Speak the Truth to Each Other

Read Zechariah 8

The guy flies by you in his fancy sports car with a duct tape fix on his left rear taillight then swoops right in front of you.  What was wrong with the two miles of empty interstate ahead that he couldn’t have gone a couple more car lengths before he changed lanes.

Now you find yourself on his bumper and you are angry, so you anger lingers and you ride his bumper for the next 22 miles before you have to get a better station on the radio or pick out an 8-Track tape and lose you interest in the yahoo leading this pairing of knuckleheads.

Fortunately for me, my new car will back off when an idiot armed with a car cuts in front of me.  It keeps a safe distance.  I don’t let my anger burn for very long.

We can get angry and then not be angry a short time later, often the transition goes unnoticed by us.  It’s some yahoo, some idiot, some stranger with whom I have no other relationship with other than we share the same road.  Anger passes.

When you deal with loved ones, anger can be more intense and sometimes more lasting.  Most people hold in their anger for a long time and put up with a whole lot, until one day OMG!  Here comes the anger and everything built up behind it.

It was sort of like that with God.  He loved his people.  He put up with much apostacy.  He warned his people and they did not listen.  He warned and they did not listen.  He warned and they did not listen.

Some of you might be thinking of raising your teenagers.  Others might be thinking to their own teenage years.  Warned but did not listen.  Warned but did not listen.

OK, for some it was their thirties and forties before they listened.

God showed much mercy and grace to his own chosen people until he decided that enough was enough and stood back from protecting them from the nations around them and let them be scattered to Syria and Babylon.  

Others fled the pagan conquerors to parts unknown.  But even this judgment executed by the pagans was God’s love.  He would not forget his people or let them grow even farther away from him.

Enough was enough and many of God’s people went into captivity.  And then God thought that enough was enough and he returned them to the land that he had given them.  But what relationship would God and his people enjoy?

God kept the enemies away and sent rains in season and the people began to prosper once again.  The people started feeling good about themselves once again, but did God feel good about them?

Would they return to their former ways?  Would the sinful and selfish human heart rule them once again? 

God, through the prophet Zechariah, sent words of counsel.

“Speak the truth to each other, and render true and sound judgment in your courts; do not plot evil against each other, and do not love to swear falsely. I hate all this,” declares the Lord.

We don’t see God using the H-word too much in our Bibles.  God hates the practices of the Nicolaitans.  God hates divorce.  God hates falsehood.

You want to anger your heavenly Father, then reject truth and embrace falsehood.  We will always be his children and he will never stop loving us, but that does not mean that he likes everything that we do.

We will never know his wrath—his condemning anger that will one day be poured out on an unrepentant world—but we should heed his warnings nonetheless.

God speaking through the prophet to his chosen people said speak the truth.  These words were for his chosen people, people who traced their bloodline back to Abraham.

We should heed this counsel not because of our human blood but because of the divine bloods shed for us.  God wants good for us and his words are for our own good.

So, when God says speak the truth we must understand that it is for our own good. 

But how can I speak the truth in a world where the truth is seldom to be found?  Television, Facebook, Twitter, and other media seem so imbued with bias that even if you get the facts the truth is often obscured in the telling.

How can I speak the truth?  I will give you the only counsel that I remember about public speaking.  Put on the best clothes that you have and talk about what you know.

I’m sure that the former is lesser than the latter.  That is, the clothing is less important than talking about what you know.

But how do I know what is true so I can speak the truth.  Are the Russians meddling in our elections?  Of course they are and so are the Chinese.  The Chinese are better at it and more patient but we are not called to be media referee when we speak the truth.  We must speak what we know to be true.

What?  That I made my kids peanut butter sandwiches for lunch today?

What?  That I still need to do laundry.

What?  That I don’t care what a she-shed is?

Is that the truth that I am to speak?   That’s what I can say with certainty.  Is that to be the extent of my conversation?

How about this for things that you can say and they are the truth.

God is good.

God is love.

God loves us.

We are to love one another.

I could continue but I won’t.  You can continue that list.  We have wristbands that can help you with that truth.  God loves you.  Love one another.  We can say these things and know them to be the truth.

Seek justice.  Love mercy.  Walk humbly with your God.  Can we not advise each other in this truth from the Lord. 

Zechariah would say render judgments that are true and sound.  Don’t plot evil.  Don’t love falsehood.

OK, I get the don’t plot evil and don’t love falsehood but I haven’t been called for jury duty in 30 years and I got out of that one so I don’t know about rendering judgments. 

There may come a time when you are called and do serve as part of a court, but most here hold court many times a week.  If you have children, you hold court.  Render judgments that are sound and true.

There is much that we can say that is the truth and never turn on the television and log on to the internet.  I know it’s hard to resist jumping into those online melees.  I usually don’t.  There is no real discussion there.  You like something or you don’t but the posted exchanges resemble artillery barrages more than sound discussions.

Sometimes I jump in anyway.  How could I not.  If people would read my post, that would settle everything.  How can you still think that way?  You read my post.

The prophet advised his people that one day their feasts would truly be those of joy and gladness.  The more his people obeyed the instructions God had given them, the more they would know happiness in this life.

We have the same promises in this age.  Draw near to God and he will draw near to you.  Seek his kingdom and his righteousness and he will provide all of those things that the pagans have made into their gods.

Come to God.  Bring your burdens.  Receive his rest.  Take his yoke and learn from him.

The truth is and we must speak it daily is that God loves us very much.  We should be more concerned about taking that truth to this lost world than any political, social, or religious discourse that will not endure the age.

Speak the truth.  Begin with God loves you.  Help people get to Jesus is Lord!  Help them study the word and live as his disciples, who just happen to be known by our love.

Let’s consider the full clause as we find it in the prophecy.  Speak the truth to each other.  We should always speak the truth but it will often fall on deaf ears in the world that rejects God, but it will be encouragement to those of us who seek him.

Speaking the truth may be countered by the world’s falsehoods, but among believers it is received with joy and gladness by God’s people.

It is important that we speak the truth and beneficial that we speak the truth to each other.  God hates falsehood.  We must be people of the truth.  Speak the truth to each other.

A few facts and much speculation make gossip and rumors addictive.  

Being the first to know seems to give us power.  Thinking that we have some information that somebody else doesn’t seems like it gives us a leg up on our competition.  But these things are not about truth.

Speak the truth to each other.  We know so much that is true.

God is good.

God is love.

God loves us.

We are to love one another.

The directions that God gave us are for our own good.  How do we keep these things in the forefront of our minds?

Here’s a thought that God gave to his people a long time ago.

These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.  Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.

God not only gave us directives for our own good but direction on how to internalize these directives.

Let’s be people of the truth.  Let us speak the truth because of who we are.  Let us make an extra effort to speak the truth to one another.

Regardless of what the world says, speak the truth.

Amen.