Is the Church Committing Perjury?

2 Timothy 3:5, “This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God, having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.

Romans 10:6-10, “But the righteousness which is of faith speaketh on this wise, Say not in thine heart, Who shall ascend into heaven? (that is, to bring Christ down from above:) Or, Who shall descend into the deep? (that is, to bring up Christ again from the dead.) But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach; That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

Hebrews 11:6, “⁶ But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.

Hebrews 12:1, Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses (read Hebrews 11), let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us……

---

What is ¹Perjury?

¹ Perjury = a) The crime of willfully and knowingly making a false statement about a material fact while under oath; b) An act of committing such a crime; c) the violation of any oath, vow, or solemn affirmation; specifically, in law, the willful utterance of false testimony under oath or affirmation, before a competent tribunal, upon a point material to a legal inquiry.

When a court of law is convened and the bailiff announces that the court is “now in session”, the judge will sometimes deliver his comments to the jury once it has been seated. Part of his commentary is instructional on how the court functions and how the members of the jury are to consider all the testimony they will hear. Every witness brought before the court to ‘testify’ will be required to place his or her hand on a Bible and swear that the testimony they are about to give will be “the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth”. The phrase ‘the whole truth’ indicates that to deny any part of the truth sought is indeed a lie. They will have been previously instructed that, should they lie under oath, they can be charged with  perjury and possibly face a penalty, which may include prison time, if found guilty.

The Oath to Speak the Truth

In our legal system, perjury is considered a serious crime and can cause the perjurer to be imprisoned; that is why the witnesses are required to swear before the judge and jury that their testimony will be truthful. It has been shown that many who commit perjury do so under influence or pressure from an outside force that has an interest in the case being tried. If the person who ‘suborns’ perjury is caught, accused and found guilty, he or she can be sentenced to jail for one year up to five years depending on where the crime was committed.

However, the bottom line on perjury is that the witness who swears to be truthful is responsible for doing so whether pressured to lie or not. Special circumstances, like being pressured to lie under oath, which in itself is a very serious issue, may allow the person charged with perjury to escape prosecution if he or she ‘recants’ the false testimony while the proceeding is occurring. After the proceeding has ended, there is usually no way to avoid prosecution for the crime of perjury.

Denial of truth, whether in a court of law or in one’s daily life is equivalent to lying, and a lie willingly told under oath IS perjury.

Now, we all know that the main purpose of some of the witnesses in a courtroom trial is to purposely obfuscate their testimony so as to make it nearly impossible to determine what IS truth and whether a witness has spoken truthfully or lied under oath. In many cases, those who lie under oath DO get away with it and are never caught and punished for their perjury. As bad as this is, it is not as consequential as lying in ‘real life’, especially on a habitual basis.

A person who has been found guilty of perjury has instantly lost much, if not all, of his credibility. His word, which should be the measure of his character, has been tainted and rightfully so. No one wants to have his security, his wellbeing, his future placed in the hands of a liar.

Does It Matter? And Why Does It Matter?

So you might be asking what all this talk of perjury has to do with the truth and the Christian walk. Good question. While we know that a witness in a trial case is sworn to tell the truth, placing his or her hand on God’s word and swearing, upon pain of punishment for breaking that oath, that the truth WILL be told,  few seem to consider that, when a person accepts the truth of Jesus and His life, death and resurrection, he is swearing to the truth of His life, death and resurrection. In effect, an oath has been taken that, in God’s court, binds that person to the truth and requires that the truth become the very basis of his or her life from that moment on.

Perjury and the Church

Jesus, the anointed Messiah, Jeshua Meshea, is called “the Logos of God” in the Gospel of John. The meaning of ‘logos’ in John 1:1 is “the Divine Expression”, or the very embodiment of God. Before He came to earth in the form of a human being, He was the “Word of God”. As such, and since God is TRUTH, the Word of God is ALSO truth. While there are differences between committing perjury as a witness in a legal case being tried in court and the same offense committed by professing Christians, there are also many similarities.

When a person truly accepts the redemption provided by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, he or she has in effect sworn an oath to always follow Christ, with the word of God being the ‘life-guide’. His word is accepted as TRUTH, regardless of what the world may consider truth to be. Consider that the placing of one’s hand on a Bible while swearing to tell the truth during testimony aligns with the Christian allowing God’s word to be the basis for all truth and all decisions in his life.

Shortly before His crucifixion, Jesus told His disciples about the Holy Spirit Who would be sent to them after His departure. Jesus called Him the ‘Spirit of Truth’ and informed them that, as the Spirit of Truth, He would guide them into all truth. Jesus wanted all those who would choose to follow Him to know how important it is to walk in the truth, following a perfect Guide Whose purpose is to ensure the follower understands Truth in order to KNOW the Truth and avoid any deception.

