So tonight we are on chapter 23 of the London Baptist Confession, which is on the topic of lawful oaths and vows, lawful oaths and vows. If you were to sit down and begin to write 32 chapters in a confession of faith, if someone gave you the task of saying, could you please sit down and in 32 chapters, could you write down for me the most important aspects of the Christian faith? If you were to do that, how many of you would include in those 32 chapters of lawful oaths and vows? Probably nobody. Mackenzie gave a half-raise, but she's really just scratching her back. I don't think anybody would include this, not in our day, not in our time, I don't think anybody would include this in one of the 32 most important topics or doctrines of the Christian faith. but the writers of the 1689 Confession did. And I think this is one of those chapters that is helpful to us in the 21st century, not so much because we live in a day and time in which this is particularly relevant. Undoubtedly, it was more relevant in a lot of ways to the circumstances historically of the writers of the Confession than it is for us today. But it's helpful in the sense that it helps us think in a way that's unusual for our day. It puts us into a framework of thinking that's not common for the 21st century Christian. Or to put it another way, we live in a day in which oaths and vows don't mean all that much. Promises really don't mean that much. Our words don't really mean that much. But to the writers of the Confession, they understood that biblically, the words that come out of our mouth, especially in the context of oaths and vows, are extremely important. Not just horizontally in relation to one another, but vertically in our relationship with the Lord. The things we say matter. And when we make an oath or a vow, then it matters with great weight and importance that we actually do what we've said and that what we say is actually true. And so it's true, oaths and vows are probably, I'll go ahead and warn you, you might not walk out of here tonight thinking, man, that was the most powerful sermon I've ever heard. Or that is the most practically helpful thing anyone has ever said to me. You probably won't walk away thinking that, but I hope we walk away with something like a mentality of God cares about honesty. He really cares about us doing the things we say we're going to do and us being truthful in the things that we say. So if nothing else, I hope we leave here with the conviction that we should be very careful with our words, especially when it comes to oaths or promises, solemn promises in the presence of God and vows. I think another reason this chapter might be helpful to us is for the very reason that we haven't given a lot of thought to it, at least not me personally. Maybe you're different than me, and maybe you've given a lot of thought to lawful vows and oaths, but I haven't, and so this chapter is helpful in the sense that it informs us in an area in which we probably don't have that much information. For example, it tells us the type of circumstance or situation in which an oath or a vow is appropriate. I haven't given much thought to that. When should I think seriously about making an oath or a vow? The confession helps us think through some of that and provides us with some framework for thinking through those things. All right, so if you look on the outline, you'll notice it's broken into two primary headings there. Paragraphs one to four, which is number one on the outline, has to do with lawful oaths. And then paragraph five has to do with lawful vows. So the first four paragraphs have to do with oaths, the last paragraph has to do with vows. What's the difference between an oath and a vow? Anyone want to render a guess at what's the difference between an oath and a vow? Witness? Yeah. That's great. Yeah, Dave nailed it. So for those who couldn't hear, an oath is a promise you're making to someone else with God as your witness. So it's a horizontal promise. I promise to you with God as my witness that this is true or that I'm going to do this. A vow is a promise we make directly to God. So, it's a vertical promise or a vertical commitment, and an oath is a horizontal commitment with God as our witness. And so, the chapter is broken up into those two categories. First, the first four paragraphs have to do with lawful oaths, horizontal oaths in the presence of God as witness. And so, number one there on the outline you'll see just makes clear, swearing in truth to another person. That's what an oath is. We swear in truth to another person, calling God to witness and judge. So it's something we say to another person, but we're saying it with the acknowledgement that God himself is witnessing the act and will stand as judge over what we say. So if you go back to the paragraph of the confession, we'll read the first paragraph together. It says, a lawful oath is a part of religious worship in which the person swearing in truth, righteousness, and judgment solemnly calls God to witness what he swears, affirms, or promises, and to judge him according to the truth or falsity