What is your status?

Posted : 24 Mar, 2012 02:39 AM

"Dear Hearers! May I ask you: What is your status in regard to the ninth commandment? Do you too belong to those who occupy themselves with lying and slandering? Oh, I know, we are all guilty, terribly guilty in this matter. As I said before, we are born as liars and slanderers and therefore we commit that sin. But there is still a difference in sinning. If you belong to those who make their work of that sin, then in the name of the Lord I admonish you to desist, and to refrain from that devilish work. Have you not sown enough misery, quarrels and divisions with your lying and slander? Remember, God will require it. He will reprove you and set your sins in order before your eyes. We have already sketched for you what the portion of the slanderer is, both in this life and in the life hereafter. You can not set right what your slandering has perverted. I am thinking of a minister whose life had been embittered by lies and slander. But when that man lay on his deathbed, the slanderers became so alarmed that they came with words of regret and asked him how they could make amends. Without many words he gave his slanderers a pillow and said, "Take this pillow and standing upon the tower, shake the feathers out of it. Then pick up the feathers again, put them in the pillow and place it under my head. Then you will have made amends for your evil conduct." "But, sir," they said, "we shall not be able to do that! The wind shall scatter the feathers everywhere. We shall not be able to gather half of them." "Thus," said the dying servant of God, "you cannot make amends, for your slander has also spread far and near. Ask forgiveness of God, seek reconciliation with the Father, in the atonement of the Son, by the work of the Holy Spirit." That is the advice I give to all my fellow sinners with the sincere wish that the Lord grant you grace and power from above to follow that advice! Are you slandered? People of God, you cannot stop it, any more than you can prevent it. Endure it quietly. Do not requite slander with abuse, but commit yourself to Him Who knows you better, judges you more righteously and treats you more gently than anyone else. And, oh, that everyone of us may receive grace, so that as the Instructor says, we may "in judgment and other dealings love the truth, speak it uprightly and confess it." Through the common grace of God there still is among men some sense of truth. Man has become an image-bearer of Satan, and often does the work of Satan but has not become a total lie as Satan has. But loving the truth for God's sake, because God is a God of truth, that can be done only by special grace. For that we need regeneration. The upright desire to be true, everywhere and always. But we need not therefore say everything we know. Matthew, Mark and Luke did write that one of the disciples cut off the ear of Malchus, but they did not put their dear brother in prison. Only John wrote who had done it, but then they could not harm him anymore, for then Peter was in heaven. Nevertheless, the Lord says, "Everyone that is of the truth heareth My voice," and Peter says, "Charity shall cover the multitude of sins." If we may experience the renewal of our heart, then we shall also strive by grace "to defend and promote, as much as we are able, the honor and good character of our neighbor." We have shown you before that our good name is very important in this life. And now it is our duty to promote the honor and good character of our neighbor. Consider what grief it causes you when men attack your honor and good character. Then do not sin thus against your neighbor, lest he grieve because of you. Truly here we must pray, "O let Thy Spirit be my constant aid, that all my ways may ever be directed to keep Thy statutes." Else we would rather sacrifice the honor of our neighbor, yea of God Himself to our supposed honor and good name. Without that Spirit we cannot rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him, when He permits the slanderer to grieve us for awhile. But, people of God, if you would see peace and good days, keep your lips from speaking guile and � "Love the truth and peace."

http://www.the-highway.com/ten_commandments9.html"

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