The thing about deception that makes it so dangerous is that it is often ‘cloaked’ with just enough truth to make it sound not only believable, but acceptable. Underneath the cleverly worded ‘cloaking’ lurks a dangerous lie that can cause untold destruction. There is a very fine line between walking in the truth and stepping off into a life of lies and deception and that line becomes blurred more and more as a person listens to the lies, seemingly wanting them to be true. The more one listens to the lies, the more willing he or she becomes to deny the truth, which may at times bring discomfort, and accept the lie which, while more comfortable, will bring ultimate loss.

The Inherent Danger of Perjury

During the life of the Prophet Jeremiah, the Jewish people were straying far off the course that God had placed them on, missing out on the benefits of His promises to keep them whole and safe from any enemies. When they began to forsake the truth of those promises, God sent them warning after warning to try to get them back on the right track, but they refused, over and over, to listen to His prophet’s warnings.

Their failure eventually brought God’s judgment on the entire nation. Their captivity by the Babylonians and subsequent enslavement for seventy years was a low point in the history of the Jewish people. Many Jews perished and the course of the nation was forever changed due to their refusal to not only believe the TRUTH but to proclaim it to everyone, thus allowing the light of God’s word to grow dim in a darkening world.

If God loved His people Israel and did not hesitate to judge their evil actions, how can any believer in the Unites States possibly think that we will escape the same judgment for the same sins they committed?

The Truth of the Gospel

In Romans 10:8-10, Paul writes, “But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach; That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

The word ‘saved’ in verse 9 is the Greek word ‘sozo’ (Strong’s 4982) and many Christians truly believe it means only saved unto eternal life after we die. However it’s true meaning is “to save, heal, deliver, make whole and preserve”. According to Paul’s letter to the Church at Rome, the gospel is the ‘POWER of God unto salvation’ ( Romans 5:16). Let’s look at the word ‘salvation’ for a moment. It is a translation of the Greek word, ‘soteria’ (Strong’s 4991), meaning deliver, health, salvation, save and saving. The word is derived from the base word ‘sozo’ and the translators of the king James Bible could as easily have said this: That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved, healed, delivered, preserved and made whole. These definitions leave little for any true believer to be concerned about IF that truth is believed and adhered to.

In the passage above, read how Paul explicitly explains just what God’s powerful gospel has provided and ask yourself if you are enjoying all these benefits or missing out on fully experiencing that powerful gospel. If God designed His gospel to provide everything the word “sozo” entails: being saved, healed, delivered, made whole and preserved”, why would anyone deny His power to do what He says He CAN and WILL do for those who truly believe His word? After all, believers are sworn to uphold and speak that truth to a hurting world in need of the truth. And if believers publicly deny that truth, would that not be tantamount to perjury in a court of law?

The last ‘church’ that Jesus addressed in Revelation 2-3 was the Laodicean Church whose sin was that of denying the truth of the WHOLE GOSPEL and their NEED for the gospel and the benefits that every believer has been promised and instead stating, “I am rich and increased with goods, and have need of nothing;”  while in fact, they are, in God’s eyes, “wretched, and miserable and poor and blind and naked”. They are thus denying the truth of God’s word and denying that they have any need of God’s provision. Does this not sound like the Church in America?

God spoke to His prophet Jeremiah regarding the condition of the Israelites shortly before they were carried away into captivity by the Babylonians. In the first six chapters of the Book of Jeremiah, God was calling Judah to repentance, reminding them of all the sins they had committed against Him and His word. They refused to hear and still turned their backs on God. In the seventh chapter, God finally delivers His word of judgment by telling Jeremiah NOT to pray for the people nor to make intercession for them because He (God) will NOT hear him. This placed the inhabitants of Judah in a terrible place, about to be captured and placed in slavery, with NO God to hear their cries of despair.

Please read the entire 7th chapter of Jeremiah:

¹The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying,

²Stand in the gate of the Lord‘s house, and proclaim there this word, and say, Hear the word of the Lord, all ye of Judah, that enter in at these gates to worship the Lord.

³ Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, Amend your ways and your doings, and I will cause you to dwell in this place.

⁴ Trust ye not in lying words, saying, The temple of the Lord, The temple of the Lord, The temple of the Lord, are these.

⁵ For if ye thoroughly amend your ways and your doings; if ye throughly execute judgment between a man and his neighbour;

⁶ If ye oppress not the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow, and shed not innocent blood in this place, neither walk after other gods to your hurt:

⁷ Then will I cause you to dwell in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers, for ever and ever.

