“Again you have heard that it was said to them of old time, ‘You shall not make false vows, but shall perform to the Lord your vows,’ but I tell you, don’t swear at all: neither by heaven, for it is the throne of God; nor by the earth, for it is the footstool of his feet; nor by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. Neither shall you swear by your head, for you can’t make one hair white or black. But let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes’ and your ‘No’ be ‘No.’ Whatever is more than these is of the evil one.
Matthew 5:33-37
Because of these verses, there are some Christians who refuse to "swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth" in court. As a result, in USA, the courts ask people to "swear or affirm" instead of just to swear.
But that actually is missing the point. It's not the word "swear" that is the problem here. When you "affirm" instead, it's still the same thing - you're promising to tell the truth.
I think Jesus' point is that we should always be telling the truth, so that it is unnecessary for us to "swear" to tell the truth when we really really want to be believed. This is as opposed to some people's practice of not feeling like they have to tell the truth unless they are swearing to it.
"My word is my bond" should be the way the people of God live.
We Chinese-Malaysians have a culture of telling "white lies" to children to get them to do what is right. "If you don't eat all the rice off your plate, you will marry a pock-marked spouse" for example. And other, more specific, "white lies."
My wife and I have done our best to never lie to our kids, so that our kids know that when we tell them something, we believe it to be true.
Of course, they also know that we make mistakes and are wrong sometimes, and that we sometimes say we intend to do something and then changing circumstances cause us to be unable to fulfil what we said.
But they know that we never intentionally mislead them.
I also strive to do this with other people than my children. I don't do it perfectly. My sin nature is still there, and the self-presevation instinct, so sometimes I find that I lie on the spur of the moment. Then I have to repent. But I think I have not deliberately lied in years when I have had the chance to think through what to say before I say it.
So: "My word is my bond." Follow the Father of Truth and and not the Father of Lies.
Let your "yes" be yes and your "no" be no.
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