Fifty years ago Kenneth Taylor wrote in the Living Bible, “For there is going to come a time when people won’t listen to the truth, but will go around looking for teachers who will tell them just what they want to hear (2 Timothy 4:3). Today Eugene Peterson translated the same passage in The Message, “You’re going to find that there will be times when people will have no stomach for solid teaching, but will fill up on spiritual junk food – catchy opinions that tickle their fancy.”

Are there some whose teaching about this subject has strayed from the truth? Isn’t it important that we know what to say?

Is it ever okay to break a promise? We have all broken promises before – to our family, our friends and to God. Making a promise to someone is perhaps the most powerful form of communication that exists. Many times the vows we make are impossible to keep before they trickle over our lips. Broken promises have a disastrous effect on our relationships with others and within ourselves.

You meant it when you said it, but following now seems inconvenient if not impossible. Words have power, and when misused or misdirected, things matter. Here are five things broken promises say to other people.

  • A broken promise says we cannot be trusted. Albert Einstein paraphrased Jesus when he said, “Whoever is careless with the truth in small matters cannot be trusted with important matters.” Telling the truth forms the basis for that trust.
  • A broken promise makes the other person feel unimportant or under-valued. Some say that breaking promises really doesn’t hurt anyone. But when the promise you were counting on does not appear, you feel as if the person did not think you were important enough or cared for enough to follow through.
  • A broken promise leads to actions of disrespect. When a promise is broken, actions of disrespect may accompany the lack of truth – on both the part of the giver and the receiver of the broken promise.
  • A broken promise creates disappointment. John F. Kennedy said, “The great enemy of truth is very often not the lie, deliberate, contrived and dishonest; but the myth, persistent, persuasive and unrealistic.” When a promise is broken, the expecting party leaves empty handed.
  • A broken promise from you gives permission for others to break promises. When someone breaks a promise, it sets the expectation that promises can be broken.

avoiding the term

While the world almost universally agrees that breaking promises is wrong, there is a tendency for the world to explain the reasons one breaks a promise. They try to avoid using the word “sin” or assigning responsibility.

The Psychology Today website does not even call it a “broken promise,” rather they write, “Some people give empty promises.” The site continues, “If there is an empty promiser in your life, or there has been in the past, then you have experienced a form of emotional abuse.” They list some of the effects as:

  • Distortion of normal, concluding that all relationships will end in negative consequences and disappointment
  • Deteriorating sense of self-worth
  • Increasing the likelihood of inflicting emotional abuse on someone else
  • Caution and fear of developing close relationships
  • Fear of abandonment
  • Overly-sensitive

whatever became of sin

First published in 1973, world-famous psychiatrist Karl Menninger’s ground-breaking book Whatever Became of Sin? speculated that the understanding of sin would be replaced by rationalizations excusing individual accountability.

According to Menninger, the day was approaching when everyone would be considered damaged and their behavior would be overlooked, even pardoned. There would no longer be any liability for human choices.

The Biblical Counseling Institute writes “the term sin would be replaced with words like illness, disorder, dysfunction and syndrome.” Choices of behavior are the result of traumatic experiences.