INTEGRITY

Neal Pollard

Famed explorer and adventurer Freya Stark said, “There can be no happiness if the things we believe in are different from the things we do.”  Beyond happiness, can it not be said that it is difficult to find lasting peace or genuine righteousness in the absence of integrity?  In the 15th Psalm, David explores the qualities of a man with integrity, one who, in the words of the early church fathers, “Walketh without stain, and worketh righteousness” (Schaff, 47).  What is at stake is being God’s guest, “dwelling” and “abiding” with Him.  What is required for that to happen is a love for truth at the deepest level, a hatred for running down the name and reputation of another, one who follows the golden rule, hates error and upholds truth lovers, keeps his word no matter what, and flees from materialism (2-5).  “Here is the holiness without which no one sees God (Heb. 12:14), covering conduct, conversation and relationships (2–3), values, integrity and financial contentment (4–5)” (Carson, New Bible Commentary, Logos).

Think about that.  Integrity covers your observable actions, your speech, your interaction with others, what you believe in and hold dear, and your relationship to the material things of this world.  Failures in integrity usually come in one or more of these areas.  Hypocrisy, dishonesty and deceit, conforming to worldliness, ethical iffiness, and the like reveal perilous cracks in the foundation of one’s integrity.  Much of that is a matter of being what we claim to be and what we portray to others that we are.  It is having one face, the same for our closer friends and peers that we show to everyone else.  It is not just being on Monday through Saturday what we display on Sunday.  It is being in private the public image we project.

Let us believe the inspired psalmist, that nurturing a close relationship with God depends on how we treat others and how consistently we practice what we preach.  Beware the person who says he is all about Jesus, but who is willing to violate Jesus’ teaching about holiness and true godliness.  Such lack the integrity necessary to dwell in the house of the Lord!