under the influence of Satan.

John 8:44, Jesus said, “You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies.”

Satan is the father of lies.

In the Garden, when Satan tempted Eve, he used half-truths and lies to seduce her.

Until someone is converted, they are of the devil.

They follow the pattern that he has set before them.

It’s a pattern of vagueness, half-truths, and lies.

But upon conversion, you are no longer a servant of Satan, you are no longer a follower of his system.

Colossians 1:13 says, “He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son,”

When you became a Christian, you have changed allegiances.

God took you out of that system of the devil.

He adopted you.

At conversion, you go from being a child of the devil, to a child of God.

And your behavior changes.

The world may think that it’s okay to withhold truth, or to fudge truth in certain areas, but not God.

You are no longer a part of that world.

James says, “But above all ...”

But - is a contrasting conjunctive..

It means there’s a change in the flow of thought.

You lied before.

Not anymore.

“But” - it’s all changed.

“But above all ...”

You put effort into what follows.

How you speak says something about whether that change has actually happened.

How you speak says something about the condition of your soul.

Back in James 1:26, “If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this person’s religion is worthless.”

A controlled tongue, is evidence of true conversion.

So if you have been transferred out of the lying system of the devil, then above all, you pursue truth, you pursue integrity.

Ephesians 4:25, “Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another.”

The evidence of conversion is you put falsehood away.

You get rid of it.

You take it off.

We put away all lying.

Put alway all half-truths.

No longer belonging to Satan’s system, but servants and citizens of Christ’s Kingdom.

Colossians 3:9, “Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices.”

Again, there’s that language of taking off your old actions.

You put off the old self.

So above all, we pursue Christ.

You make every effort to pursue truth, and to be known as someone who pursues truth.

The second point is we pursue truth because God is truth.

God is true.

He does not lie.

He does not change.

Numbers 23:19 says, “God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?”

God is completely true, and that means that everything He says can be trusted.

His Word is true.

And those who speak for Him are to be true.

The prophets in the Old Testament, were expected to be completely accurate in what they said.

Why?

Because they were speaking for God.

And God does not lie.

So when they say, “Thus saith the Lord -” they became the mouth piece for God, and God does not lie.

The expectation of the prophets was complete truth and accuracy.

Deuteronomy 18:20 says that if a prophet spoke something that was not true, the penalty was the death penalty.

“But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name that I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die.’”

And so because God is true, He expected His prophets to speak truth.

And those who belong to God, the Church, Christians, are to speak truth.

I say this, because the truthfulness of God, means we are to pursue truth.

Continuing in James 5:12, “But above all, my brothers, do not swear, either by heaven or by earth or by any other oath ...”

Do not swear.

This isn’t talking about using bad language, curse words, or telling filthy jokes.

There are passages that forbid that kind of speech.

Ephesians 4:29, comes to mind.

“Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths ...”

This is talking about swearing or making an oath.

You are making a statement, and you want that statement to be received as true, so you make an oath, you swear that it is true.

The command is not a blanket statement, “do not swear.”

It doesn’t say, “Never ever swear, period.”

There’s more that comes after that statement.

It says to not swear by heaven or by earth or by any other oath.

So don’t think that it means that you never swear.

Or that if you have sworn, you have committed a sin.

In fact if it was a command to never swear, it would contradict some Old Testament passages, as well something that Jesus even did.

In the Old Testament, people swore and made oaths.

Mostly, because they didn’t have contracts like we have today, where you sign your name at the bottom of the page.

In the Old Testament, when there was a promise that needed to be made, they would swear, and they would swear by God’s name.

They would swear by God because they wanted people to know that whatever the statement was, it was completely accurate.

Why God’s name?

Because God is true.

God never lies.

God is the standard of truth.

He is equivalent to truth.

In the Old Testament, this was not a sin.

If anything, swearing by God, was the only approved oath or way to swear, because God is the one who is completely related to truth.

Some examples of this.

When Abraham sent his servant to go and find a wife for Isaar, he told his servant, “Put your hand under my thigh, that I may make you swear by the Lord, the God of heaven and God of earth ...”

What did he do?

He swore by God.

When Rahab hosted the spies in her home in Joshua 2, she asked that they would spare her and her family.

“Now then, please swear to me by the Lord ...”

This pagan woman, knew that the only way to guarantee their words to be true would be to swear by God.

Jericho, had these tremendous walls.

The walls made Jericho an unconquerable fortress.

They were the strength of Jericho.

They made Jericho untouchable.

Notice Rahab didn’t have the spies swear by these impregnable walls.

Why?

Because as strong as they were, they were manmade.

As strong as they were, they could fall.

And they would fall.

The spies swore by God.

David and Jonathan were dear friends.

Jonathan and David swore to be friends, despite Saul’s desire to murder David.

They said “The Lord, the God of Israel, be witness!”

We have similar words in our wedding vows when we say, “As God is my witness, I give you my word.”

We swear that we will love each other, the way Christ loved us.

