Be a Person of Integrity- Honesty by Francis Chan

so we're just saying that song I found a love greater than life itself I want you to think about that phrase I mean can you because I know you all love this relationship with Jesus Christ and I know you're here because you enjoy this knowledge of God and the salvation he brings but you know think about those words I I found a love that's greater than life itself like God's love is this treasure that is so great that everything else pales in comparison I hope you're you're not here because you're hoping that this Jesus will get you something you know it's more this Jesus that you found makes everything else seem pretty obsolete it's this love that's better than anything else you can find in this life and I and I hope you really believe that I hope you mean that as we sing that song and we think it through before I get my message there's a few things I want to clarify from previous messages I seem to do this like every two or three weeks or I kind of apologize for the last two weeks um but let me just clarify a couple of things that I said a couple weeks ago I I read an email from a 65 year old woman and I referred her as elderly and I got a lot of emails after that saying 65 is not elderly anymore because now life expectancy is older and so 65 is considered middle-aged still if you want to believe that that's great and I'll go with it because that makes me an adolescent again and what will happen with that um on another note I was that wasn't a real good apology was it um their note on a more serious note last week I gave a message is pretty heavy and some people had a had issue with it and questioned some of the things that I said and I I want to I want to clarify some things and I know that some of the things I said last week were unfamiliar but that does not make it unbiblical okay just because you're not used to hearing it a certain way and people don't normally say it like that it doesn't make it unbiblical in fact as I look back at my notes and look at all the passages I go you know what that was absolutely biblical in fact and this is this whole idea of when someone is in that type of gross sin you know and calling himself a Christian that do we have the right to ask them not to come well first Corinthians 5 and remember the passage is out of first Corinthians 6 that we talk if you turn back to 1st Corinthians 5 and how he closes the chapter in first Corinthians 5 and put on the screen starting in verse 11 Paul says this now I'm writing to you that you must must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy and idolaters or a slander a drunkard or a swindler with such a man do not even eat what business is it of mine to judge those outside the church are you not to judge those inside God will judge those outside expel the wicked man from among you okay now that's not a passage you hear taught very often it's not a passage that believers bring up and for that reason sometimes we have things backwards I mean it says at the end there he says you know what business of it of mine is to judge those outside the church are you not to judge those inside and I believe Christians have this backwards all over the place where we judge those outside in the outside of this room we judge the world and that is so wrong the Bible tells us not to do that I mean here Christians all the time going oh those evil unbelievers those pagans and it's like you know what leave them alone what the Bible says is what we ought to be do is looking looking inside this room and judging one another those of us who call ourselves believers he says you know if there are people who are in this room they call themselves believers but they're living that type of immoral lifestyle or that greedy lifestyle or that that wicked like deceiving weapon he says you don't don't even eat with those people in fact he says expel the wicked man from among you so if anything last week maybe I was too gentle if anything with this issue because the Bible makes us a command says to expel the wicked man from among you so I guess what I'm saying is I don't take back anything that I said last week in fact I put an exclamation point on it and say you know what that it's very biblical but and be careful because we hear so many messages in the world and every once in a while you'll hear something that's so unique but it's clearly in Scripture don't throw it out of your mind or say that it's wrong just because it doesn't feel like what you normally hear check it out stay the Word of God and if you disagree with something then pointed out in Scripture but so often we can just think that something's wrong because we haven't heard it that way before and yet it's so clearly because that makes sense okay and then thank you Tom um it's uh let me go to another topic we're just kind of jumping from Thing Thing the land over on Tierra hada just to make sure you understand where we're at with that we turned in completed application about what we did it a year ago and then they asked for more things we we've gone back and forth and then we gave the the final copy about three months ago and once we turn in the application the county has 30 working days to respond after those 30 days were over they asked if they could have an extension because they weren't done yet so we gave them a 30-day extension I mean you really can't say no but you know what do you can say so we gave them another 30 days session because that's what they asked for so we gave them another 30 working days after those 30 working days were over they asked for another extension of another 15 days and so that was just this week they asked for another extension that's why we still don't know about the property and so it's it's a good sign actually that that they're still asking for things and they're still looking into it we kind of have a rough idea of what they're going