of it. So there are two aspects to an oath. I've said that an oath is a horizontal promise or statement where we're promising something to another person with God as witness. But there are two aspects of what an oath can look like. On one hand, an oath could just be a solemn swearing that something is true. So it's like being in a courtroom and you agree to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God. The idea is what I am about to say, I am swearing in the presence of God that it is true. I am not going to say anything other than the truth, so help me God. In other words, may God help me or otherwise according to the truthfulness of my statement. So we are saying this is true, God is my witness. But then an oath can also be a promise, something that we are saying we will do. We agree to perform some particular task, fulfill some promise. And so an oath can be promissory or future, saying I will do this and God is my witness that I will do what I'm saying I'm going to do. So those, an example of that might be wedding vows, even though we call them vows, we can call them wedding oaths. We are making an oath to our spouse that we will love them in all situations of life, no matter whether it's easy or hard. We are promising to love our wife or our husband. And so that's an oath, that's a promise. So two aspects of an oath, one is swearing the truthfulness of something, the other is promising to do something. Both of them are made horizontally to another person with God as witness and as judge, which is number two there, subheading two on the outline, calling God to witness and judge. A good passage for this, if you want to turn there with me, is 2 Corinthians 1, verse 23. Apostle Paul, many of you know, in the letter to the Corinthians, both 1st and 2nd, but especially in 2nd Corinthians, he's dealing with a lot of accusations against him of being a false apostle. A lot of people are putting into question his validity as an apostle. And so he says in verse 23, to assure them of the truthfulness of his statements, he says in verse 23, but I call God as witness to my soul that to spare you I did not come again to Corinth. So we won't get into all the background of what's going on there. Basically, people are calling Paul a liar. And he is saying, I call God to witness, and he says, to my soul. That can literally be translated, and if you have an NASB, you'll see a footnote there that says, as witness upon my soul, or it could even be translated against my soul. What the Apostle Paul is saying is, I am telling you the truth, and I am so certain that what I'm telling you is true, that I am calling upon God as witness. He sees my heart and he knows the truth, and I am saying, God as witness will judge my soul in this particular matter, with regard to the truthfulness of what I'm saying. So he's not talking about salvation, but in this particular matter, God will treat me, he will make a judgment on this matter according to whether or not this statement is true, and I am calling God to witness it. So the Apostle Paul is making an oath there to the Corinthians with God as witness and as judge in the matter. So the point then is that an oath can either be testifying to the truthfulness of something, it can be making a promise about something, but in what we're saying, we are calling God to witness so that the other person has absolute certainty that what I'm saying is true and that I have full conviction behind the words that I'm speaking. And the confession mentions that it's part of religious worship. And what that means is that, not that when we make oaths or vows, we only do it in the context of corporate worship, but what it means is that wherever we are, outside in the world, as we're going about our business, when we make an oath, whatever that oath might be, Because we are invoking the presence of God in a sense, because we are saying this is a transaction taking place between me and you in the presence of Almighty God, it becomes an act of worship. We are calling God to witness and so in a sense it's being performed sacredly in his presence because it's a promise calling him to witness. And so that's why they put in there that it's part of religious worship. All right, what's an obvious objection do you think that would be raised to what I've said so far? Who can think of a passage in the Bible that people might go to to say, hey, wait a second, Christians aren't supposed to make vows or oaths. Anybody think of a passage? Sermon on the mount, yeah. and let your yes be yes and your no be no. That's right. So Matthew chapter 5, if you want to turn there with me you can, it might be helpful. Matthew 5, Jesus is giving instructions in the Sermon on the Mount largely that have to do with errors with regard to how the Pharisees have interpreted and applied the law. And so Jesus is correcting a lot of the errors among the Pharisees, a lot of the hypocrisy and duplicity that was taking place in the lives of the Pharisees. And so in Matthew 5, he says this in verse 33 down to 37. He says, again, you have heard that the ancients were told you shall