It has been said that the first lesson of being a Christian is, “be true.” And the second lesson of being a Christian is, “be true.” The third lesson of being a Christian is, “be true.” How are we to do that? A rudimentary answer comes from Scripture itself. The third commandment God gave to Moses was, “thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.” When Jesus gave the sample prayer (that we call the Lord’s prayer) he began with the phrase, “hallowed be thy name.” Now we come to the text of today’s blog. It says, “But above all things, my brethren, swear not…” How do these injunctions fit into today’s conversations? Are we breaking the commandment, are we ignoring how hallowed/respectful should be the way we treat the name of God, are we misrepresenting the profession we make as Christians if we swear?
In today’s conversations there are various phrases that easily qualify for the breaking of these injunctions. For instance: oh God, Lordy, Jesus God Almighty, gosh, and many other vain uses. The question before us is whether or not we have a specific reason (as in swearing a court oath to tell the truth ) which is to take an oath based on our relationship with God or are we using God’s name in a careless way as an emphasis? Unfortunately, it could be easy for a person to make needless or useless exclamations involving the name of God. We must consider whether our speech is profane or providential. When we speak, is it purposeless or is it for a specific purpose? The world being what it is, common conversation can include words that do not have right meanings. The implication is that we could clearly be assuming our relationship with God in an unreal manner. We do not take other people’s names in vain to make a point or to express an emotion. We do not say for George’s sake or oh George. This careless use of words is in violation of David’s request to God, “Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth; keep the door of my lips.” (Psalm 141: 3)
The last words of our text should receive special attention. It is a warning that tells us we should be careful that we do not allow ourselves to fall into condemnation. God takes note of what we say. He knows who has ignored the simple injunction against taking his name in vain. No religion in the entire world has the name of their founder or leaders taken in vain for some type of exclamation or for emphasis. Does this not indicate some evil at the root, the very basis, of what nonbelievers are encouraged to present to others? If we are to claim ourselves separate, certainly we must abide by the words that David just said above. If we are to think of ourselves as upright people, godly people, we must monitor the words we say. That is why James said that our yes should be yes and our no should be no. There should be no excuse and no explanation for how we talk.
Our lips are an indication of our relationship with Christ and how sincere it is. The words we say should be consistent with instructions and commands from the Scriptures. The conversation we offer to the world must simply be that of what a Christian would say without any extended or additional thoughts. How we talk could be an indication that we have fallen into condemnation from God or that we have never had a true relationship with him even though we go through all the rudiments of what religion tells us.
Christian Writer 