to ask which is a little bit more information which is again a positive thing but it's not a yes or no still so that's where we stand on that last week I also told you that we had a problem with the loan that we were going to get if you remember last week was a date we were supposed to close escrow but luck mash and say luckily in God's providence the seller actually moved it back a month which was great because the lender threw in a contingency that we couldn't meet and so we were kind of in trouble last week so a good thing it didn't close but the contingency was they said you need to have more elders leading the church you need to have more you need to have more unpaid elders than paid ones okay so we have these leaders of the church and certain ones are pastors on staff and then others are volunteer elders and a couple of them were Leigh Ellis or volunteer elders and then we thought you know we could really use them on staff and so we hired them so now there are more that are paid and unpaid and they gave us this contingency on the last week saying you got to have more that are unpaid and we'll give you a year to accomplish that and we thought well that's that's difficult because that means we have to get three more elders and if any of them we want on staff we can't do that so it just kind of put a weird limitation on our leadership and so we as elders we talked about it briefly as far as well there's a lot of things we can do to get around this that that are pretty obvious we could we could take a couple of the paid elders and say well we'll make you junior elders and you know and take you off the board but you can still do everything we could we could bring a couple of people on and go through this year process that they've asked us to but knowing that we could pay off the loan within a year and so then we don't even have to deal with it by the time the year comes to an end and I and all these things we said you know there's so many ways around this and none of them are technically lying but there's just deception it's just it's deceptive and there's even even a hint of it and all the elders just clearly agreed you know we're not going to go down that road we'll need to find someone else to take it a loan from the problem is is who's going to give you a five million dollar loan in three weeks that's not real easy and so we were shopping around looking different things and just doing our due diligence and we ask that credit union say man there's no way around this no no way around it and I wrote him a letter and I explained to them our situation I just emailed them and said look here's the deal is we've been trying so hard for 14 years to show integrity financially with leadership being upfront with everything if we do this we can get around your contingency but it's a lack of integrity on our part to do so and I just simply asked is there a way we can finish you know complete this loan and as both maintain our integrity and they kind of shot it up the ladder and I guess one of the top guys started doing some research on cornerstone and ended up writing a letter down to the little people and telling them that you know I've researched cornerstone and their church they talked about what we were involved in he found out that you know what we gave to children's Hunger Fund world impact and around the world he looked at our giving statements throughout the years and he told them you know what these are the types of people we want to partner with make it happen and so yeah it's very cool yeah but it was so cool even even working through that process to sit on an elder board and all of us go okay we're going to maintain our integrity but understand what this means we could lose the property we could lose everything because we don't know how we're going to get this loan in three weeks and and yet it was just so cool to sit there and there was just no question saying you know what that you can't compromise out of fear you got to just lay it out and then let the chips fall that's about expression huh that's like gambling which we as elders don't do now but it is this whole it's this whole idea yeah that's what other expression is it let the chips fall where they may you know just this whole idea of you know you just you kind of just be honest you just lay it out there and suffer the consequences but you got a trust that you know what God's not going to bless us for being deceptive like when has that ever happened when he's ever blessed someone because they were deceptive there were times when he blessed people in spite of their deception but you know it's always best to just say you know what here it is let's just lay it out and we lose it we lose it but at least we maintain our integrity and I want to talk about that a little bit tonight after we experienced that on Monday I thought you know I I feel like it's something that we all struggle with because there's times in life when we need to make decisions and we know it would be so easy just to stretch the truth a tiny bit and it's not even technically lying you know you can even say the right words and everything else and and we're so tempted to do that because it seems like would make life easier and it also seems like everyone's doing it right I mean everyone lies and so what's the big deal and yet like we talked about last week just because everyone's doing it is because it's popular doesn't mean that God hates it less in fact it says in the proverbs 12 verse 22 it says the Lord detests lying lips but he delights in men who are truthful okay the Lord detests remember we talked about how last week no not all sins are the same all sins do condemn but the Bible is not tea each that all sins are the same there are certain things that God seems to emphasize and we talked about immorality last week in the way focus on this week I want to talk about honesty because it says that