The Freedom of Truthfulness: Living Authentically in a Dishonest World

Bob: 00:00

The interesting thing about lying is one lie leads to another lie, because once you get caught in the lie, you have to make up another lie to try to cover up the lie that you got caught in. Yeah, right. So there's no end to that, that cycle, but it's impacting you. It's just like any other sin, it destroys you. It's destroying you. It's eating you from the inside out, so don't let it. Jesus is really saying that to say, look, be free.

Nathan: 00:35

Hey, what's up? I'm Nathan, and I want to welcome you back to the love shape life podcast, where we live in our dream, or talk about our dream to see, experience and live in the wonder of God's radical love. We are in season six, episode six, and I'm here in the studio with my friend Bob, and we are looking forward to another fantastic conversation as we work through this incredible section of teaching by Jesus, where he lays out five he takes five guidelines from the ancient Hebrew text. Speaks them into the culture. People were familiar with them, but what he does is he takes them to a whole new level, as he talks about what it's like to be Kingdom people who are salt and light in their culture, in their communities, in their homes, their families.

Bob: 01:25

Yeah, it's exciting. You know, again, the teachings of Jesus and his very first outing, speaking publicly, laying the foundation of his kingdom. And what it's all about, it's totally opposite the kingdoms that we're used to that are ruled by force. This one's built on love. This is a spiritual kingdom. This is a kingdom that will not only transform individual lives, but also enable them to be instruments in God's hands, to impact and transform other people's lives. And it's a kingdom that is built little by little, but ultimately will be the largest Kingdom ever built.

Nathan: 02:02

That's right. So, and I want to say, in just as we come into this episode, say again, this idea of, you know, if your exposure to religion and to God etc has been rules and negativity has been do this, do that, shove down your throat, whatever it's been. What I want to say is just put that on the back burner, or throw it out altogether, and give Jesus a chance to tell you the true story about the kingdom and the thing he's developing. Let him speak hope and speak a new story of God into your life. That's what we think is worth doing, because, as we see it, the story of Jesus is attractive and compelling. And a lot of the stuff we believed before, a lot of the stuff we see in society around us is just religious garbage. A lot of the stuff Jesus is confronting is straight up religious garbage. And Jesus himself is reframing, in a sense, deconstructing, stripping away the garbage, holding up the beautiful gems of truth, saving the baby, discarding the bath water. We want to invite you to let that happen at your pace, but give it a chance to happen. We think that's worth it. Yeah,

Bob: 03:22

I, you know, I was sharing with a friend the other day, and I was actually thanking God that he sustained me long enough through what I want to call the fog of religion to see his beauty. Because oftentimes that garbage that you're talking about, if you focus on the garbage is enough to just throw it all out, right, right? But in the midst of all that, God is working. And just like you said, give God a chance. Because, you know, just like the fog, the sun, the sun comes up, it burns it off and ends up with a beautiful, clear sky, God will do the same. That's right, that's right. So I don't think it's a matter of like, gritting your teeth and hanging in there. I think it's leaning into God. That's saying God just, just teach me, take away the garbage and just teach me the simplicity of your ways, and he'll do that, right? And it's this, you know, like the apostle Paul said in the book of Philippians, Philippians, it's a the height and depth and breadth of God's love, right? So that's, that was his prayer for the Ephesians. That's his prayer for for really those who've gone after and that's really our prayer for our audience and for everyone that is listening, that that God would open our eyes to see the height and depth and breadth of his love, and as a result of that, what the what Paul said was we would be filled with all of his fullness. Man, imagine that just being filled with the ability to love the way Jesus loved, right?

Nathan: 04:52

Yes, yes, yep. And there are beautiful people in the world, in society. Beauty, that have discovered that beauty and are living it out, yes. And so yes, we see lots of brokenness in the world, lots of brokenness in people, and yet, recognizing that there are gems and jewels who have discovered the wonder of Jesus and are living that out in everyday lives of kindness, of goodness, where God is showing up in deeds of beauty.