⁸ Behold, ye trust in lying words, that cannot profit.

⁹ Will ye steal, murder, and commit adultery, and swear falsely, and burn incense unto Baal, and walk after other gods whom ye know not;

¹⁰ And come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, We are delivered to do all these abominations?

¹¹ Is this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your eyes? Behold, even I have seen it, saith the Lord.

¹² But go ye now unto my place which was in Shiloh, where I set my name at the first, and see what I did to it for the wickedness of my people Israel.

¹³ And now, because ye have done all these works, saith the Lord, and I spake unto you, rising up early and speaking, but ye heard not; and I called you, but ye answered not;

¹⁴ Therefore will I do unto this house, which is called by my name, wherein ye trust, and unto the place which I gave to you and to your fathers, as I have done to Shiloh.

¹⁵ And I will cast you out of my sight, as I have cast out all your brethren, even the whole seed of Ephraim.

¹⁶ Therefore pray not thou for this people, neither lift up cry nor prayer for them, neither make intercession to me: for I will not hear thee.

¹⁷ Seest thou not what they do in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?

¹⁸ The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead their dough, to make cakes to the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto other gods, that they may provoke me to anger.

¹⁹ Do they provoke me to anger? saith the Lord: do they not provoke themselves to the confusion of their own faces?

²⁰ Therefore thus saith the Lord God; Behold, mine anger and my fury shall be poured out upon this place, upon man, and upon beast, and upon the trees of the field, and upon the fruit of the ground; and it shall burn, and shall not be quenched.

²¹ Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel; Put your burnt offerings unto your sacrifices, and eat flesh.

²² For I spake not unto your fathers, nor commanded them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices:

²³ But this thing commanded I them, saying, Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and ye shall be my people: and walk ye in all the ways that I have commanded you, that it may be well unto you.

²⁴ But they hearkened not, nor inclined their ear, but walked in the counsels and in the imagination of their evil heart, and went backward, and not forward.

²⁵ Since the day that your fathers came forth out of the land of Egypt unto this day I have even sent unto you all my servants the prophets, daily rising up early and sending them:

²⁶ Yet they hearkened not unto me, nor inclined their ear, but hardened their neck: they did worse than their fathers.

²⁷ Therefore thou shalt speak all these words unto them; but they will not hearken to thee: thou shalt also call unto them; but they will not answer thee.

²⁸ But thou shalt say unto them, This is a nation that obeyeth not the voice of the Lord their God, nor receiveth correction: TRUTH IS PERISHED, and is cut off from their mouth.

²⁹ Cut off thine hair, O Jerusalem, and cast it away, and take up a lamentation on high places; for the Lord hath rejected and forsaken the generation of his wrath.

³⁰ For the children of Judah have done evil in my sight, saith the Lord: they have set their abominations in the house which is called by my name, to pollute it.

³¹ And they have built the high places of Tophet, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire; which I commanded them not, neither came it into my heart.

³² Therefore, behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that it shall no more be called Tophet, nor the valley of the son of Hinnom, but the valley of slaughter: for they shall bury in Tophet, till there be no place.

³³ And the carcasses of this people shall be meat for the fowls of the heaven, and for the beasts of the earth; and none shall fray them away.

³⁴ Then will I cause to cease from the cities of Judah, and from the streets of Jerusalem, the voice of mirth, and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride: for the land shall be desolate.

Conclusion

I know that’s a lot of scripture to read, but the thrust of this word from God to His people, Israel, is how they were placing themselves in danger by their disobedience. And as they refused to hear God’s correction, they were taken captive to Babylon for seventy years, exiled from their country. That message is so needed today in this nation that it MUST be read by every believer who should by now understand and see the parallels between Israel in Jeremiah’s time and what is happening in the cities and streets all across America.

God refused to hear the cries of His people Israel because of their disobedience. Could the United States be nearing that same precarious place where the God of all creation is about to close His ears to the cries of His prophets, pastors, evangelists and teachers who are seeing the coming destruction from God’s judgments against a wicked and perverse nation?

To repeat the words of God in Jeremiah 7:28, “But thou shalt say unto them, This is a nation that obeyeth not the voice of the Lord their God, nor receiveth correction: TRUTH IS PERISHED, and is cut off from their mouth.

I fear that the United States is now close to that same situation, where no cries of the people for deliverance will be heard by God. If I am right, I urge you to return to God and diligently seek His counsel and wisdom, all the while speaking all the truth in every situation to a darkening world.

Do NOT commit spiritual perjury any longer: TIME IS VERY SHORT!

Blessings and Maranatha!

©Bud Hancock. All rights reserved.

RELATED VIDEO: Separation of Church and State