not make false vows, but shall fulfill your vows to the Lord. But I say to you, make no oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, or by the earth, for it is the footstool of his feet, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great king. Nor shall you make an oath by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. But let your statement be, yes, yes, or no, no. Anything beyond these is of evil. Well, that seems pretty straightforward, doesn't it? Let your yes be yes and your no, no. Anything more than that is of evil. Make no oath at all, Jesus says. And there have been plenty of people, and perhaps tonight there are some who have read this verse and have taken it to mean just that. No oath at all in any context. It's completely inappropriate. One of the reasons this chapter of the Confession was written is because there were a group of people in the 17th century who were making that argument. They were the Anabaptists. And the Anabaptists were a group of more radical, very anti-government, anti-institutional Christians. And they basically argued that because Jesus says no oath, no vow, that even in the context of something like a courtroom or before a government where a certain vow is being required, it is completely condemned by Christ. There's no place in any context, whether it's a courtroom or a marriage oath or vow or any other context in which a vow or oath is appropriate. And so the confession, that's where this chapter, one of the reasons this chapter was written. The other reason, by the way, is the Roman Catholic abuses of vows and oaths. So on the one hand, you had the Anabaptists who were saying, no vow, no oath in any context is always wrong. Then you had the Roman Catholics who were inventing all sorts of vows and oaths and were abusing it and perverting it. And so the writers of the confession felt it necessary to say what a vow and oath was in biblical terms. All of that by way of distract, not on topic. But what is at stake here is the question of what oaths are forbidden by Christ? Is it every oath in every situation, no matter the context? As I see, I hope we'll see in just a little bit, I don't think that's the case because there are other examples in the New Testaments of oaths by the apostles. And so it would be hard to argue that Jesus is here making a blanket statement condemning every form of oath. But I think he is condemning the way that oaths were being used in the particular context in which he's speaking these things. And so the Pharisees, they, again, I mentioned the Sermon on the Mount is largely written to correct many of the errors of the Pharisees when it comes to the law. And it's helpful to understand one of the ways that the Pharisees were abusing or misusing oaths and vows. And so we could go to a number of Old Testament passages in Deuteronomy, Leviticus, we'll see some of them in a little while, that basically say, when you swear in the name of the Lord, you must fulfill your vow. When you swear in the name of Yahweh, you must fulfill what you've spoken. If you don't, if you swear falsely in the name of Yahweh, then you will be judged. So they would argue, the Bible says, the Torah says, you must not swear falsely in the name of Yahweh. But then, being the crafty fallen humans that they were, they developed a way to excuse themselves from oaths by saying, well, it's one thing to swear by the name of the Lord, it's another thing to swear by heaven, or by earth, or to Jerusalem, or by my own head, because Technically, the Bible says we're obligated to fulfill an oath made in the name of Yahweh. But with each step away from Yahweh, the oaths that we make become less and less binding. And so if I make an oath by heaven, if I swear to you, hey man, I swear by heaven, I'm not lying. Well, I haven't sworn by the name of Yahweh, I've sworn by the name of heaven. And so there's a way for me to slip out from under the obligation of keeping my vow because I've sworn by something less than the name of Yahweh. And that's what Jesus is correcting. If you notice, he says, if you swear by, in verse, let's see, Verse 34, but I say to you, make no oath at all, either by heaven or it's the throne of God. So the Pharisees were saying, I swear by heaven. I can find a way out from the obligation of keeping my oath because I swear by heaven, not by the name of God. But Jesus is saying, don't you understand? If you swear by heaven, you're swearing by the throne of God. It's the same thing. Or the earth, for that's, he says in verse 35, or by the earth, for it is the footstool of his feet. You can't swear by the earth and get out from under it because you're still swearing by the footstool of God. In other words, what he's saying is every promise you make, it's connected to God. Whether you swear by heaven or earth or your own head or Jerusalem, it doesn't matter. You're swearing by God, essentially, when you say those things. And so what Jesus is condemning here is not just blanket oaths of any form. What he's condemning is the flippant, careless way that the Pharisees would use oaths and then use