In fact, the there were even commands in the Old Testament to swear by God.

Deuteronomy 10:20 - “You shall fear the Lord your God. You shall serve him and hold fast to him, and by his name you shall swear.”

God’s expectation was that His people would speak the truth.

They would swear only by Him, because they fear God and they know Him to be completely true.

Jeremiah 12:16 - “And it shall come to pass, if they will diligently learn the ways of my people, to swear by my name, ‘As the Lord lives,’ even as they taught my people to swear by Baal, then they shall be built up in the midst of my people.”

God even expects the Gentiles to be able to swear by Him and His name.

In Matthew 26:63-64, Jesus was before the Sanhedrin, and the high priest said, “I adjure you by the living God, tell us if you are the Christ, the Son of God.” Jesus said to him, “You have said so. ...”

The high priest told Jesus to swear by the living God if He is the Son of God.

And Jesus participated.

He spoke truth, because God is truth.

If you ever find yourself in a courtroom, called to testify, and you are asked to place your hand on the Bible and say:

“Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?”

And you say yes.

You aren’t sinning.

Because the words contained within that book, are the very words of God.

Infallible.

Inerrant.

Sufficient.

God breathed.

Swearing isn’t the problem.

I’ve just shown you evidence of swearing.

The problem is what comes after those first words.

James mentions the problem, “do not swear, either by heaven or by earth or by any other oath”

The problem is when people would swear by things other than God.

This problem was in James day, as well as in Jesus’ day.

Oaths were being misused.

They were being used to deceive people.

So for example, we swear in God’s name, because He is true, and that means the oath is equally true.

But what if you swear by something that is less than God?

What if you swear by something that is changeable?

Some rabbis began teaching that an oath was only binding if it was made in God’s name.

So if you wanted to lie, you swore by something less.

You could swear by the throne room of God, because that was less than God.

You could swear by Jerusalem, because that was less than God.

Basically, you could swear by something lower than God, and make a big fat lie and get away with it.

Kind of like a kid who tells a promise with his fingers crossed.

James’ point here is that you tell the truth.

And your motivation is that God is truth.

Our first point was that you are taken out of Satan’s kingdom, and you now belong to Christ’s kingdom.

Now our motivation for truth, is because we know God who is truth.

The third way that Christians pursue truth is by Speaking a Clear Truth.

James says, “let your ‘yes’ be yes and your ‘no’ be no ...”

Most people agree that lies are wrong.

We don’t like being lied to.

And you might have a hard time telling a flat out lie.

Where people struggle with the truth are what we call white lies.

These are the small lies.

The inconsequential lies.

These are often the lies that we make for approval from others.

These white lies are a deception.

They make someone believe something that isn’t true.

Sometimes they’re based off a truth, but they are embellished.

You tell people you made more money than you really did.

Thinking back about high school football, you tell people you threw for more touchdowns than you really did.

In talking about how fast you run, you take off a few seconds off your mile.

All in an effort to make yourself seem better.

To improve how people view you.

George MacDonald, was a Scottish pastor and author.

He influenced men like JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis.

He was convicted by small deceptions.

He wanted to be truthful, but found that at times he put on an air that wasn’t true.

“I always try—I think I do—to be truthful. All the same I tell a great many petty lies, e.g. things that mean one thing to myself though another to other people. But I do not think lightly of it. Where I am more often wrong is in tacitly pretending I hear things which I do not, especially jokes and good stories, the point of which I always miss; but, seeing every one laugh, I laugh too, for the sake of not looking a fool. My respect for the world’s opinion is my greatest stumbling-block, I fear.”

He was convicted about laughing at a joke, when he didn’t hear the punchline.

He would laugh because he wanted to be approved by his friends.

He didn’t want to look like a fool.

He would deceive others, because he wanted the world to respect him.

How often have you deceived others to be approved by them?

Have you ever pretended to be something that you are not, just so others will think you are a part of the crowd.

James says, “let your yes be yes and your no be no.”

This is a call for a clear answer.

You are asked a question.

But instead of telling the simple and clear truth, you hold back.

When asked a question, instead of saying yes or no, we live in the grey.

You say “maybe” when there’s no maybe.

We don’t think it’s that big of a deal.

Sometimes we even claim, “It’s just a white lie.”

As if those are given a free pass.

Acts 5, the members of the church were selling their possessions and giving them to the church.

There was a couple named Ananias and Sapphira.

They sold some of their property, but held some of it back.

They told everyone that they gave all of the proceeds.

They were asked if they gave it all, and they said yes.

But it wasn’t true.

They held some back.

I’m sure they would have said, “It’s just a white lie.”

But they were trying to win the approval of everyone else.

Claim to give everything.

The church would be happy.

Peter said, “Why is it that you contrived this in your heart? You have not lied to man but to God.”

We may think it’s not a big deal.

But when we lie, it’s a lie to God.

Not just one another, but to God Himself.

God calls for us to live with clarity.

