by Shirley D. Tingle
When you were a kid, do you remember what you said and did when trying to get your little friends to keep a secret? Did you have them promise not to tell a living soul, cross their heart and hope to die, and even do a pinkie swear? Well, that was supposed to be the lock, the key, and the throwing away of the key on telling the secret, because “a promise is a promise,” right?
I think we all have experienced how it feels to have someone break a promise that they made to us. We may have felt angry, hurt, or betrayed, and then we may have become mistrustful of people, and we’re put on guard for the next promise made to us. Abraham Lincoln once said, “We must not promise what we ought not, lest we be called on to perform what we cannot.” And Benjamin Franklin said this: “Promises may fit the friends, but non-performance will turn them into enemies.” [Quotes from: dumb.com/quotes/promises.quotes/2/].
What kinds of promises do we see and expect to be fulfilled in our every day lives? Well, we have statesmen, representatives, governors, judges, mayors, officers of the law, and the highest office, the president of our country, who take an oath of office. An oath is a solemn promise to carry out or fulfill the specific duties entailed in each office. We want the people we select to govern and protect us to be trustworthy and to keep the promises they make. If the promises aren’t kept, we have the right to choose others to assume these positions of leadership, and to hold them accountable for the promises they make.
The institution of marriage is another area in which promises that are made by the man and his wife on the day of the wedding must be kept. The wedding promises, more often called, “vows,” often include these familiar words: “To have and to hold, from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, until death do us part, according to God’s holy ordinance; and thereto I pledge thee my faith.” [theknot.com, “Traditional Wedding Vows…”]. The last word, faith, is often replaced with the word “troth,” which is an archaic word meaning “faith or loyalty—i.e. truth.” [Google Dictionary].
Some couples like to write their own vows for the wedding ceremony. Regardless of which “promises” are made by couples on their wedding day, the sad statistic is that 40-50% of marriages in the United States end in divorce, according to a report from the American Psychological Association. [USAtoday.com, “Broken hearts: A rundown of the divorce capital of every state”]. That means that someone in the marriage has broken the promises they made on that day they’d expected to live “happily ever after.”
Another example of how promises effect our lives is when one is called to testify in a court of law. It’s required that the person swear, or affirm “to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God.” When the person says, “I do,” he or she is making a promise to tell nothing but the truth. What happens if this person breaks the promise and lies under this oath? The person who breaks the promise to tell the truth has now broken not only the promise but has broken the law. Their crime is perjury, for which they can receive punishment.
Here’s one last example of a promise that we make, sometimes rotely, and without thinking. We learn to say the “Pledge of Allegiance” at a young age, but when do we learn what it means? In 1954, the year I was born, the words, “under God,” were added to the pledge. I’m grateful for those words because our country, and even the whole world, is under God, and belongs to God. I hope many of you have seen Red Skelton’s rendition of the “Pledge of Allegiance.” He breaks it down, word by word, phrase by phrase, and really tells us the meaning that we seem to miss when we just say the pledge by rote memorization. You can find it on YouTube, and it’s worth watching. But try not to cry. I always do.
A pledge is a solemn promise. So, if someone pledges, or promises allegiance, they’re promising to be faithful to, loyal to, committed to, devoted to, duty-bound to and will show patriotism for our flag and our country. Those who break this promise don’t have the nation’s best interest at heart. We’re so blessed to be free in this nation under God. As a patriot of this country, I’ll strive to take this promise seriously.
Our God has made many, many promises since the dawn of time—too many to name here. But I’d like to discuss a few of them. “Genesis 3:15, is commonly called the ‘Protevangelium,’ a term that essentially signifies the idea of ‘first gospel proclamation.”’ (Yes, I had trouble pronouncing that word at first, too, but I learned something new!). In Genesis 3:15, KJV, God made a promise. “I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed: it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.” So, who would the woman’s seed be? Through time, the seed spoken of here would be our Lord, Jesus Christ, given by God to this world to save us from our sins, and to ultimately destroy Satan forever. The source for the quote at the beginning of this section is from an article on the Christian Courier website, titled: “Crushing the Serpent’s Head: The Meaning of Genesis 3:15, written by Wayne Jackson. It’s a very interesting read!