those oaths that they swore by something other than the name of Yahweh in order to slip out from under the obligation of it. And there seems to be good evidence from scholars that that's exactly what they were doing. in first century Judaism. And so it just became a common way of speech day after day. I swear by heaven. I swear by Jerusalem. I swear by the earth. I swear by my own head that I will do this. I will pay you this money. What I'm saying is true. And at the end of the day, they would skirt out from under the obligation by saying, well, it wasn't actually in the name of Yahweh that I swore. And so what is Jesus doing here? He's condemning that kind of swearing. Basically, he's saying, your word matters, no matter whether it's with an oath or not. Your yes should always be yes, and your no should always be no. It should never be yes, no, and no, yes. You should be and do exactly what you say you are and what you're going to do. And so his point then is not to condemn oaths in themselves, but to condemn oaths that are being used, swearing by the things like heaven and earth that he mentions, as a means of skirting out from under the obligation of fulfillment. And it seems like this is why he says in verse 37, anything beyond these is of evil. It's literally, anything beyond these is of the evil one. So what does that mean? Anything beyond these is of the evil one. He says, let your yes be yes, your no, no. Anything beyond these is of the evil one. Well, Satan is a liar. He is the father of lies, isn't he? And he uses all of the resources that are available to him to deceive and to manipulate and to lead astray. And so when the Pharisees, or anyone else, when the Pharisees would use things like, I swear by heaven, or I swear by the earth, as a means of lessening their obligation to be truthful, and opening up the opportunity for them to be deceitful, what Jesus is saying is you're doing the very thing that the evil one does. He is a liar. And so when you swear by these things as a way of lessening your moral obligation to be truthful, you are doing the very thing that Satan does. when he lies, and when he deceives, and when he manipulates. And so Jesus is saying, anything beyond a simple yes-yes and no-no is a lie, and it is of Satan, it's of the evil one. I think that's his point. But moving on, I don't think his point is to condemn all oaths of every form, because if he did, if he was trying to say that, by the way, there's lots of things in the Sermon on the Mount that are similar to that, where Jesus makes a statement, and if you just look at that one statement right there in that one context without pulling back and seeing more of what the scriptures have to say about that particular topic, you will come away with a wrong understanding. One example, don't let your right hand know what your left hand is giving. Always give in secret. When you go back and you put an envelope in the offering box, are you doing this, making sure no one at all is looking at you? His point is there is an abuse of it. There is an abuse of people giving publicly so that they will be noticed and praised for their giving. And what he's saying is don't be like that. Give in secret. He doesn't mean literally like never let anybody know that you're giving a gift or an offering. But what he's saying is don't be like those Pharisees and those hypocrites who go about giving publicly in order to be praised and worshipped by men. There's no reward in that. And so he makes these statements that are very strong and very sharp. And we have to pull back a little bit and say, wait a second, we can't take this only by itself. We have to see it in the larger context of what Jesus has said in other places and what the scriptures say in other places. And that's the same thing we have to do here with oaths and vows. So there are plenty of places in the scriptures that show that oaths made in the name of the Lord are not wicked. They're not evil, like Jesus says here. And so Jesus cannot be saying that any oath beyond yes, yes, and no, no is wicked. Well, how do I know that? Well, who is the person who swore by his own name to Abraham in the book of Genesis? Who swore by his own name? The Lord, right? The Lord swore by his own name. Who swore by his own name to Noah? The Lord. Who swore by his own name in Isaiah? The Lord. Again and again, we see throughout the scriptures that the Lord swears, God Almighty swears by his own name. And someone might say, God, you shouldn't do that. Let your yes be yes and your no, no. You shouldn't swear by your own name. But the point is, God is swearing by his own name, not because his word is lacking veracity, but to give us full assurance, even abundantly more assurance, that everything he's spoken is true. It's not that he's ever untruthful, but he wants us to know that he's truthful. Hebrews 6 talks about that, and it says, to show even more the unchangeableness of his promise, he swore by himself. So the Lord swears by his own name, so it must not be evil. Angels swear by the name of the Lord. Did you know that? Have you ever thought about that? Angels