Bob: 05:26

And that's the privilege that we have here. In love shaped life. Our goal is to help people see, experience and live the radical love of God. That's it. We're also, you know, we're on a journey, just like anybody else, and God's continually to open our eyes to see more of it, because there's no end to it, right, right? Like the size of the universe, there's no end to the size of the universe, yeah, and growing in an understanding of God and seeing his beauty, there's no end to it, which is wonderful, yeah, absolutely, for that. So we have the privilege of being on that journey, and then being able to share that journey here through our podcast, our blogs, or our resource material that's can be found at loveshape dot life

Nathan: 06:04

right, which includes, probably by the time this podcast is released, includes potentially at least a second book in the works. And one of the things I want to highlight that we do offer is spiritual wellness coaching and one on one coaching, or groups virtually, where we are just walking with you as you let God operate in your life, walking with you, working through the kinks of maybe bad experience in the past. Maybe you're totally new to the Jesus way. Maybe you just need someone to help you find the ropes, or maybe your whole experience with the Jesus story has been toxic, and you need someone to walk beside you and help you shed the toxic and discover the wonder of Jesus. So spiritual wellness coaching is about someone walking beside you as you lean into God's love, and that's that for us is central, is core to what we do. Sure, we like to create resources, right? We do that, but our real goal is that connection with people, individuals, groups of people, and saying, listen, we've seen God's beauty. We experience God's beauty, and we would love to do whatever we can to help you experience that beauty too. Yeah.

Bob: 07:18

And oftentimes we hear this phrase being used by people deconstruction, right? So think of coaching as somebody walking alongside you through your deconstruction process. Yes, and not only deconstruction, but being rebuilt. Rebuilt.

Nathan: 07:31

Yeah, exactly. So we're in this where Jesus has these five sayings he pulls from the ancient text, sayings that were familiar to the people of his time, that focused on externals, the outside. The first one was, Don't murder. He's like, Yeah, don't murder. Like, don't kill anybody. But and then Jesus took it deeper. He said, actually, the real command is about God changing the heart how we view and think of other people. Get the hatred out. Get the anger out. Like, let's change how we see people. Because the upstream is that I have bad if I have a the thoughts and feelings inside of me, the upstream downstream ends up deforming and ultimately destroying me as a human being.

Bob: 08:17

Yeah, you know, because what was happening in the day was that the religious leaders focus the people and their religion on outward observances, right? It was all outward, right? And oftentimes in religion today, that's the same thing. It's about outward. You know, everything's outward, but Jesus talked about cleansing first, that which was within, right, right? So that he and you're talking about God, the power of God working in our hearts and our life and changing human beings from the inside out. Yep, right. And it's not about us. Let you know, we've mentioned before on previous podcast stuff us trying to reach some moral standard on our own. It's about God changing our hearts to enable us to live in such a way.

Nathan: 08:59

That's right. And the second one, the second saying was about marriage and adultery, where Jesus was holding this high standard of preserving the most important human relationship in society as a means of raising the bar of relational wellness in the culture. So the next thing this, third one that Jesus holds up is right here. We're reading from Matthew five. Again, this is the first biography of four in the New Testament, as it's often called, The Book of Matthew, one of the followers of Jesus, chapter 533, to 37 again, you have heard that it was said to the people long ago, do not break your oath, but fulfill to the Lord the vows you have made. But I tell you, do not swear an oath at all, either by heaven, for it is God's throne, or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great king. And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make even one hair white. White or black. All you need to say is simply yes or no. Anything beyond this comes from the evil one.

Bob: 10:08

Wow. Anything beyond this, anything beyond a simple yes or no, comes from the evil one, you know. So it was very common in the day to make these oaths, you know, these pledges, you know, I'll never do it again. I swear by God's throne. I swear by the Earth. Whatever you're swearing by, you're making these pledges that you're not going to do something again, or you're going to do something, you know, right, right? You know you're promising to do something. And the nature of human beings is our promises are just like sand running through our hands, you know, just like water run through our hands, because, apart from the power of God, we're nothing, right? Jesus said, Without me, you can do nothing, so all our pledges become pretty much useless. And Jesus was saying, Stop with us, nonsense, basically, right? Because you're just lying, right? You're lying, and you're creating a way to propagate your lie or continue in it, right? Because you're never really going to fulfill the oath. And he just said, stop that. Just let your answer be yes or no, right?

