"Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor: for we are members one of another."
Ephesians 4:25
Part 1
Today: We Need to Stop Lying
Paul’s writing to the Ephesians gives us examples of how a believer in Jesus Christ ought to live. As Christ-lovers, our lives are changed from the inside out. We are to be living differently now as believers. There are five simple commands in this passage that deal with different sins.
Do not lie.
Do not use anger sinfully.
Do not steal.
Do not speak sinfully.
Do not grieve the Holy Spirit.
In each case, he gives “a negative command, …a positive command, …and a reason for the positive command”[1] (BKC). We are looking for what the Scriptures teach about “the truth.” Let’s see what God’s Word has to say about the believer and the sin of lying.
“Wherefore putting away lying.”
(Negative command)
This command is easy to understand. A believer is to stop lying. Why does God’s Word tell Christians to stop lying? Because even Christians have trouble telling the truth at times.
“A lie is a statement that is contrary to fact, spoken with the intent to deceive”[2] (Wiersbe).
We shorten this definition, “a lie is the intent to deceive.”[3] Any time we are deceptive in our speech or actions, we are lying. Whenever we try to hide the truth from an individual or even from God, we are lying. If we try to make ourselves better than we are, we are lying. It is this desire to deceive others that is at the heart of lying in us. God says we must stop lying.
But we should ask this question, why does God have a problem with lying? First, there is His character. Lying is completely un-godlike. Unlike us, God never lies!
“God is not a man, that He should lie; neither the son of man, that He should repent: hath He said, and shall He not do it? or hath He spoken, and shall He not make it good?” (Numbers 23:19).
When God speaks a promise, He keeps it. He will never lie to us.
“Nevertheless, my lovingkindness will I not utterly take from him, nor suffer my faithfulness to fail. My covenant will I not break nor alter the thing that is gone out of my lips. Once have I sworn by my holiness that I will not lie unto David” (Psalm 89:33-35).
Because God never lies, He can always be trusted.
The second reason that God demands our truthfulness is Satan! John tells us what Jesus said about Satan and his propensity for lying, as He talked with the scribes and the Pharisees that day.
“Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning and abode not in the truth because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it” (John 8:44).
There, Jesus said it; Satan is the father of the lie. Before we knew Jesus Christ as our Savior, the devil was our dad. But now, born again believers are the children of the Heavenly Father, the God of truth. It is no wonder that God wants His children to speak the truth. Why would a believer ever be content to act like their old father? Satan is never to be trusted.
So, believers, we must stop lying; God says so! Come back tomorrow as we look at the positive side of this command.
Quote: Stop lying! “A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes”[4] (Spurgeon).
[1] Hoehner, H. W. (1985). Ephesians. In J. F. Walvoord & R. B. Zuck (Eds.), The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures (Vol. 2, p. 637). Wheaton, IL: Victor Books.
[2] Wiersbe, W. W. (1996). The Bible exposition commentary (Vol. 2, pp. 40–41). Wheaton, IL: Victor Books.
[3] Jay Adams, Bill Goode, and others.
[4] Spurgeon’s quote Downloaded: Monday, July 5, 2021. From: azquotes.com.