swear in God's name in the New Testament. In Revelation chapter 10, this is what we read. Then the angel whom I saw standing on the sea and on the land lifted up his right hand to heaven and swore by him who lives forever and ever. who created heaven and the things in it, and the earth and the things in it, and the sea and the things in it, that there will be no delay any longer." The angel lifted up his hand and swore by God's name that there would be no delay any longer. So, can't be then that that was of the evil one. So that has to shape our interpretation of Matthew 5. When the angel raised his hand and swore by the name of the Lord, he was not acting in an evil way. I think probably most convincing is the example of the Apostle Paul in the New Testament. The Apostle Paul repeatedly, I have here 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 occasions but there are more in the New Testament. The Apostle Paul repeatedly calls God to witness the truthfulness of his statement. We already saw one of those from 2 Corinthians chapter 1. where he says, but I call God as witness to my soul or against my soul, that to spare you I did not come again to Corinth. So the Apostle Paul swears with God as his witness to the truthfulness of his statements. There are a number of other verses listed there under number five on biblical evidences for the use of oaths. There's the First Thessalonians 2.5 verses. He says, for we never came with flattering speech, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed. How would they know that Paul didn't come with a pretext for greed? Well, Paul could just tell them, I didn't come with a pretext for greed. And that would be a yes-yes and a no-no. That would just be a statement. But Paul goes beyond that. He says, I didn't come with a pretext for greed. Here's how you can know with absolute certainty that I didn't come with a pretext for greed. He says, God is witness. I am calling God to witness that my motive in coming to you was not greed. It was love. God is my witness. There are a number of other examples there, we won't go to all of them, but again and again the Apostle Paul calls God as his witness to the truthfulness of the things that he's saying. It's not that Paul in other occasions was a liar, but the solemnity of the moment, the seriousness and weight of the circumstance required that Paul go above and beyond in making very certain that there was no doubt to his truthfulness, the veracity of his words. All right, so the point of all of that is simply to say the Christian can legitimately use lawful oaths and vows. All of that was a long way of saying that there are times and situations in which it is appropriate for a Christian to make an oath or to make a vow. So when are those times? And how should we make the oaths that we make? Well, that's the next section on the outline there, letter B, how should lawful oaths be made? I'll go ahead and read paragraph two of the confession where this is worked out in detail. People ought to swear only by the name of God. God's name is to be used in this way with the utmost holy fear and reverence. Therefore, to swear vainly or rashly, in an empty or careless and thoughtless way, by that glorious and dreadful or awesome name, or to swear at all by any other thing, is sinful and to be abhorred. In matters of substance and significance, an oath is warranted by the word of God for the confirmation of truth and the end of all conflict. Therefore, when a lawful oath is imposed by lawful authority in such matters, it ought to be taken. So it's just giving some directives there with regard to how an oath should be used. And first of all, it should be used only in the name of the Lord. We've seen that to some measure. Deuteronomy 10 verse 20 says, you shall fear the Lord your God. You shall serve him and cling to him. And then it says, and you shall swear by his name. When you swear, you are to swear by the name of the Lord. And what that means is that basically you are attaching the honor of his name to your statement. And you are saying, if I am being untruthful or if I fail to fulfill my word, I will bring dishonor on the name of the Lord. Then it should be made with utmost fear and reverence, which naturally is the outworking of understanding that we're making the oath in God's name. We should do it with fear and reverence, with a desire not to bring dishonor to our Lord in whose name we're making the oath. And then it says, in matters of substance and significance. So when should we use an oath? When should we make a solemn promise or swear solemnly to another individual and call God as witness on the matter? The confession gives us two situations in which that would be appropriate. Letter A there on the outline is the confirmation of the truth. Basically, that's what the Apostle Paul does, the examples we saw, where Paul is saying, what I'm telling you is true, and there is such a significance or substance to this matter. This is so important. When Paul was writing his letters, he was dealing with the gospel, and he was arguing that the gospel he preached