“But God came to Abimelech in a dream by night, and said to him, “Indeed you are a dead man because of the woman whom you have taken, for she is a man’s wife.” But Abimelech had not come near her; and he said, “Lord, will You slay a righteous nation also? Did he not say to me, ‘She is my sister’? And she, even she herself said, ‘He is my brother.’ In the integrity of my heart and innocence of my hands I have done this.”
Genesis 20:3-5
Here in Genesis 20:5 is the first time the word Integrity is used in the Bible. The interesting thing is that in this first mention of this word the person that is being spoken of isn’t a biblical hero, it’s not even a guy who is well known for good works. It’s actually the Philistine King Abimelech who is referred to as having Integrity. Now you might find yourself asking:
“Wait a second…Aren’t the Philistines later to become the enemies of Abraham’s children “the Israelites”?”
To be honest, I would too. But it seems that there are a couple things that God is giving some light to here in the story of Abraham and Abimelech.
Although Abimelech is shown here in this passage to have integrity, it say’s in verse 6 that it was actually God that kept Abimelech from sinning. It doesn’t matter who you are, or where you’re from, at the end of the day its God who establishes righteousness. Because Sarah was indeed Abraham’s half-sister, Abraham didn’t exactly lie, but then again he didn’t tell the truth. But in God’s math, a half-truth always equals a whole lie. Abraham blew it, so did Sarah, and Abimelech ends up being the only guy who shows a little bit of “honest to goodness” integrity.
Integrity however isn’t what gets us into heaven…Holiness and righteousness is.
You see integrity is simply the soundness of your character. Character is the substance that God shapes to be Holy and righteous here on earth so we might have the capacity for eternity with Him in heaven. Apart from God our character falls short of eternal standards and our capacity for Holiness is zero. That’s why God sent us Jesus Christ, by living a perfect standard of character and dying and innocent death God then saw the flaws in our character perfected by the propitiation of Jesus. Jesus willingly indwells us with Holiness through our faith in Him and we are saved.
You see all of us blow it like Abraham and Sarah. All of us tell half truths, at times backsliding from where we’ve come in our faith. Then in a wonderful way Jesus reminds us that He has made up for our short-comings, and by faith in Him we can go beyond our shortcomings into an abiding righteous walk both positionally and practically day by day.
Remember, although you see guys like Abraham and think “What a screw-up, that guy is such a bonehead” and then see guys like Abimelech and think, “That guy is a gem”; the truth is bones are alive because of the blood that flows through them… and gems, although nice to look at, are altogether dead inside. It’s not simply a matter of integrity; it’s also a matter of life and death, apart from Jesus we’ve got nothing.