Nathan: 11:15

So here's simple it's done. It is and back in the in the kind of the origins of this law, which is interesting, all the other laws, Jesus has said, you heard, they said this. And then he kind of doubles down, in a sense, or raises the bar, don't commit adultery. And then he says, actually, if you look at a woman to lust after her, you're committing adultery in your heart, the one before that. You've heard that it was said, Don't murder. But I tell you, if you hate somebody, so he raises the bar in this one, it's interesting. He said, Actually, just get rid of the oath. So this is one case in which Jesus, in this context, is actually overturning an ancient practice. Why is that? Because originally this, this oath taking was guideline was put in place so people took promises seriously. But what had happened over time is that now people were using an oath to to put the seal of truthfulness on whatever statement they said. It was kind of way of anchoring their statement in truth. The implication is that if I don't somehow certify like a certified letter, if I don't certify my words as true, they may or may not be true. So the oath had actually become a doorway to inadvertently create space for untruthfulness or half truths to find a life of their own. And so Jesus is actually coming in and saying that original solution worked then, but it doesn't work anymore because of how it's been twisted. So what I'm telling you to do is just get rid of all that oath taking just be people of integrity. We've talked about how Jesus is raising the bar, right? So why does he go here? This seems like something, so it's kind of, I mean, murder and adultery, like that's big deal. Why would Jesus say come down to this where he's talking about, again, he chooses five things, right? Yeah, five examples. Why does his third example is it simply the call for people to establish integrity of communication.

Bob: 13:28

Well, I think that's a that's a powerful thought. And remember what he called us all to be was Salt and Light, right? So, you are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world. We were the salt of the earth. We were designed to to demonstrate to the world what God was like. You know, he's calling his followers and his people to live in that space, right, to be His ambassadors in this world. You're the light of the world. What a powerful thing that through us, through sinful human beings. God wants to so shape our lives, that our lives are resembling him, and people are seeing him and us, right? So this whole way of communicating is so important, because, as a man thinks in his heart, so is he right? So what we're thinking is who we're becoming. What I'm speaking is who I am, right, out of the heart, right, right? Identifies who I am when I'm speaking. Right? Exactly. So, so Jesus is saying, look, look at we. We need to clean it up, clean it up, and we need to clean it up, and we need to clean up how we're communicating with people, yes, and making sure, like you're saying, We're people of integrity, right? A word does have value, right? And so this oath taking is not working that should get rid Exactly. Get rid of it. Get rid of it. Ever wonder what it's like to truly experience God's love at love shape life. We're here to guide you on that journey through our weekly emails, podcasts, blogs, coaching and more. We're helping. People just like you discover the transformative power of Divine Love, join

Nathan: 15:05

our community at love shaped dot life and be part of a movement that's changing lives. Love shaped life your partner in the journey of seeing, experiencing and living God's love. I mean, you look at this, at our society today, or let's just take before, before we go there just a society in general, a civilization in general, is built on kind of what, what we might call the and I know there's a technical term that I'm not going to get right, but like the common covenant, is the assumption that if you say something to me, I can trust that to be true, like there is a fundamental transactional trustworthiness in society. If that fundamental transactional truthfulness is broken, the society loses its capacity to function. So you look at our political system, you look at our churches, you look at the churches, you look at any any of our religious any part of society. And we're at a crisis of integrity, a crisis of truthfulness. We don't know if the ad we're seeing is telling us the truth. We don't know if the news we're watching is telling us the truth. We don't know who's spinning behind it, which organization is behind the telling of this thing? We don't know if the statistics have been manipulated or collected in such a way as to make the case in favor of the person putting forth the specific agenda, or if these are are factual, like we're really at a crisis of functioning as a society, because this fundamental question of truthfulness and integrity in communication has been broken. Jesus saw that coming, that a society that loses its integrity once that general contract of trustworthiness, once that's broken, society is impossible. You know,

