Word of Salvation – Vol.23 No.14 – December 1976

 

Lord’s Day 37 (P.K.)

 

Sermon by Rev. P. Koster, B.D. on Lord’s Day 37

Readings: 2Cor I and Mat.5:33-37

Psalter Hymnal: 439; 170; 250; 286:1,3; 493

 

Congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Today we consider Lord’s Day 37, which deals with the doctrine of the oath.

It is part of the discussion on the third commandment, for it concerns the use of the Name of God by His creatures.

The previous Lord’s Day tells us that we may not use God’s Name in vain by taking it lightly upon our lips, or, worse still, to use His Name in an unholy and profane way.

That is how we must NOT take the name of God.
But is there then a correct way to use the name of God in our speaking?
Or, more specifically, is it right to use the Name of God in an oath?

Some of you may have been required to do so at some time, in a court case, or at a naturalization ceremony, or in similar circumstances.

Even if you have never been in a position where this was required of you, you have no doubt seen it happen.

The person making the oath is requested by an official representing the State or the Law to swear by God that he is telling the truth or that he intends to keep the promise that he is making.

This is always an interesting position for a Christian to be in, for we have two passages in the New Testament which say “do not swear at all” (Mat.5 and James 5), and yet on the other hand we have the catechism telling us that we may swear by the Name of God when the magistrate requires it of us.

What are we to make of this?

Is the catechism here contrary to Scripture?

We have always maintained that the Catechism is NOT the 28th book of the New Testament, that it is NOT divinely inspired, and that it is NOT infallible.  Can this be the proof?

There are quite a large number of Christian people who would immediately answer in the affirmative.

They will quote Matthew 5, “Do not swear at all, let what you say be simply yes or no; anything more than this comes from evil.”

And then they will quote James 5 “But above all my brethren, do not swear, either by heaven or by earth or with any other oath, but let your yes be yes and your no be no, that you may not fall under condemnation.”  And then they will shut the book.

After all, what could be plainer than that we should not take any oath at all?  These two passages could not be more explicit.  It’s an open-shut case.  The people who drew up our catechism, they will say, have never read their Bible, or perhaps they somehow missed those verses.

But, congregation, from our previous study of the catechism, it does not really appear that either of these alternatives is a very likely explanation for the affirmation of oath taking in this Lord’s Day.

The writers of the catechism do not show evidence of neglecting Scripture, either in whole or in part.

On the contrary, the catechism is a wonderful tool for bringing us the truth of Scripture.  We should not be too hasty in simply dismissing this Lord’s Day as some have been.  Perhaps we ought to prise open that shut book again and have another look at the question of oath taking.  Perhaps there is more to be said on the subject than those two verses from Matthew and James taken in isolation would lead us to believe.

And then of course we should first of all be clear in our minds as to what an oath is.  What are we doing when we swear an oath in the Name of God?  This is what we are doing: we call God to witness that we are telling the truth, and we invite Him to punish us if we are false or if we do not carry out that which we have promised to do.  We are asking God to give some sort of divine authority to what we say.

Sometimes we use people in the same way, as a sort of a back-up to what we say.  “You go and ask him, he’ll back me up”, and that sort of thing.

Sometimes we even ask for such human back-ups.  The employer asks his prospective employee for references, and so does the bank manager when we ask him for a loan.

This is necessary in a world full of sin and evil, when people cannot always be taken merely at their word, especially when they have everything to gain and we have everything to lose.

Of course nobody takes it as a personal insult if he is asked for business references, for we all understand that it is a necessary standard practice.  But there are some situations in which human back-ups are either impossible or insufficient.  No-one can support with evidence the thoughts of your mind, for no-one can be absolutely certain that he knows the thoughts of your mind.

There are cases in which no other human can safely say whether or not you are telling the truth or whether you firmly intend to carry out a promise.  Even in business references and the like, there is no guarantee of your future behaviour.  The employer or bank manager is only able to assume, that your character having been such in the past, he will be able to trust you for the future.

In situations in which no human could be called as a witness, people began to call God Himself as their witness, for He alone knows the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

This is of course a very serious thing to do: To call God as a witness.  That the creature should call upon his Creator to validate his statements.  It was to be the final authority in any dispute.

The use of oaths in the Old Testament, where they are fairly frequent, was very carefully prescribed.

The third commandment warns against taking God’s name in vain, i.e. calling upon Him to back-up a falsehood.  For God will not be united to falsehood, being the perfectly Holy One, being Truth itself.

Leviticus 19:12 tells us the same thing as the third commandment, “You shall not swear by my name falsely, and so profane the name of your God”.  Our covenant God cannot bear witness to a falsehood, for this is against the very nature of His being.

Just imagine for a moment that God were to sanction the lie and the false intention.  It would destroy the basis of all goodness and of all life.  It would make a mockery of God’s own covenant promises.  And then how could we live?

Without the assurance that comes from trusting God and His Word there can be no real life; at least, none worthy of the name Life.

The penalty for swearing falsely by the Name of God was severe, and rightly so, for to do that is to undermine radically the most basic foundations of all society and of all life.

Of course it soon became very clear that to swear an oath was a very convenient means of winning any argument, regardless of whether you were right or wrong, or even if you weren’t sure about it yourself.

Such is the nature of the heart of man that he soon finds ways of taking advantage of whatever means he can to get his way.

