One’s integrity is founded in one’s belief system. The way one acts, reacts or responds is dependent on what one believes to be true, and the depth of that belief. The belief system encompasses a number of areas: such as whether or not one believes in God, and if one does, what he believes about God; what a person believes about himself, and what is believed about how God views him, and of course what one thinks about others, to name a few. As Believers, we need to examine what are our core beliefs, and how they line up with the Word of God if we are going to walk with integrity. Furthermore, it is time to believe what we believe.
What we believe about God will affect how we approach Him, and how much of Him we allow in our lives. It affects our attitudes in the way we handle the things of God, and how we treat other people. For example, if we are firm in our belief in God, and we truly believe what is written in Scripture, we will have a genuine fear of the Lord. This means that we will take greater care in how we view His Word and how we treat it. In terms of doctrine, we will want the true doctrine of Christ, and utterly reject the doctrines of men and devils. In essence, we will want what is true according to God, and we are willing to let go of anything that is contrary to His Word. Integrity will cause us to want what is right in God’s eyes, thus walking in the fear of the Lord and rejecting the fear of man.
If we truly believe God’s Word, we will love Him with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. Above all else, love should be our motivation behind what we do. For example, Jesus said that if we love Him we would keep His commandments (see John 14:15). Galatians 5:6 says that, “Faith worketh by love.” Love brings us into another a dimension, it causes us to want to think and act differently. For example, because we love the Father, we are going to want to bless Him and do what pleases Him. On the reverse side, because of our love for Him we will not want to hurt Him, thus we will hate to do anything that would cause Him to grieve. Both love and the fear of the Lord hates sin and loves the things of God.
As stated before, integrity will affect our relationship with others. It is one thing to view other believers as brothers and sisters, which makes them our peers, but another dimension is that they are also the children of God. This means that we are going to take greater care in how we interact with our brothers and sisters because they are His children. If for example, I insult a brother, I am not only insulting my brother, I am insulting a child of the Most High. In essence, I am insulting my Father’s son -not good! On the other hand, if I am seeking to bless my brother, I am blessing my Father’s son. Of course, as a brother I should be seeking to bless my brother out of love. Indeed, if I love the Lord and His family, I am going to seek to bless them all. As a parent of three boys, I can understand this at a greater level. If they are treating each other well, it sits well with me. If one were to speak ill of the other, the opposite is true. The thought is, yes, he is your brother, but he is also my son – not good! Obviously, our belief system affects more than just our relationship with other brothers and sisters. It carries into how we view and treat non-believers; how we view those in management, and how it influences our work ethic as employees while on the job; or how we treat employees if we are in management position; whether or not we are honest, and the list goes on.
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