Fulfill Your Vows – The Ninth Commandment

Fulfill Your Vows

Exodus 20:16

“You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.”

“For richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, for better or for worse.” Probably most of us have declared those vows to the Lord. Keeping vows is an important part of truth-telling, and this requires a continuous vigilance on our parts.

Deuteronomy 23:21-23 reminds us that the Lord takes our vows seriously, and He expects us to be assiduous in fulfilling them. We are “to be careful to do what has passed from your lips, for you have voluntarily vowed to the LORD your God what you have promised with your mouth.”

The rate of broken marriages among evangelical Christians suggests either that many of us haven’t made the connection between vows and truth-telling, or we have but little regard for the Law of God. Either way, how can we expect the Lord to bless our blatant rejection or casual indifference to His will?

And what about those vows of church membership? To support the worship and work of the Lord to the best of our ability? Hmmm.

What other kinds of vows have you taken? Church membership? Church office? Promises to pay or complete a pledge?

Daily meditation in the Law of God helps us along the path of holiness, righteousness, and goodness (Rom. 7:12). Order your copy of The Law of God, a compilation of the Mosaic Law for contemporary believers, by going to www.MyParuchia.com, point your browser to “Publications,” then click on the drop-down option, “Waxed Tablet Publications.”

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In the Gates is a devotional series on the Law of God by Rev. T.M. Moore.

T.M. Moore is editor of the Worldview Church. He serves as dean of the Centurions Program of the Wilberforce Forum and principal of The Fellowship of Ailbe, a spiritual fellowship in the Celtic Christian tradition. He is the author or editor of twenty books, and has contributed chapters to four others. His essays, reviews, articles, papers, and poetry have appeared in dozens of national and international journals, and on a wide range of websites. His most recent books are The Ailbe Psalter and The Ground for Christian Ethics (Waxed Tablet).

Scripture quotations in this article are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, (c) copyright 2001, 2007 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Editor’s note: The use of a translation other than the Authorised Version in an article does not constitute an endorsement in whole or in part by The Christian Observer.