Rick Warren - God Blesses A Heart of Integrity—Part Two

Hello, and welcome to Pastor Rick's Daily Hope with Rick Warren.

We are so glad you're here with us.

Today we're going to continue our series called The Keys

to a Blessed Life, And in these messages, Rick walks

through Jesus' Sermon on the Mount and shows us how

to live a truly hopeful and purpose filled life. Today,

we're back with part two of God blesses a heart

of integrity.

So how do you get it? How do you get integrity?

What does it even look like?

Well?

In Psalm chapter fifteen, the fifteenth Psalm, David gives us

eight characteristics of what it means to walk or live

with integrity. Let me read it to you Psalm fifteen

one to five. Lord, who may stand in your sanctuary

and who may live on your holy mountain?

And what's he talking about here?

This is a metaphor, he said, God, who gets to

be close to you? You, That's what he's saying. Who gets

to be your friend? All that thing stuff I just

was talking about earlier. Who gets to live in your presence,

Who gets to experience your power, who gets to understand

your peace? Who gets to live your purpose?

God?

Who gets to be your friend. That's what he's saying.

Who may stay in your sanctuary and live on your

holy mountain. Here's the answer, the one who walks with integrity.

Circle that walks with integrity. And then he gives us

eight characteristics of a man who has integrity or a

woman who has integrity, and here's what they are.

A Number one.

He speaks the truth from his heart. You don't lie

when you have integrity. He refuses to slander others with

his tongue. WHOA anytime you put down anybody else, you've.

Just lost integrity.

Anytime you slander anybody else for their politics, or their religion,

or their lifestyle, or any other difference, cultural difference, whatever,

he says, you've just lost your integrity. He refuses to

slander others with his tongue. He won't listen to gossip.

Oh now we're meddling, says. If you listen, not share it.

But even if you just listen to it, you've lost

your integrity. He will not cast a slur on his

fellow man. Instead, he honors those who fear the Lord,

and he keeps his promises even when it hurts. He

lends his money freely without charging interest. In other words,

he's very, very generous. That's a mark of integrity, and

he cannot be bribed by money. Whoever does these things,

these things will never be shaken. You won't have security

in your life. You want to get rid of all

the insecure in your life. Get integrity in your life.

You want to have stability in your life, Get integered

in your life. You want to have the confidence Tom

was talking about. Then you've got to get integered in

your life. When you lack integrity, you go through life insecure.

The Bible says the man of integrity walks securely. And

the whole reason you don't have security, the whole reason

you feel insecure so much time, is because you lack integrity, wholeness, authenticity,

and an unmixed motivation. What I want to do now

is give you a little checklist. It's a pretty quick checklist.

It's not going to take a lot of time for

me to explain it. In fact, I don't have to

illustrate it because once I say these things, you'll understand it.

Integrity demands that every area of your life is treated

with the same intensity that you say, I'm going to

have the same commitment to excellence in my marriage as.

I have in my career.

I'm going to have the same commitment to excellence in

my ministry and in my parenting as I do in

making money. I'm going to have as much commitment to

the right motivation as I do into doing the right thing.

So let me just give you six of the common

ways you can work on these this week from the Bible.

Number one, you become a person of integrity by keeping

your promises. By keeping your promises, people of integrity keep

their word. If they say they'll do it, they'll do it.

If they say they'll be there, they'll be there.

They say you.

Can count on it, You can count on it. People

of integrity keep their promises. This is verbal integrity. And

the Bible says in Proverbs twenty five, verse fourteen, people

who promise things that they never give. He says, they're

like clouds and wind that bring no rain. He said,

they're worthless. There's been a hot bunch of hot air.

This is vapor, and there's nothing to them. They don't

bring wind, they don't bring rain, they don't bring any benefit.

They're just all smoking mirrors.

So my question to you is this, what promises have

you made that you have not kept? And you need

to keep them before integrity? Say, have you made some

promises your kids? Broken promises are the number one cause

of bitterness in children. The number one cause of bitterness

broken promises that parents said. I said up, Mom, you

said Dad, you said, they break the promise. Have you

made a promise to your spouse about something you're going

to change and you haven't done it. It's a broken promise.

Have you made a promise to God, a spiritual promise,

a vow and you haven't kept it. That is a

lack of integrity. Now I know that what happens is

we say, well, the circumstances have changed, doesn't matter.

If you made a promise.

