Throughout this entire section, Jesus is challenging paradigms. "Here is what you have heard in the past, but here is what I say."
Today: "You have heard it said, 'You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn.... But I say to you, do not take an oath at all.... Let what you say be simply 'yes,' or 'no.'"
What Jesus is talking about here is integrity. If we are people of integrity, those who know us will trust us. We should be living the kind of lives that those who know us can count on whatever we say, and extra oaths are not required.
Unfortunately most people -including most Christians, do not have this kind of integrity. Most people often tell half-truths, sometimes tell outright lies, and routinely scheme and angle and spin things to make themselves look good.
Jesus is saying that integrity is a basic, fundamental value in the Kingdom of God. This has to be the case because God is a God of truth. Jesus said, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life." He also said that the devil is a liar and the father of lies. Father of lies means that all deception, all half-truths, all cheating, all scheming and distorting of truth, all breaches in integrity originate in Satan.
Followers of Jesus have a very clear and very basic choice to make. There are very few issues in all of Scripture this clear. God is a God of truth; the devil the father of lies. We must choose with whom we will align ourselves.
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