the Lord hates this he detest lips that speak evil or deception and he delights in men who are truthful and as we talk about honesty you know I I struggled with this because I'm putting together this message right I'm looking up all these verses on honesty deception on and on and on and I thought to myself okay there are people in this room who lie so much I mean so much like it just kind of comes out your mouth you can't even control it you just lie and I was talking to a girl my office a couple weeks ago and I finally had to stop I go you know what do you think you could is it like can you even tell the truth like you know because there are certain people you get to a point it's like do you ever get concerned I asked do you ever get concerned about yourself like you're not even able to tell the truth because she had already been caught in multiple huge lies and I go let's look through these things and do you ever get concerned that you've been lying so long like it's such a pattern that if I were to ask you to look me in the eyes and tell me the truth right now you're not even sure you could tell the truth because you've been so used to deceiving people and lying never meet people like that where you just go man I don't know if he or she has the ability to tell the truth and I thought okay so so what am I going to do I'm going to preach a sermon on lying is that really going to change anyone and because that's a major thing if someone's had this pattern of deception and there are many of you in this room that have held things you know in secret for so long am I really to give a sermon where you go okay here it is here's what I've really done here's who I really am because you man you're protecting some serious things there are some things you are so embarrassed of and you've worked so hard to deceive people for years I was thinking man last thing I want because I can put together a sermon on online I don't I'm not worried about that and I knew I could put together sermon where you walk out the room go wow that was a good sermon online but that's not the goal is rego who that was a good sermon you know I mean the goal is that we would come clean because because here's the thing okay I've been there iiiiii and I was a liar my whole life you know just just growing us all my brother's fault he um he was so good lying and I is my big brother and he taught me and every you know he'd get bad grades right and he always would shoot for an F because the f you can change to a B and he was saying the DS and C's you really can't change because when I get an F it's it's an automatic B I just you know add a couple of squiggles and and I thought I was so cool and but but I remember there's this how good he was how bad he was kids don't be like him he when we were juniors when he was a junior high school he asked my mom if he could buy a car and my mom said no they bought one anyways and parked it around the corner and every day we'd go yeah we're walking to school we'd walk around the corner and get in his car and drive to school and we did this for a year I hear oh wow we got a car for a year you know and it was cool because on rainy days she would let us take the family car to school and so we drive around the corner and my brother would jump in his car and let me drive the family car I was like 13 14 years old I mean this is this so this is the way I grew up it was like yeah I was the coolest freshman man you know I got the school take all my friends at lunch everything and in our over this one time though I totally remember like we went to school you know in his car and then midway through the day it started raining and so we're driving home and my mom was coming to the school to pick us up because it was raining and so we're driving this and she's coming right at us and I go Paul it's mom and he goes duck I still remember that we're just down for a few seconds I could think she's deaf and think she's passing you know any drives around we go back to the school parking lot and start walking in the rain I go oh hey mom you know I mean that's so it was just this deception right and and it was just lie after lie after lie and oh man I could go on and on about my deceptive lifestyle you know and and and I was thinking you know many of us grow it's weird how lying just comes so naturally right I mean it's a little kid you know you've seen your little kids holding a marker right and there's drawings all around the wall and going I didn't do it I didn't do it you know and it's just the first thing either mouth is just this lie and I was thinking okay what what changed I mean at what point did it what did it just it wasn't a sermon no one ever preached a sermon on honesty that actually made me change when so it's kind of frustrating because I'm looking at this and I'm going man there's many people in there that have been lying for years and years and years what was it that changes a person what what gets them from this path of deception to then go you know what I'm going to I'm going to pursue the truth pursue the truth and I'm not saying that I never lie uh you know we you know but but it's like you first you get rid of these big lies right and then you realize ah there's still some more deception in there and there's still some deception are there but every thought you just get cleaner and cleaner and cleaner and and instill it all throughout your life it seems like there's still a little bit of deception a little bit of ception but less and less and less until the Bible says we get to this point of maturity and completeness but what puts a person on that road and I and I felt pretty helpless because I thought I sermons not going to pull it off tonight by any stretch of the imagination and so honestly I didn't study a ton this week because Paul says in first Corinthians he says um I talked about how he didn't come to the Corinthians with