Another promise made by God was given after God brought the Great Flood upon all the earth. It was time to renew, repopulate, and regenerate the land on this fresh “new” earth. He had the ever-faithful Noah, and Noah’s wife, their three sons and their wives, and a big ark full of wonderful animals to begin the process of being “fruitful and multiplying” as God commanded. It’s at this time that God made a special promise. Genesis 9:11-17, KJV, says that God made an everlasting covenant between Himself and “every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth,” that He would never again destroy the earth and all flesh with a flood. We have a token of His promise that we can see in the sky from time to time after it rains—a rainbow. What a beautiful reminder that God keeps His promises!
Another great man of faith, who lived in Old Testament times, was Abraham. He’s even been called “The Father of the Faithful.” God recognized Abraham’s faith and obedience to Him. In Genesis 12:2-3, KJV, the LORD called on Abram to leave his home and set out on a journey to where God would lead him. God promised Abram that He would make a great nation to descend from him, and that He would bless him.
When Abram was 90 years old, the LORD appeared to him, promising to multiply his descendants, making him the father of many nations. God also changed his name to Abraham. The LORD further promised to make him “exceeding fruitful,” and that kings would also come from him. Abraham and his descendants would also be blessed with a new land to live in for generations to come, Genesis 17:1-9, KJV.
After Abraham proved his faithfulness again to God by taking his son, Isaac, to offer up as a sacrifice, God repeated His promise to bless him, and to multiply his descendants, Genesis 22:1-17, KJV. The next verse says, “And in thy seed shall all nations of the earth be blessed, because thou hast obeyed my voice,” Genesis 22:18, KJV. How would all nations of the earth be blessed by this promise? When did God fulfill this promise?
Galatians 3:17-29, KJV, tells us the answer, and concludes in verses 27-29 by saying, “For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.”
So, God’s promises down through the ages have made their way to all of us. The promises in the Bible are about God’s love for man and about His plan to save man by redeeming him and bringing him to live with Him forever. I John 2:25, KJV, says, “And this is the promise that he hath promised us, even eternal life.” God has promised that if we seek His kingdom first, He will provide our daily needs here on earth, Matthew 3:31-34, KJV. We’re also promised in John 14:1-4 that after Jesus prepares mansions in His Father’s house, He will come back and receive those who believe and obey and take them home to the Father. James 1:12, KJV, says, “Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him.” And finally, those who labor and are carrying heavy burdens are given the invitation to, “Come unto me…and I will give you rest; and ye shall find rest unto your souls,” Matthew 11:28-29, KJV.
God has never broken a promise. When God makes a promise, you can rest assured that it will come to pass. God has promised that there’s a “Great Day” coming—Judgment Day. God has made His promise to give faithful Christians eternal life with Him in Heaven. But He has also promised the alternative of eternal punishment for those who reject or ignore His commands and shun His promises. Romans 6:23, KJV, says: “For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
To be in Christ is to be a Christian—one who has been baptized for the remission of sins. If we obey the conditions set forth by God in His Word, through His commandments, and by our obedience when we hear the Word, believe the Word, believe that Jesus is God’s Son, repent of all of our sins, confess the name of Jesus Christ before men, submit to being buried with Him in baptism for the remission of sins, and then work towards living a faithful life in Him until death, the promises of God will be fulfilled in us when we hear these words: “Well done thou good and faithful servant…enter thou into the joy of thy lord,” Matthew 25:21, KJV.
II Peter 3:9, KJV, says: “The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.”
As my cousin, Brian Cook, always says, “If we do what the Bible says, we will receive what the Bible promises.”
After all, a “promise is a promise.”