He calls for us to speak with clarity.

Not in vagueness.

But with solid answers.

Let your yes be yes.

And your no be no.

Finally, in your pursuit of truth, beware of The Lies of Lies.

James tells us to pursue truth above all, to not swear by any created thing, but let your answers be yes or no.

And note the motivation, “so that you may not fall under condemnation.”

The lie of lies says that a little lie isn’t that important.

The lie of lies says that a lie will rescue you in your hour of need.

You find yourself in a corner, and the lie of lies says that it will free you.

That it will bring you out of danger.

The lie of lies justifies sinful behavior.

The lie of lies is that God doesn’t care about lies.

That He finds some lies acceptable.

Lies will never save.

John 8:31-32, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

And who is truth?

It’s Jesus Christ.

He is the one who saves.

He’s is the one Who is sovereign.

He is the one who rescues.

He’s the one who saved.

But what does the lie say?

The lie lies to you, saying that if you trust in him, trust in the lie, it will rescue you.

I’m not speaking allegorically, metaphorically, or philosophically.

I’m being completely blunt and serious.

When you tell a lie, you are saying, that Jesus is not powerful enough to help you in your hour of need.

You are saying that somehow, your lie will save you, because you don’t think Jesus can.

Lying becomes an example of faithlessness.

God has never put up with lying.

It’s the complete opposite of Him.

Where it shows up there are consequences.

We are to pursue truth.

But if there is a pattern of lying, then this is evidence of an unrepentant heart.

A pattern of lying, becomes evidence of a heart that does not trust in Christ.

If you see a pattern of lying in your life, you have to ask yourself if you know who God is.

If you swear by God but lie, the 10 Commandments say that God will not hold you guiltless, because you have used His name in vain.

Matthew 12:36 says, that “every careless word” will be brought into account.

Revelation 21:8 says that all liars will have their portion in the lake of fire.

How do we become a truthful people who don’t have to fear this condemnation?

Feed on truth.

Jesus prayed that His church would be sanctified in truth, John 17:17, “Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.”

If you are going to be a person who pursues truth, and speaks truth, you need to know truth.

The only way this will happen is if you are in the truth.

And I mean regularly feeding on the Word of God, and sitting under faithful preaching and teaching.

Not only do you need to know truth, but you need to know the one Who is truth.

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.”

This means you must reject the lie of lies, and accept the truth of Christ.

And completely accept Him.

Accept that you are saved only by Him and His atoning work on the Cross.

There is no other name to call upon to be saved.

That no lie will save you.

Know that Jesus is exclusive.

The lie of the world is that there are many paths to God.

There is only one path, only one way and it’s through Him.

Anything else is a lie.

Accept that you need a savior.

You need a savior, because your sins earned you Hell.

Picture the worst person that ever lived.

In your sins, you deserved to be right next to that person in Hell.

That’s what you were in your sins.

That’s also why it took Jesus Christ, the perfect and spotless lamb of God to save you.

If you weren’t that bad, than you wouldn’t have needed Jesus.

One of the lies of the world says that deep down you’re a good person.

Romans says that no one is good.

Your sins called for damnation.

And the truth is that it took Jesus to pay for your sins.

How do we pursue truth?

Become a disciple of Jesus.

That means obey what we have been given in His Word.

Fall under the Lordship of Jesus Christ.

Know that every jot and tittle, every word is to be trusted in and obeyed.

You feed your mind on that truth.

Become a student of God’s Word.

And where your thoughts differ from the Word, you bring your thoughts into subjection of it.

Where your thoughts differ from the Word of God, mark that down as a lie that you have been deceived by.

And as you feed on truth, and it becomes the standard that you love, you’ll discover your appetite changes.

Your old diet becomes repulsive and vile.

You don’t want to go back to that, because it was based on a lie.

This is the pursuit of truth.

As we wrap this up, there is something for you to consider, what have you sworn, what have you said yes to, what has freed you from condemnation?

Romans says that if you call Jesus Lord you will be saved.

This is to swear that He is not a part of creation.

He is the ruler of creation.

Eternal.

And returning to gather and to judge.

Have you sworn by Christ.

Have you said yes to Christ?

No longer being neutral about Him.

I spoke to a person recently, asking if he was a believer, and he said that he believed that Jesus was a way.

Not really a yes or no answer.

You’ve got to say yes to Christ.

Have you said yes to Christ?

Have you acknowledge that there is no other name in all of creation?

And do you have a confidence that you will not fall under condemnation.

Hebrews 9:27 says that it is appointed for man to die, then face judgment.

Do you have confidence that when that day comes you will survive?

Your sins call for condemnation.

They call for Hell.

But for you in Christ, there is no condemnation.

Because He took it for you.

You see, faith must be active.

And you must answer these questions with an affirmative.

Do so today.

One of the weird things about internet church, is I don’t get to see you.

I want to know how the Lord is changing you.

If it’s time for you to say yes to Christ, let me know.