Bob: 17:04

Time Magazine, this several years ago, had a cover article and it said lying, everybody's doing it. Because it was just talking about the problem of lying in our society. And that was years ago, and now it's just gotten worse. Like you said, we don't know what to believe and what not right when it comes to the news, unless you just happen to adhere to a certain bias. I want to call it a certain bias. So you cling to a certain news outlet and you think that is what truth is right. That is what is right, because they're saying it, but that's not correct, right? Because Jesus is also saying, and let your yes be yes and your no be No. Is that a partial truth is still a lie, right? Right? So we call it spinning, right, right? What kind of a spin are we going to put on it? We're going to we're going to proclaim a certain thing, but it's not the whole truth, and then we're just going to

Nathan: 18:00

spin it right. It's enough of the truth to get what I want. Yeah, and cause

Bob: 18:04

confusion. And, you know, Jesus told the Pharisees really a powerful thing in John chapter eight, he said, You are of your father, the devil, and the lies of the Father, you will do because he, he is a liar, and the father of it. He said, listen, the devil is the father of lies. And what was, what was even crazier, he told the religious leaders, that's your father. You have this covering that you're serving me and that you're communicating who God is, but where you're communicating is a lie, yes, in the real God behind this cover of religion is the devil himself. That's

Nathan: 18:48

right, that's a powerful thing, yeah, powerful thing. His whole system is grounded from the beginning of the rebellion. His whole thing was grounded in twisting truth, in lying. And so, about God, about God, right? About God, about God. So just you know, as Jesus is talking about raising the bar, that a culture of integrity, where my word is dependable, Jesus is saying the kingdom people are people who are people of integrity. You were talking about this idea of lies being pervasive, and I was thinking about this thought of the white lie. Doesn't mean that a little what we call white lie, does it mean the little white lie is going to cause a bunch of trouble in the short term. No. But what Jesus recognized is that once I accommodate the little white lie that I begin to compromise. In other words, it's the upstream these little compromises we make with with the principles of A. Functioning civilization. Once we start that path, the downstream is a matter of next steps.

Bob: 20:07

Yeah, and like the Bible says, a little leaven, Leavens, the whole lot, right, right? So it's the little things that will eventually leaven right. Yeast is going to impact the whole bread, right? The whole dough, and eventually bring bread. So a little lie will eventually impact your whole life, right? So what it's saying is, what we're doing is we're identifying in the enemy's camp, right? And yes, and that's why Jesus said, Look, just let it be yes or no, yes, nothing else. Don't. No partial truths, no spins on something. No need to cover yourself up to make yourself look good. If you've done wrong, admit that you've done wrong. That's all there is to it. Be honest. Be be truthful, no matter what the consequences, just be truthful. Tell the truth. Right? So that's what he's trying to raise the bar right of integrity amongst the salt and light people is to be men and women who tell the truth, right? You know, there's a little saying in regard to relationship. It says this good communication leads to understanding. Understanding leads to trust, and trust leads to love. Wow, see. So in regard to restoring relationships with people, right? Good communication. It'll lead to understanding, I'm understanding you, right, beautiful. Which can lead me to trust you, right? Which is going to lead to a love relationship, right? That's good between neighbors, absolutely, between husbands and wives, between parents and their children, and their parents, right? It's being men and women who are committed to allowing God to live in them, to tell the truth. No need to cover anything up, right? No need to cover anything up. Listen, God's love for you has not changed and will not change. So he's in your corner. We all do wrong. We all are like Adam and Eve sometimes, right? They Adam and Eve sinned, and they immediately covered themselves up, right? Right? Because they're ashamed, right? Because often times we're ashamed, so we cover things up. The interesting thing about lying is one lie leads to another lie, because once you get caught in the lie, you have to make up another lie to try to cover up the lie that you got caught in Yeah, right. So there's no end to that, that cycle, but it's impacting you. It's just like any other sin, it destroys you. It's destroying you. It's eating you from the inside out. So don't let it. Jesus is really saying that to say, look, be free. Don't allow the enemy to to grab a hold of your heart again and take you captive, just like the adultery, right? Lusting at the woman inside, just like hating a person turns into murder. Don't allow resentments and so on. Don't allow not telling the truth to be a part of your character, because, right? Because in God's kingdom, it's all about character. In the world, it's about your reputation, right? And there's a difference between reputation and character. You can look like one thing outside the door and the people even on social media, and you can be another thing behind the door. But with God, it's about who you are behind the door, and Jesus came to restore the character of God and you and me, right? So that we can be the same person behind the door is the same person outside the door. Amen. That's sweet, that's sweet, that's sweet.