was the true gospel. There's nothing more weighty than that. There's nothing weightier than that. And so the Apostle Paul, in trying to persuade the Corinthians and others of the truthfulness of his gospel, he felt it absolutely essential that they believe him, that they understand his word is true. And so it was a weighty matter, a heavy, substantial, significant matter. And so in that situation, to confirm his truth, he calls upon God as witness of his truthfulness. He swears or makes an oath. But then secondly, ending a conflict. So if you have your Bibles again, you can turn to Hebrews 6. This is speaking of God's promise or his oath to Abraham, but it also makes at the end of these verses a helpful application to us in terms of our own oaths to one another. In Hebrews 6, verse 16, It says, for men swear by one greater than themselves. And then it says, and with them, an oath given as confirmation is an end of every dispute. An oath given as confirmation is the end of every dispute. So not only does it confirm the truth, confirmation, but it ends a dispute. So what would be a situation in which an oath might end a dispute? Think about various situations in life where an oath might settle a dispute between two individuals. The Bible actually gives us some examples and one of those examples is found in the book of Exodus in chapter 20 where basically it's laying out the law for what it would look like in this scenario. Let's say you've got two men who are neighbors. And one of these men is going to go on a journey for several weeks. And as he leaves for his journey, he goes over to his neighbor and he says, neighbor, could you allow my sheep to stay in your field? And could you tend my sheep while I travel? And when I come back, I'll take them back again from you. And so the neighbor agrees, and the man goes on this journey for a few weeks, and then he returns, and when he returns, he finds out that one of the sheep that he'd entrusted to his neighbor is dead. And for whatever reason, the neighbor who traveled, whose sheep is dead, feels absolutely convinced that the man who was caring for the sheep, or was supposed to be caring for the sheep, actually killed his sheep. Out of spite, or for whatever other motive, he killed his sheep. He struck him and killed him. Or maybe he just neglected him and failed to care for him well, and the sheep died. But the neighbor who cared for the sheep is insisting, I didn't do anything to the sheep. He was in my field with the rest of the sheep. And just like all the other sheep, he was eating and feeding and grazing. And I was here caring for them. But the sheep just fell dead. And I don't know what happened. He just died. And the man who traveled insists and says, no, I know that you killed him. And the other man insists and says, no, I really didn't kill him. How do you end that dispute? Well, the assumption in the book of Exodus is that these two men are Israelites that fear the Lord. And these two men who fear the Lord can settle this dispute by this man, who was supposed to be caring for the sheep, who's being accused of killing the sheep, by this man making a solemn oath in the presence of God. And this is what Exodus says. In Exodus chapter 20, verse 7, I think. Not 7. Exodus chapter 20 can't be right because that's the Ten Commandments. I'm looking at the wrong What's the verse that's listed on the bullet, on the outline there? Exodus 22, that's what it is, yeah. 10 to 11. So in Exodus 22, verse 10, it says, if a man gives his neighbor a donkey, an ox, a sheep, or any animal to keep for him, and it dies or is hurt or is driven away while no one is looking, an oath before the Lord shall be made by the two of them that he has not laid hands on his neighbor's property. And its owner shall accept it, and he shall not make restitution. So there's uncertainty about what happened. The sheep died. They don't know how it died. How do you settle it? An oath is made. The man says, I swear to you, before the Lord God as my witness, that I did not lay my hands on your sheep. And the law says the other man should accept it. He should take his word, his oath, and that settles the dispute. It's done. And they move on. And so there are situations in which there's no resolution, there's no clear answer, there's no clear way forward. There's just a dispute. And there are situations in which it may be entirely appropriate for the two parties to sit down and say, hey, we've reached an impasse. You love the Lord. I love the Lord. You fear the Lord. I fear the Lord. And I am swearing to you in the presence of God as my witness that what you think of me is not true. And that settles the dispute according to the law. And so, an example, I guess, of where an oath can be the end of every conflict, as it's stated in Hebrews and phrased in the Confession. All right, well, the last two points here, I think, are clear under letter B, numbers 4 and 5, with certainty of the truth. So we shouldn't say something. Again, going back to that scenario, let's say that the neighbor is sort of uncertain about whether or not he struck the sheep