Here we are now, the ninth commandment,
and this is the second in our little heart-to-heart talk
regarding this God's ninth rule for living.
And that's just exactly what the Ten Commandments are.
They are God's ten rules
for man's living here on this earth.
The ninth commandment, and this is my second
in our little heart-to-heart talk regarding this commandment.
Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.
Now, this commandment has a twofold intention.
First, it guards the reputation.
And secondly, it closes the door of opportunity
against unworthy men,
against women who have gossipy tongues,
against those who might seek to enter
therein upon false testimony.
And do you want to know something? Listen.
So important is the reputation.
So important is your reputation, my reputation.
Watch this now.
That God has literally given a commandment
to protect, to safeguard it.
A fool is the person who will shrug his shoulders and say,
I don't care what my neighbors think about me.
That person is nothing more or less than an idiot.
That's right.
Stupid is the person who will just sneer and say,
well, I don't care what anybody thinks about me.
I don't care what my relatives think about me.
I don't care what the folk where I work think about me.
A fool is the person who does not care about his reputation.
When you consider that God felt that the reputation
of an individual was so important, was so valuable,
that he had a law which literally protected and safeguarded
man's reputation.
Isn't that something?
Indeed, I do care what people think about me.
Indeed, I do care what the man on the street thinks about me.
I'm not ashamed to tell you that I value my reputation.
I mean that.
My reputation is something that is priceless.
I care about this reputation of mine.
And I am mighty pleased to know that my Heavenly Father
has done something to help safeguard my reputation.
Now, I'm not talking about character.
Character and reputation are two separate things.
Character is the true fact concerning oneself.
Character is what I am, the real me.
Somebody says, what is Catherine Koeman really like?
They're not talking about my reputation.
They're talking about my character, me, my true self.
Now, God knows all about my character.
In fact, he knows me better than I know myself.
I know me.
I know a different me than you know.
I know a different person than perhaps the man on the street
knows, or the fellow who parks my car,
or even the next door neighbor knows.
That's the reason, in spite of all of my mistakes.
And believe me, they are many, because you
see, I am not infallible.
I make so many mistakes, so many errors.
I do so many things wrong.
I am so sorry at the close of the day for things
that I may have said, things that I may have done.
But it's the most wonderful thing in the world
to come to the close of a day, lie down on your bed,
look directly up in the face of Almighty God,
and say, well, Heavenly Father, in spite of it all,
you and I both know I didn't do it intentionally.
No matter what anyone says about me,
I can still look up in the face of my father and say,
you and I both know that I'm sincere about this thing.
Oh, I can't tell you how often.
Since I first preached that sermon,
when I was not more than 14, 15 years of age,
I can never tell you how often, when folk had been critical,
have said unkind things, that the two of us, the master
and I, have just sort of had an understanding.
And I've looked up and said, well, Lord,
one thing we both know, I have been sincere
in preaching the gospel.
I have been sincere in what I am doing.
Oh, I tell you, those early days when I was inexperienced,
my feelings were so easily hurt.
I hadn't become hard and do many things.
I shall never forget those early weeks, those early months.
I'll never forget the first meeting I ever held.
I had worked so hard on that one sermon, Zach Kiasopatri,
that I really, and I tell you the truth, I was so stupid,
I was so young, so inexperienced, that I didn't know
if you were to stand up, hope that you were supposed
to have long sleeves and high collar
and your dress is a certain length.
I didn't find anything about that in the Bible.
I was so busy getting Zach Kiasopatri,
that to preach that sermon, I really had only one dress
to wear, only one that I could wear.
I didn't know the sleeves were a little too short.
I never thought about the neck being a little too low.
Are the skirt a little, well, it was, I think it covered my knees,
but I'm never quite sure about that now when I think of it.
But some old sister sat in that audience, and while I was trying
to get Zach Kiasopatri and trying to be true to my call,
all she could think about was the dress that was unbecoming
to the girl that stood on the platform.
I shed more tears over that, but that isn't the thing
that I shed the most tears about.
My call was definite from the Lord.
That's the reason it ever fazed me when anyone would say
that women were not supposed to preach,
that I had no right to preach.
It never has fazed me, never.
That thing has never bothered me.
It has never fazed me for one minute,
because I know how definite my call from God really was
to preach the word.
It was something as definite, as real as my conversion.
I mean that.
No one could ever talk me out of it.
All the forces of hell could never dampen my spirit.
Nothing, all the steam rollers
in the world could never stop me, because I had
to preach the gospel.
It may have seemed inconsistent to everyone else,
yet it was something I had to do.
I couldn't eat.
I couldn't sleep.
I had to do it.
Those early days, I lived on five-cent rolls.
Oh, that was the best Bible school.
That was the best seminary.
That was the best way of learning
that I know anything about.
Probably I wouldn't have the ministry that we have today
had it not been for that early training.
I began right down before the first rung on the ladder.
Everything that I have gotten, everything I have learned,
I've gotten it the hard way.
Everything.
I would stand on the platform after not having had anything
more than a five-cent roll to eat,
a pair of 15-cent Lyle stockings that I got from Grant's store,
only one dress.
And then some old sister would say, if that was my daughter,
I wouldn't have her traipsing all over the country.
I'd have her right at home, believe me.
What does that girl's mother think
of letting her out there?
In Idaho.
She needs to be back in Missouri.
What does her mother think anyway?
There I was, sleeping in a turkey house,
not far from Caldwell to Idaho.
Sure.
That the Lowcountry Church had been closed for months
and months and months because they couldn't pay a preacher.
I went to members of the congregation
and begged and pled that they would just unlock the church
and let me preach.
I had no experience.
How else could I get experience?
And I preached to those farmers.
Just recently, I received a letter
from someone in that same community who remembered me.
And yet, an old sister could have killed me.
She could have wrecked me.
By spreading the word around the community, I was too young.
I should be home with my mother.
What was I doing?
That young preaching.
When beloved, she didn't know what was in my heart.
It was something I had to do.
I had to do it.
From that day until this very hour,
there's one thing that the two of us, the master and myself,
know.
And that is that in my heart, I've always been sincere
in what I was doing.
That's character.
But the world can't see the inside of one.
All that the world knows about me, about you,
is by reputation.
And reputation is the estimate which others form of you.
Reputation is very priceless.
But remember, your neighbor can misjudge you.
You may be one thing by reputation,
but something else when it comes to character.
That is the reason, as you study the Word of God,
read Paul, read the New Testament over and over again.
In essence, we have the scripture saying,
avoid the very appearance of doing wrong.
Avoid the very appearance of evil.
Inside of you, you may be just as pure.
Inside of you, you can be just as far from wrongdoing
as a baby.
Inside of you, so far as character is concerned,
you wouldn't do that thing for a title
to be the whole world.
And yet, just because the circumstances,
just because the looks of things,
just because some action may put doubt in somebody's mind,
they accept it as a fact.
You're so close to the borderline of the thing
that maybe their eyes deceive them.
Uh-huh.
That's why, my friend, the best thing in the world
is to avoid the very appearance of evil.
I shall continue in our next broadcast.