Nathan: 23:26

I loved what you said. It brought back I thought I had earlier in this episode. What you said, it's not about like what happens on the outside, but what it does to you on the inside. I love that concept that you know, we think, Well, I can get away with such and such. And here's the reality, you don't get away with it. You don't even if nobody catches you, yeah, because when we engage in wrong, when we engage in, in this case, lying, when we engage in that, we're not getting away from it in that it's impacting us, whether or not we ever get in trouble for it, whether anyone else is the Wiser because of what we because of our lies, we're still impacted by it. So the thing with evil is that we may, technically, in a superficial sense, do the thing without being caught, but our act of doing it has created injury within us that is not escapable, correct,

Bob: 24:27

destroying. I think we need to look at it this way that the principles found in this book are life giving. They're created for our happiness. They're created for our joy. They're created for our fulfillment, the greatest experience you're gonna have in life is choosing to live in harmony with God in His ways. But when we step outside of living in these ways, even though we don't get caught, the character is being changed within. So in losing our joy, we're losing our peace. We're becoming unrestful. It's affecting us. It's just like cancer, right? Just think of it as a poison that you've chosen to drink a poison. That's why I just want to appeal to anybody in the audience, if this is the life you're living, if you're if you realize that you've been lying, or perhaps living a lie, come clean with God. It's a safe place to go. God is a safe place to go. Run to God. Don't run from God. That's right, that's the beautiful thing about it. Yeah, this wrong picture of God is that if you've done something wrong, well, God's angry with you, and so you better go hide in the corner and go nonsense God. It's all nonsense. It's all a lie that God is going to punish you. No, you are being punished right now because of the choices that you're making. So the punishment is the consequences of the choices, right, right, right, and that's the guilt, the shame, whatever you're living. So I would just want to give you the good news is Jesus came to set you free. Jesus died that you might be forgiven. Jesus died that you might have a new heart and a new life, no matter where you're at, right? Just come clean with God is better than anything, right? If, if we've stolen something, return what you've stolen, right? So I was in a I was with a group, and, and this lady showed up, and she happened to be works for the United States government. She was a male person, okay? And she showed up with a box and and the box was the things that she had been stealing from delivering people's mail. Oh, wow, and she asked us to return them for her, because she wanted her heart to be right, because she realized the most important thing was our hearts mean right with God. That's the greatest joy. That's that's the greatest thing you can do. So if, if we're lying before God, if we got wrongs to be made right between with an individual, we need to go and make those wrongs right so that we can be free, right? And then, by His grace, we're not making a pledge that I'll never lie again, because you will lie again, apart from the grace of God. The only way you might not lie again is if Christ is living in you every day, right, right? Yeah. And if we do lie, we confess our wrongs, not only to God, but to whoever that we perhaps lied to, right, right? Because sometimes, you know, we're in situations and somebody says something catches us off God guard, and we respond to it only then it's like, Why did I say that? You don't think you ever done that, right? It's like, Why did I even say that? Right? Maybe to cover my own embarrassment, but, but just go make it right, right? It's okay, and those people will respect you more for coming and and making something right, right, versus covering it up.

Nathan: 27:45

Yep, yep. So there's, there is this, this teaching in this book of Proverbs, part of the ancient wisdom literature of the Hebrew people. And it's chapter one, and it's a fascinating piece of instruction, my son of sinful men, entice you. Do not give in to them. If they say, come along with us. Let's lie and wait for innocent blood. Let's ambush some harmless soul. Let's swallow them alive like the grave and whole like those who go down to the pit. We will get all sorts of valuable things and fill our houses with plunder. Cast lots with us. We will all share the loot. My son, do not go along with them. Do not set foot on their paths, for their feet rush into evil. They are swift to shed blood. How useless to spread a net where every bird can see it. Here's the catch. These men lie in wait for their own blood. They ambush only themselves. So here's this example, the king, whoever the wise man is writing the text. He says, Listen, if some some fellows around town, they say, Hey, we're going to go rip off a joint tonight. Come join us. We'll split. You know, we'll split. Everybody evenly. Will all take a part of a part of the part of the the pot, whatever. And the writer says, don't, because what's actually happening is they think they're gonna rip the joint off. Yeah, they might succeed, but the process and the action is actually ripping themselves off. So the illusion that I'm doing evil and getting away from it and benefiting from it is only an illusion. The evil I do is actually working something in me that in fact, as this writer says, These men lie in wait for their own blood, the thing I'm plotting to do and get away with is actually setting a trap of destroying myself.

