Faithbase

welcome again to thinking about the Bible and thinking about God's law we are at the ninth yes we're at the ninth commandment you shall not bear false witness against your neighbor and in ancient Israel this would have played out one of two ways and and we think about it in our world a little bit differently probably but first of all in the courtroom you don't bear false witness against your neighbor you don't and we talked about this earlier when we mentioned that the command against using God's name in vain would also include false swearing and then making testimony that would in fact be false but in this case is specifically about our neighbor about the neighbor in ancient Israel you don't make false testimony in a courtroom you don't try to convict somebody through your lies and if you do you're gonna pay a price for that the scripture bears it out also according to the case law you would then be subject to the same punishment that you were trying to inflict on it on that other person but the other side of this is just the rumor mongering and the inappropriate talk about people in the community and that's also talked about or fleshed out a bit in the Old Testament along with the idea of the courtroom so in either case we don't speak falsely about our neighbor that's not something that is ever appropriate you shall not bear false witness against your neighbor now for us today of course it'd be the same thing in a courtroom we we don't commit perjury obviously there's laws against that in our nation and there is likewise it is prohibited by God's Word simply that we aren't tailbearers we aren't rumor mongers we aren't people who talk about other folks now when we look at these kinds of laws it's easy for us to to justify our behaviors justify talking about somebody else I've heard so many times a rumor wrapped up in a prayer request or a slander wrapped up in a prayer request over the years as a Christian and as a pastor and have failed some sometimes have failed to call that out but we need to be careful of that you and I can think about God's law today and say to ourselves in what ways have I born false witness against my neighbor in what ways have I spoke against my co-worker in what ways have I slandered my family member or whoever it might be and be considering that our responsibility to this law remains in force remains a factor and again to show love to another person is to speak well of them not to speak ill of them so today as we think about God's law I encourage you to think about the ways that you may have failed this and ask the Lord to forgive you and think about ways that you can counter this kind of thing to either stand up for the other person when you hear a slander or a rumor or simply to be one who speaks good things about your neighbor God bless you I'll see you again tomorrow