because he got drunk one night and can't really remember everything he did. And so when it comes time to make the oath, he's kind of thinking, I don't think I killed the sheep, but I can't really remember everything from that night, so I might have killed the sheep. He should not make an oath in that situation is basically what the confession is saying because of his uncertainty of the truthfulness of it. And then, without deceit or ambiguity. In other words, we should mean what we say and say what we mean. Or we should say what we mean and mean what we say, whichever way that goes. We should say exactly what we intend to be understood. We shouldn't use ambiguous language that might lead people off course in terms of what we really are trying to communicate. We shouldn't use terminology that's open to misunderstanding. We should be very clear, to the point, make sure that we're understood by the person with whom we're making the oath. All right, then the second section, the last paragraph, has to do with lawful vows. And again, a vow is made to God alone. These are vows that are vertical. We make these vows to God. A helpful passage on vows is found in Ecclesiastes chapter 5. Ecclesiastes chapter five is warning us against being hasty in approaching God and especially in approaching him with vows. It says, guard your steps as you go to the house of God and draw near to listen rather than to offer the sacrifice of fools. For they do not know they are doing evil. Do not be hasty in word or impulsive in thought to bring up a matter in the presence of God. For God is in heaven and you are on the earth. Therefore, let your words be few. For the dream comes through much effort and the voice of a fool through many words. When you make a vow to God, do not be late in paying it, for he takes no delight in fools. Pay what you vow. It is better that you should not vow than that you should vow and not pay. And so that puts some weight and some sobriety on the way that we make vows to the Lord. It is better that you not vow at all than that you vow and not fulfill what you've vowed to the Lord. You should be careful in the vows you make. And not only should you be careful in the vows you make, but you should be faithful in carrying them out. If you've made a vow to the Lord, he says, don't delay in fulfilling it. Accomplish it. Do what you have vowed to the Lord. But what about vows that are sinful? What if we vow to do something that's actually not in God's will? And so if you turn back over to the confession, paragraph five, about halfway through the third sentence, It says, but popish monastic vows, that is perpetual single life, professed poverty, and regular obedience, or regulated monastic submission and routines, are so far from being degrees of higher perfection as to be superstitious and sinful snares in which no Christian may entangle himself. So basically what the confession is saying there is we have the potential to make very foolish and even sinful vows to the Lord. Martin Luther, when he was first converted, became a monk. If you remember, there was a time in his life where he was almost struck by lightning and he cried out to Mary and said, I will become a monk. And he did, he became a monk. And he took a vow of celibacy. and was a monk for years until he was converted, continued to be a monk even after that, until he started eventually to be pushed out of the Roman Catholic Church, but especially as he started to realize that many of the doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church were anti-gospel, and were legalism, and were anti-grace. and were just untrue and were added to the scriptures. And one of the things that he came to realize was an unbiblical, extra biblical practice of the Roman Catholic Church was the vow of celibacy or perpetual singleness required by the monks. And so what did Martin Luther do in that situation? Did he continue to be bound by an oath or a vow, I should say, by a vow he had made to the Lord that he was now under the conviction was a sinful vow. He got married. That's what he did. He got married. Eventually. It took him a while, but he got married. And he actually arranged the marriages of dozens of other ex-nuns who had come out of the Roman Catholic Church, and he found husbands for them as well. And so Martin Luther realized that it is not honoring to the Lord to keep a vow that was made sinfully to begin with. A. A. Hodge, a theologian from the 20th century, it's a simple statement, but I think it gets right to the point. He says, the sin is in taking the oath to do the unlawful thing, not in breaking it. It's not sin to break the oath that you should have never made to begin with. That's the point. It was sin to make the vow. It's not sin to break the sinful vow. And so that's what the confession is arguing here. There are certain things that are just sinful snares imposed upon us by ourselves or by others that it actually is unwise and sinful to continue in. Things like perpetual singleness. or professed poverty. Because it keeps us, for example, professed poverty, Ephesians 4, we're told we're