Bob: 29:46

There you go. Living outside of the framework of God's way, right? Is a self destructive pain. It's a plot against my own life. And, you know, again, the concept of peer pressure, the concept of, you know. So I need to lie to cover something up. These are all the things that we face in life. You know, different challenges we face in life, but the safest path is to follow what Jesus was teaching. Let your Yes be Yes, and your no be No, yes, be real clear. Then you become men and women, of the kingdom of God,

Nathan: 30:23

right and integrity begins inside. Again, the path is not trying to be absolutely like focusing our lives our minds on being absolutely truthful. It's leaning into Jesus, who shapes our heart so that our lives are truthful. Again, that it's not a direct path. It's the indirect path of leaning, in some words by Bonhoeffer, if I can't, yeah, sure, untruthfulness destroys fellowship, but truth cuts false fellowship to pieces and establishes genuine brotherhood. Wow. Can you read that again? Untruthfulness destroys fellowship, we could say destroys community or connection. It does, but truth cuts false fellowship to pieces that is just surface relationships and establishes genuine Brotherhood or genuine connection. Beautiful,

Bob: 31:22

that's it, you know. It destroys community. It destroys relationships, you know. And it destroys you, absolutely, yeah. But the the upside of telling the truth, it builds relationships right, and stronger relationships, and it builds a stronger you, absolutely, that's right, and a more joyful you, and happier Yes, you know.

Nathan: 31:48

So the takeaway, see, experience, live. What would you say is the C?

Bob: 31:59

I would say the C is that God doesn't lie. I was thinking

Nathan: 32:06

the same thing the integrity of God, which we really didn't highlight. But the integrity of God is that He is a God who is always communicating, telling the truth.

Bob: 32:18

And it is we know it was the devil that lied in the beginning, in the dark of Eden, and like Jesus said, He's the father of lies, right? So the sea is seeing that God is is a truth telling. He is truth. He doesn't lie, right, right? And experience, experience is thanks to him, he can change my heart to make me the same,

Nathan: 32:45

right? And and I think part of this too is the experience that I'm authentically outside what I am inside, because God's changing my heart so I'm truly an authentic person. It's not a put on, it's not a charade, it's not a social media spin. I'm authentically in real life, authentically beautiful inside, and so the reality outside is an authentic reflection of the inside, like that's God's goal, is to have people who are authentically good from inside to outside representing him exactly. And I think that overlaps with the living that the person on the inside, shaped by the goodness of God, is beautiful in their interactions with people. And you

Bob: 33:29

can lay down at night, put your head on the pillow and have a sweet sleep.

Nathan: 33:33

You got nothing to hide, nothing to run from.

Bob: 33:36

Your conscience is evolving, right? Exactly.

Nathan: 33:39

So if you're enjoying what you're hearing, we would love for you to share with a friend. Love for you to share one of our reels on your Facebook, Instagram, whatever social media feed you have. We would also love it if you would like and subscribe. So until next time, lean into the love shaped life.

Nathan: 34:02

You Steve, thank you so much for tuning into the love shaped life podcast. We hope you find this podcast not only inspirational, but life changing. Here at love shaped life, we're working to create a community, an online community, in fact, where individuals like you can connect with each other and lean into God's love together.

Bob: 34:23

We also provide spiritual wellness coaching, where we walk alongside people to help them to see the beauty of God's character, discover if there's anything that might be hindering them from finding the healing power that's in that love.

Nathan: 34:36

And as you might have expected, love shaped life is crowd funded individuals like you give generously to make this dream a reality. If you'd like to join that crowd, you can give today at loveshape, dot life you.