The past two weeks, the lesson in my Sunday School class has involved integrity.

Wikipedia defines integrity this way.

Integrity is the qualification of being honest and having strong moral principles, or moral uprightness. It is generally a personal choice to hold oneself to consistent moral and ethical standards.

In ethics, integrity is regarded as the honesty and truthfulness or accuracy of one’s actions.

Integrity can stand in opposition to hypocrisy, in that judging with the standards of integrity involves regarding internal consistency as a virtue, and suggests that parties holding within themselves apparently conflicting values should account for the discrepancy or alter their beliefs.

When King Solomon asked God to give him wisdom, God granted Solomon’s request. Not only did God give Solomon wisdom, God added much more with the stipulation Solomon walk in integrity.

Near the beginning of Solomon’s reign, all was well. He performed his duty as king with wisdom and integrity. He built a temple for the Lord God. A dream Solomon’s father, David, held, but one which God did not allowed David to accomplish.

Before long, however, Solomon began to compromise his beliefs.

He made alliances with foreign kings by marrying their daughters. This was a common practice at the time. However, there was a problem beyond the fact there were 700 hundred wives plus about 300 concubines, these wives worshiped idols. To appease his wives, Solomon built altars for their false gods.

Eventually, Solomon’s wives turned his heart away form the Lord. They encouraged him to worship their gods instead of trusting completely in the One True God.

Solomon no longer walked with integrity before the Lord. He compromised his faith to appease those around him along with his own selfish desires. He was no longer faithful to God.

After breaking the covenant God established between them, the Lord passed judgment on Solomon. The kingdom would be torn away from Solomon’s son and family. The kingdom of Israel Solomon’s father worked so hard to establish was divided.

As followers of Jesus, we are called to walk with integrity before the Lord. We are to be honest and exhibit strong moral principles.

Our actions should display integrity with honesty and truthfulness. We are not to compromise our beliefs to fit in with the world around us.

How are we doing with that?

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And if you live in honesty and truth as your father David did, always obeying me, then I will cause your descendants to be the kings of Israel forever, just as I promised your father David when I told him, ‘One of your sons shall always be upon the throne of Israel.’

 “However, if you or your children turn away from me and worship other gods and do not obey my laws,  then I will take away the people of Israel from this land that I have given them. I will take them from this Temple which I have hallowed for my name, and I will cast them out of my sight; and Israel will become a joke to the nations and an example and proverb of sudden disaster. 1 Kings 9:4-7 (TLB)

You can find my August Inspire a Fire post here. Please stop by and read it.

I wish you well.

Sandy

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