You got to keep your word, even if it is

not beneficial to you. Do you remember that Psalm FI

we just read. Let me look at it again here

on the screen. So I'm fifteen verse four. God blesses

the one who walks with integrity, who keeps his promises

even when it hurts, even when it cost you more.

And you thought I was going to cost you. You

keep your promise. I said, I'd sult to you for that.

I'm gonna sell it to you for that, even though

it's worth a whole lot more or whatever. You keep

your promises even when it hurts. I remember when Matthew,

my youngest son, was young, and he really struggled with

panic attacks as part of his mental illness. Panic thanks

are not mental illness, but he had that in addition too,

and he struggled with a lot of fears in his life.

And I really wanted him to go to camp, but

he was afraid to go to church camp. And so

I made a promise to my young son. I said,

Matthew is sixth grade. So Matthew, if you'll go to camp,

I promised to go with you, and then you can

handle it. You won't be afraid. I'll be there with you.

I'll be your camp counselor I'll go with you. And

he decided he didn't want to go, so I went

ahead and I took some other commitments that week. Then

he decided he wanted to go. And I had made

a commitment to speak to one hundred thousand men in

a stadium of promise keepers in Atlanta. So I broke

a promise to speak to the promise keepers, to keep

a promise to my son, and I have never never

regretted that. Now I would have had a whole lot

more fun speaking to one hundred thousand men than being

a camp counselor in sixth grade camp. You become a

person of integrity by keeping your promises.

Number two, you.

Become a person of integrity by paying your bills.

Now you may not think.

This is a big deal, but it's a big deal

to God. This is financial integrity. And the Bible says

over and over and over and over again that the

way you use your money is a test of your integrity.

Do you spend more money than you make That is

a lack of integrity. Do you get yourself in debt

to things that you can't pay off, That is a

lack of integrity. The Bible says, people of integrity pay

their bills. It's like keeping your promises financially. Now, I'm

not going to go into all the different ways, but

let me just give you a couple. Here's a couple verses. First,

you don't default on loans and you pay off your

credit card. Psalm thirty seven to twenty one says the

wicked man borrows and never pays back. And not only

that this one's really meddling. Some of these are going

to get a little personal here. You don't defraud the

government of taxes. The Bible says in Romans thirteen, verse

six and seven, the authorities working are working for God.

Pay what you owe them.

Pay your personal and property taxes. You say, but Rick,

the government is wasting my money. Of course I know that, okay,

And they don't. The government lacks integrity because they're spending

far more than they take in. Okay, and they're doing

deficit spending. But you don't get to do that if

you have integrity. What they do with my taxes, they're

going to be accountable to God for. But I am

accountable to God to pay my taxes that do not

cheat on them, because if I do, I lack integrity.

The Bible says, to do that. Okay.

Number three, you become a person of integrity by keeping

your promises, paying your bills. And number three, this one's

really meddling. By refusing to gossip. That's what the Bible says.

This is relational integrity, and that is you don't talk

one way with one group of people and then go

talk about.

Them behind their back.

If you flatter somebody, and you butter them up and

you like they're best friends, and then behind them you

cut them off with the knees and you say one

thing here and one thing there, and you gossip. The

Bible says, you lack integrity. You don't have it, and

you're not gonna have God's blessing on your life if

you keep on gossiping like that, And the Bible says,

if you listen to it. Did you know that accepting

stolen goods gets the same criminal indictment as stealing it,

and so accepting gossip is the same thing as offering

it up.

It's a wrong thing. Every time you.

Gossip, you lose integrity. Do you talk about other people

behind their back? Can you keep a secret? The Bible

says this in Proverbs eleven, verse thirteen. A gossip can't

be trusted with a secret, but somewhat of integrity won't

violate a confidence.

Do you know what we need today? We need men

and women of.

Integrity who know how to keep a secret and not

put it on Facebook or blab it on Twitter, or

pass it around on social media. You know, one of

the rules of our small groups is what set in

the group stays in the group. Why because everybody needs

a safe place of a few friends where you can

be real and be yourself and have not other everybody

go publish it about you. Real friends walk into your

life when everybody else walks out. And that's the purpose

of a small group, one of the purposes. And so

what set in the group stays in the group? Can

you keep a confidence? Or as soon as somebody says, now,

I've never told this to anybody, you.

Immediately go tell it somebody else.

If you do, you lack integrity. The Bible says this

there on the screen Proverbs ten eighteen. Anyone who spreads gossip,

God says you're a fool. Anyone who spreads gossip is

a fool. It's a foolish, destructive thing to do, all right.