to steal no longer, but we're actually to work with our own hands so that we'll have something to give to others. What was happening in this time, when the confession was written, is the monks would make this profession of poverty, and then they would beg on the streets, which is a clear contradiction of the commandments of 2 Thessalonians 3 and Ephesians 4 and other passages that tell us we should work with our hands. And so their point is these, and then the regular monastic vows that they talk about there, those are just, they're all types of different schools of monasticism, the Franciscans and others that have all these different rules and regulations that they impose upon their monks and their monasteries that are ridiculous and are completely unbiblical and extra biblical. And they're saying those things don't help anybody attain to higher degrees of holiness. this vow of perpetual singleness, this vow of professed poverty, this vow of regulated rules and systems in the monastic context, those things don't help anybody grow in holiness at all, ever. they actually are just a snare, and they actually open us up to other temptations. We could read 1 Corinthians 7 to see the kinds of temptations that are opened up to someone who unwisely chooses singleness. Or, again, there's references to Ephesians 4 and 2 Thessalonians 3 that demonstrate the snares that are opened up to us in a vow of poverty unwisely. All right, so all of that to say, we should take our vows very seriously before the Lord, And especially by being careful not to make foolish vows before the Lord. And the safest way to do that, if we feel compelled to make a vow, and to be honest, I haven't given a lot of thought to what that looks like. So as I've read through this chapter and studied for tonight, I've asked the question, what does it look like to make vows before the Lord? When is that appropriate? And there certainly is an appropriate context, but I think the best way to think about it is to never go beyond what's here in the Word of God. If we're going to make a vow to the Lord, let's vow with added vigor to do what He's commanded in His Word and to commit ourselves to those things so that we're not leaving ourselves open to the possibility of foolishly vowing something that's outside of God's will. But there's more to be thought through in that, and as you think through vows in your own life, perhaps there's other things that come to mind and would need to be thought through. But the bottom line is, we should not treat oaths or vows like something very trivial or light or just mundane. We are promising something in the presence of a holy God and we are calling him to witness and to treat us according to the truthfulness of that vow. That's a serious matter. And so again, to conclude tonight, there are still maybe some uncertainties with regard to the details of some of these things, but I hope that the main takeaway is that honesty matters, that the Lord cares about whether or not we speak the truth to one another and to Him. And so I'll close with these words from the Apostle Paul to the Ephesians reminding us, we are new creatures, we are a new creation in Christ, and as new creatures we are to put aside the old way of life, put on the new way of life, and that new way of life means speaking the truth. And so this is what the Apostle Paul says in Ephesians 4. You did not learn Christ in this way, if indeed you have learned him and have been taught in him, just as truth is in Jesus. That in reference to your former manner of life you lay aside the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit, and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth. Therefore, laying aside falsehood, speak truth, each one of you with his neighbor, for we are members of one another. Amen. Let's pray. Our Father, we do recognize that even as we are here in your presence now, you not only hear the words of our mouth, but you see the thoughts and the intentions of our heart. And Lord, without the gospel, that would leave us hopeless, because you see the secrets there that would condemn us to an eternity in hell. But we thank you for the gospel of your Son, that though you search the innermost parts of our being and you see the sin, You've also told us that you've laid that sin upon your son on the cross and he has taken it upon himself for us that we would be set free from the curse and the burden of our sin. And so we do confess before you, Lord, that often our words have been careless and thoughtless and even dishonest. And we also recognize that in Christ we have forgiveness for that. And we pray that you would help us moving forward to be a people who take truth very seriously and honor you with the things that we say, the promises that we make before you and to the people around us. We pray that you would help us to do this because we know that your name is attached to our speech, and the way we speak reflects something of your glory and your honor. So help us to be faithful, to speak what is true, that we would honor and magnify your goodness. We pray this in Jesus' name, amen.