That is how things were in the Jewish nation.

But it was realised that to swear falsely in God’s name was a very weighty.  And so a compromise solution was found.  The Name of God was not used in oaths.  In fact the name of God was not used at all.

Thus the Israelite thought to ensure that he did not use God’s Name in vain.  But there were plenty of other things to swear by, and to take oaths upon.  And so they swore by the temple or by heaven or by earth or by any of a dozen other things.  There was a whole range of oaths that could be used in varying situations.  In fact, they were even arranged on a sliding scale of importance.

To swear by earth was not so weighty a matter as to swear by heaven and so the arrangement developed in which more important matters were sworn to by heaven and less important things only required an oath in which the person swore by the earth or by other objects according to the gravity of the case.

And because God said nothing in His law about taking the name of the earth in vain, the punishment inflicted for falsely swearing was only light, according to the object in whose name the oath was taken.

And thus it was, that at the time of Jesus and of James men swore with impunity.  With no regard for right and wrong they used oaths profusely to obtain their own ends.  It is in the context of this double minded, shallow and hypocritical attitude to the truth that the New Testament was written.

Does this argument from context bear enough weight however, to enable us to use an oath when the magistrate requires it of us, despite the words of Jesus and of James?

I grant you that the language used by Jesus is absolute, “Do not swear AT ALL”.  The same goes for James.  “But above all, do not swear.”  These certainly are explicit commands.

The absolute terms, “above all” and “not at all” seem to prohibit us from using even context as a determining factor in their interpretation.

But let me give you an example of just how determinative context can be.  On a certain brand of Tea-bags, there is inscribed on the tab, “Always use boiling water.”  Let us say that this a commandment, “always use boiling water”.  To obey that commandment, you do not have to fill your car with boiling water when you are almost out of fuel, nor do you need to use boiling water when you brush your teeth, nor even when you make a drink of cold cordial, nor even when you make an ordinary pot of tea, nor even, I would say, when you use a different brand of tea-bag.

That commandment, as we have called it, applies only to a very limited situation i.e.  making a cup of tea with that particular type of tea-bag.  Despite the fact that the commandment is using very absolute language, “always”, it was clearly not intended to lay down the law for the kind of fuel you use in your car.

When Jesus and James said, “never swear” they were speaking in a certain context and despite the absolute nature of the language, the context must still determine its interpretation and application.

The catechism takes it that the New Testament was simply condemning the evil use of the oath of that day, and did not mean to prohibit the legal use of the oath before the magistrate.

That there is a proper use of the oath is made manifestly clear in both the Old and New Testaments.  Many times the prophets of God depict God Himself taking an oath.  “As I live, says the Lord,” is one quite common form of oath that God uses.  Old Testament saints are also said to use these oaths at various times.  The apostle Paul, in his divinely inspired letters to the churches, takes oaths in calling God to witness that he is telling the truth.  “I call God to witness against me, it was to spare you that I refrained from coming to Corinth” (2Cor 1:23).  “Before God, I do not lie” (Gal.1:20).

“For God is my witness… that without ceasing I mention you always in my prayers” (Rom.1:9).  “The God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is blessed forever, knows that I do not lie” (2Cor.1:31).

In these examples we can see that when Paul was making a statement in which he thought that his personal veracity might be challenged, he was not afraid to invoke God as His witness in an oath.

In Hebrews chapter 6, we can read that God Himself swore an oath by His Name, when He made the covenant with Abraham.  For God loves the truth and is desirous that all men should believe the truth.

That is why He swore to Abraham, so that Abraham would believe His promise.  That is why God is willing to be called as a witness to the truth.  Because the truth is His and He will uphold it and not forsake it.

Men have no rights over God.  They may not simply summon Him whenever it is convenient.  They are certainly not to use Him for their own ends and purposes.  And yet it is a fact that God is willing to have His name used to support the truth.

This also serves as an important lesson for us on the importance of the truth.  For it is sanctified by God’s own presence.  How much then we ought to respect the truth.  Because the truth is God’s own truth, it can never be disregarded without consequences.  Sometimes people think that it will do no harm, but always it does.  It harms the individual who lies or makes rash promises and it can also harm the other people involved in the matter.  Even the Saturday golfer who plays by himself and cheats on his scorecard cannot escape the consequences of falsehood.  Whenever we sacrifice truth for any personal advantage, whatever its nature, we will ultimately be the losers.  Because it is the truth of God that we defile, and we cast our vote in favour of Satan the father of lies, who by lying has ever sought to bring down the Kingdom of God.  O how we must hate the lie!

And as much as we hate the lie we must love the truth, for this is the highest principle by which a man can live.

In a world full of lying politicians and economists, the Christian needs to stand out as a person of the truth.  All around us people are bending the truth, twisting it, disregarding it, because truth is second place to achieving one’s end.  What matters is the power and the glory and the wealth and the success, and the truth is too easily set aside for these things.

But truth is for the Christian always first.  Jesus puts it this way, “I am the truth”, and the measure of our love for Christ will be the measure of our love for the truth.  We love the truth because it is of God.  And we will uphold the truth even by oath if necessary, as Paul did and as God Himself did.  It is by a proper regard for the sanctity of the truth that we will avoid the situation which arose in Jesus day.  For to hold the truth in contempt is to take the Name of the Lord in vain, and the Lord will not hold him guiltless that takes His Name in vain.

Amen