Number four, I'm just going through these pretty quickly. Integrity

is developed by keeping your promises, paying your bills, refusing

the gossip. Number four, by faithfully tithing. Did you know

that the Bible says that tithing is a test of integrity.

One of the ways God tests my integrity is through tithing.

Do I trust him with my finances? Do I put

him first? Whatever? Wherever you put your money first is

what's most important to you. Let me say it again,

Wherever you put your money first is what's most important

to you. And the Bible says that tithing is a

test of integrity because Jesus said, wherever your heart is,

wherever your treasure is, that's where your heart's going to be.

So you can always know what's important to people by

looking at it and where they spend their money. Here's

what God says about this Malachi chapter three.

Is it right.

For a person to cheat God? Of course not yet.

You are robbing me, says the Lord. How he asked me.

You're spending my money by withholding your full tithe and offerings.

Bring to me the full amount of your tithe to

my house. Put me to the test, and you'll see

that I will open the windows of heaven and pour

out so much blessing on you that you won't even

have enough room to receive it.

All.

This is a test, and this is a promise. It's

the Pepsi challenge eirth Jesus, God says, I dare you

to trust me on this?

I dare you to trust me.

Do you have the integrity to put me first in

your finances. Number five, You become a person of integrity,

keeping your promises, paying your bills, refusing the gossip, faithfully tithing,

by doing your best at work. By doing your best

at work, this is business integrity or vocational spiritual integrity.

Tithing and relational integrity, not gossiping and financial integrity.

Paying your bills.

This is vocational integrity, of having integrity where you work.

Do you do your best at work? Are you to

just slough off when the boss isn't watching? See, some

people only work hard when the boss is around, when

the supervisor's around, and the rest of the time they're

goofing off. They're playing around, they're standing in a watercolor gossiping.

They're playing solitaire on the computer or reading some online magazine.

They're they're taking supplies home to their house, ripping off

the office. They're you know, taking breaks, coming in late,

as long as they're not being noticed. You may have

never realized what a serious sin God considers it for

you to give a full day's work when you're paid

a full day's wage. You don't have the right to

goof off. He said, Well, everybody else is slacking off.

Nobody else works hard in my office. Well, so what,

they're not a follower of Christ, and maybe they don't

care about integrity, and maybe they don't care about leaving

a legacy rewards for eternity and personal stability.

But you do.

And so whether they work hard and well or not

is irrelevant. Let me show you some just a few

verses about this here in the screen. Proverbs eighteen, verse

nine says this, slack habits and sloppy work are as

bad as vandalism.

That's what God says about it.

He says, you know, if you're just goofing off and

you do poor work and you don't really that's good

enough for this. You know, nobody's gonna even notice. He said,

that's like vandalism. Let me show you in the Living Bible.

The Bible says this, a lazy employee is as destructive

as a saboteur.

Oh, you know, we're really getting deep here.

He's saying that if I am not given a full

day's work for a full day's wage, I may hate

my job. It doesn't matter if I hate it or not.

I am actually vandalizing and I'm sabotaging somebody else's business

if I'm not giving it my best. If I don't

give it my best, then I lack integrity. Let me

show you a couple other Versesphesian six six says this,

don't work hard only when your master, that's your supervisor

is watching, and then sure when he isn't looking, work

hard and work with gladness, and that's enthusiasm all the time,

even if you hate your job, as though working for Christ,

doing the will of God with all your heart. It

is God's will that you work hard and with gladness

all the time, as if you were working for Christ.

You see, if you're a believer, your boss is and

your boss, your real boss is God. And whether anybody

else sees it or not, you said, nobody's going to

see whether I worked or not. God does, and he's

your boss. Your boss isn't watching you all the time,

but God is watching you all the time. And this

is a test. It's a test of integrity. And as

God's will that I not waste the time and the

money and the resources of.

The owner of the business or my employer. Let me

show you another one.

Colossums three twenty two says this, and don't just do

the minimum that will get you by do your best.

That's integrity. Are you doing your best at work? If not,

you need to change. You need to what's called repent.

I need to not just do the minimum. I need

to give it my best shot, do your best. In fact,

the next verse Colossians three twenty three, it's on your outline,

says this, work hard and cheerfully at whatever you do

as though you were working for the Lord.

Said it twice.

Anytime the Bible says something twice, you better pay attention. Okay,

work hard and cheerfully is whatever you do as though

you're working for the Lord rather than people.

That is a mark of integrity.

Hey, thanks for listening to Pastor Rick's Daily Hope. Right now,

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