eloquence or superior wisdom but he came with a demonstration of power and I was looking at that passage and think man when Paul went to a place he just spoke with power it wasn't a carefully crafted sermon he just came powerfully with a demonstration of the Spirit and so every time I was going to study I just said you know I'm going to pray instead this week I'm just going to pray that God does something that it's just something supernatural something I can't explain just a power that gets you to change and sets you on that road because no one can talk someone else into truth you know I was speaking at this conference for pastors last week and I and I was telling them I go you know sometimes I feel like our church services in our church services we can sound more like the prophets of bail than like Elijah from restoring for screen first Kings 19 with 18 or 19 where where it talks about how there were the prophets of bail and Elijah challenges them there on Mount Carmel and they have the sacrifice on this on this on this not on top of this mountain and they go you know what why don't you guys get your God to once you get bailed to light that thing on fire and so the prophets of bail they start jumping up and down hundreds of them screaming cutting each other you know just working themselves into a frenzy and nothing really happened but they had a good time you know they're screaming they're shouting then afterwards Elijah just prays quietly and just as God do your thing and then fire comes out of heaven and consumes that sacrifice and everyone is just left going no way that was awesome and I just questioned these pastors like what do our services feel like don't you feel like a lot of times we can just jump up and down and you know and enjoy each other's company yeah but did anything happen that was supernatural that God acted fired really come down into this room and I just started praying for that I just started praying sin God you know I can't I can't make anyone stop lying would you do something supernatural and I was thinking about this idea of deception do you realize that there's only one time in the New Testament when God strikes someone dead he did all the time in the Old Testament but New Testament and it's a shorter span in the New Testament you know it's just just a few years you know whereas the Old Testament spans over thousands of years in New Testament we're just talking about you know 80 80 90 years I'm like that and there's only one instance when he struck someone dead and that was in the early church in Acts chapter 5 with Ananias and Sapphira and if you remember the story and in aizen's fire they're a couple that sold some property and gave it to the church gave the money to the church but they held back some of it and they lied about it which which was dumb because from what we understand the passage they didn't even have to give the money but there was just some sort of proud it was like this it was really a white lie of anything because they're going you know what here's all the money I mean it was a good thing that they did they sold their land and gave the money to the church it's just when Peter says is that all of it they go yeah it was all of it and they really held back some and it says in Acts chapter 5 the story says in verse 3 it says then Peter said to Ananias so he says to the man because for he came alone his anti is how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you receive for the land then the next verse didn't it belong to you before it was sold and after it was sold wasn't the money at your disposal so I say you see he says look didn't in the land belong to you and after you sold it you could have done whatever you wanted with the money just be honest with it so they says what made you think of doing such a thing you have not lied to men but to God and then verse five it says when Ananias heard this he fell down and died and great fear seized all who heard what had happened ad to me I go man that's an understatement great fear seized the church I'm going to imagine and then right after that happened his wife comes in and they ask her hey did you give us all of the money and she says yes and Peter says you know what the same people that just carried out your husband they're going to carry you out also and she falls over and dies okay I'm reading this I'm going to see God that would work okay you know I mean can you imagine I mean it says great fear seized the church and I'm going man are you kidding me of course it did and I look at a passage like that and I think wow could you imagine could you imagine something like that happened if I if I asked fast-fill something over there I go hey man just tell me the truth right now and he lied to me and I knew it and I said Phil you're stretching the truth and he just fell over I mean right now and then Paula tries to defend him goes no really really and she falls over - I mean can you imagine how that you process that for a week you come back next week and I ask someone else a question can you imagine what you would think inside like okay let me think 100% truth 100% truth I saw what happened to those last two you know I just think okay that's the power of God right now the truth is is is there are times when God makes us tell the truth right where he exposes us there are times like with David where he sends a prophet and just as look you're lying when Nathan came to him but isn't it so much better when nothing external happens like that and instead of being exposed you confess to me that's one of the most beautiful things that can happen I love that love that don't you love it when someone wasn't caught but instead they just come out and saying here's the truth about me I'm praying for that in fact I want you to pray about that I would you just bow your heads right now I just want to give God some some room some time in fact right now would you just pray to God and ask him ask him to do something supernatural in this room in everyone's heart that he would convict everyone in this room of the lies in their life just just pray for everyone right now God would you cleanse our businesses of slight deception and Trust help us to trust that you know what just always best to be absolutely honest help us to trust that really believe that father would you cleanse our families of deception husbands and wives that are holding things from each other parents and kids that are guilty just deceiving each other and got just all of our friendships that are based upon lies father may just cleanse us of those things help us to trust that coming clean is going to just make everything so much better because you are God in Jesus name Amen I want to I just want to share one last passage with you that that hit me the most when I was looking at these passages and it's in proverbs chapter 30 proverbs chapter 30 starting in verse 7 he says this look at this phrase and then think about how you would complete this sentence because he says this in proverbs 30 verse 7 two things I ask of you Lord or I ask of you O Lord do not refuse me before I die if you had to complete that if you were writing this proverb and you said okay God here's two things I want before I die please just these two things not being agree but I just want these two things before I die how would you complete that now look what this prophet what this guy says keep falsehood and lies far from me give me neither poverty nor riches but give me only my daily bread not crazy okay these are the two things he's saying God just if I could have anything these two things don't deny me these things and the first thing he says is keep falsehood and lies far from me because if there's one thing I could have I want to be an honest person so just keep the light I mean that's his greatest prayer it shows you something about his heart here we are reading in the wisdom literature these are these are from the wisest people who have ever lived this is from Al Gore he says you know what just keep these falsehood and lies for I just want to be truthful I want to be a truthful person that's so important to me so keep falsehood and lies far from me then the other thing he prays for he goes and the other thing is give me neither poverty nor riches but give me only my daily bread and I thought about that prayer and I thought would any American pray that God okay one thing I asked is don't let me get rich I don't want to have like enough for the rest of my life just just give me only my daily bread he goes don't have me starve to death he goes but here's my request god I just want my daily bread I just want to I want to live paycheck to paycheck that's his prayer he explains it after because otherwise I may have too much and disown you and say who is the Lord or I may become poor and steal and so dishonor the name of my god it's not an interesting prayer he says seek out if you have if you give me too much anyway seen that in Scripture those who have too much they forget God and that's why is it so hard for the rich to enter the kingdom of heaven this guy goes man make sure - I just don't deny me this promise me you won't give me too much when's the last time you prayed that think about that he's God promise me you're not going to make me rich this is just like one of two requests that you got to give me for I dies don't let me get rich I just I don't want to be a liar and I don't want to be rich and I don't want to I don't worry poor because just give me my daily bread see he says I actually want to be in a place of dependence see God the one thing in my life is I don't want to forget about you and if I have too much then I don't need to depend on you anymore and yet that's the American dream is to set ourselves up in such a way that we don't have to depend on God I've got plenty most of us really didn't need him this week to provide for us we're fine this guy goes no I want to be in a place of dependence and so please don't give me too much and I said I wonder if we could really pray that with our culture and our minds and the way we have been trained this is so ingrained in our heads that could we actually pray to be dependent people who have only their daily bread can we really pray the Lord's Prayer and mean it and say God I actually like that I actually want to be a person that every day I pray Lord give us this day our daily bread because none of us I don't think any of us have ever prayed that and really meant it right we pray it we say it but in the back of our minds is like man I could eat bread for 20 years you know I got plenty and there's something about that dependence and I just started praying that this week no god I want to I want to be wise enough like this person I want to be wise enough to realize that I actually don't want too much because too much would keep me from being dependent on you and I might just forget all about you the Lord I do want to pray I do want to live paycheck to paycheck I do want to give away the access because then I have to experience you every week you know it's interesting because a few months ago probably three months it goes my guess I'm not trying to be dishonest I'm just trying to think three weeks to three months ago around I am I prayed and I thought God you know I think my life is a little bit too easy like everything's kind of coming together and I'm getting a little casual about you you ever you ever get that way where things are just cruising and they're fine it's actually a good stage of life and I feel like all the challenges I'm meeting head-on and just everything is going fine and it had been going like that for Lyle and I just said gone you know what this isn't that great and I said you know I think I need some adversity in my life and I think you need to make some things more difficult to get me more passionate in prayer so he answered my prayer and and it was so cool because this week you know I'm on my knees just come before God and saying God okay now I can't do it now it's this is impossible the things I believe you want me to do and the challenges that are in my face right now I I don't see any way I can humanly pull this off I'm not seeing light at the end of the tunnel you have to fix certain things for me you have to do this you and I just started naming things that were out of my control and as as I was praying I realized why this is what I prayed for this type of urgency where God you must come through you must come through you must come through it's what I wanted and I don't lift that up and say yeah that's the way I always pray I'm just going man you know it's at certain points in your life God gives you wisdom to realize that comfort isn't all it's cracked up to be and it can create a laziness and if God is truly our number-one desire then we would pray you know what Lord put me in situations where I'm dependent on you and I need you in fact don't make things too easy don't give me too much because I could forget you and I know right now a lot of us are hurting financially some of you guys are in some pretty difficult situations you know with housing I mean I'm not going to ask for a raise of hands yeah you how many lost their house you know it's just it's nuts how many have lost their jobs lost their houses taken pay cuts everything else and it's a crazy time I mean we're not we're not desperate in the sense that you know like people are around the world but it's very real to us and I'm just saying you know what don't take it all as a curse don't take it all as God what went wrong because there's something good about dependence in fact this this writer of Proverbs in Proverbs 30 was wise enough to even ask for that in his life and I just encourage you to think through because a lot of times in church we can say very grand statements like ah your love is greater than life welcome really you really mean that so then you're willing to give up some of these things if that will bring you closer to his love because his love is that great be long for do you desire it see I owe all I want today is I want to free you from guilt I want to free you from deception I I lied after becoming a Christian there were some big lies in my life and I still remember those days when I was hiding so much it was the worst feeling we've all done it we've all hidden stuff even after becoming believers we hide things you know that sick feeling you get and the bigger the lie is the harder it is to live with yourself the harder it is to sleep like David says it perfectly he says I felt like the inside of me was wasting away like my bones were literally rotting away like I could feel this pressure this heaviness in me I remember times when people would would look at me in the eyes and say hey I need to talk to you about something and immediately my heart would just start pounding through my chest because I thought oh no do they know and it'd be nothing right you know and they'd go oh yeah yeah I want to ask you about what kind of tires on your car your second good because you just had that guilty man I hope they don't know I hope they don't know I hope they don't know and then once it's found out and it's released and it's out there like David said it's like oh I could breathe again you know that's all I want because I think some of you are miserable they come to church and the moment I talk about deception you start feeling that stuff in your chest and you get nervous what if I walk out of this room and someone asked me what I'm lying about you don't want to be asked that and say man that's just such a terrible way to live it's so good to be free from that it's so good to confess rather than to be exposed and so that's my prayer today that's my desire my desire is not that we walk away feeling guilty feeling shame my desire is that we walk away so much more in love with the cross because we realize man that's why Jesus died Jesus died for whatever I'm hiding he Jesus died for this sin that I've been suppressing and yeah I'm going to have to confess to some people but you know what I can be forgiven of that if I confess and that's my desire I'm going to have the worship team come back out we're just going to close with one last song but here's what I want to do is I want to give you some space before we sing again if you would just bow your heads yeah I don't want to try to manipulate anything because I have no clue what's going on in your lives I just know that I can on just say I prayed for this weekend a lot more than I normally do because I wanted fire to come down from heaven in a different way I want to be a god thing where you are struck some of the stuff that's that you've been hiding [Music] and this would be the night you come clean they'll be people up by the prayer room if you need to pray with someone price want you to spend some time alone with God who knows the truth about everything and just talk through these things with him tell them the biggest lies in your life right now and you may not even sing through this whole song it just may be a whole confession time you may need prayer with someone you may want to get baptized and just be cleansed of everything and start over you may go you know what I don't even know if I'm going to heaven because I don't know if I even have relations with God just come clean with all that and pray with someone but do some business with God right now

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Keywords: Francis Chan, Francis Chan Sermons, Revival, Character Of God, Free Sermons, Video Sermons, Jesus Christ, What Is The Gospel, SermonIndex, What Is The Truth

Id: ecUAxb4d8yU

Length: 40min 31sec (2431 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 19 2012