Liar Liar Church On Fire
11/1/98 Ezekial 13:1-9 Revelations 21:1-8 Genesis 3:1-15
The story is told of Joe the Butcher who had crafty ways of selling his chickens. He had one chicken left, and he didn’t want to keep it over the weekend. The pastor of the other church in town came into the store. He said my wife sent me to buy a good size chicken to roast for dinner on Sunday. We’re having my boys come back home from college.
Joe said I have just what you need. He went to the freezer and brought out the last chicken and put it on the scale. Joe said, "this one is 2 pounds 3 ounces." The pastor said, "it looks sort of small, do you have anything else?" Joe took the chicken back into the freezer and came back with the same chicken. He put it on the scale and this time said, "this one is 3 lbs 2 ounces. But since you’re a man of the cloth of I’m going to let you have it for the same price." The pastor said, "well thank you neighbor, but come to think of it, the way my boys eat, just go ahead and give me both of the chickens and I’ll pay the higher price for them both.
Just when he least expected it, Joe had been caught in a lie. When was the last time, you like Joe, was caught in a lie? Although we don’t want to admit it, lying is one of the most common sins practiced by Christians with little thought given to it. We say a quick, "Oh God please forgive me" and go on with life.
The world has tried several ways to get around the sin of lying. First lies were classified as little white lies, huge black lies, and bold face lies. But the word lie was still in the description of the action so they went to calling it something else such as mistatement, misrepresentation, slight distortion, and legally accurate statements.
The only problem with lying is that God takes it a lot more seriously than we do. The phrase liar, liar, church on fire has its basis in what happens to all liars in the end. The word of God says, all liars shall have their place in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. That’s another way of describing hell.
Some of us may be thinking lying is somebody else’s problem. Have you ever found your self saying, "if that’s so and so on the phone, tell them I’m not here." "What about telling some one, "you never do anything in this house", "I have to do all the chores", "you always yell at me", "I always have to." Check again when you use the words always and never when describing your behavior or someone else’s. Chances are, you are lying about it.
There are several ways to lie. We can lie by our silence. Who did this?-no response. We can lie by our tongue. It wasn’t me. We can lie by our behavior. "Ooh look what somebody did." Some of us become masters at trying to cut as close as possible to a lie while still maintaining an appearance of telling the truth or living truthfully.
We can become masters at creating loopholes. A mother had disciplined her daughter by taking away her TV privileges for the night. The mother had to go to work that evening. But she had discovered it was not enough to simply tell her daughter, "You cannot watch this tv tonight." Instead she said, you cannot watch this TV or any other TV in the house, nor can you have anyone bring over another TV for you to watch, neither can you call your friend next door and have her place the TV in the window for you to watch, nor use the binoculars to look at the neighbor’s TV across the street.
We attempt to play the same kind of spiritual game with God’s word. Even thought the Scriptures do not expressly state what we are doing is wrong, we lie to ourselves and to God claiming we are technically within bounds.
Why does a God who loves us, minds so much whether or not we lie? A lie does three things. The first thing a lie does is misrepresents the truth and hides the truth. The person lied to does not know the truth; therefore he or she has to act or live upon on a lie. The more serious the lie told, the more dangerous for the person believing it.
The second thing a lie does is it makes a deceiver out of the person telling the lie. A person deceives to get what he or she wants, to seduce someone, or to cover up or hide something. The third thing a lie does is it builds a wrong relationship. Two people cannot possible be friends or live together joyfully if the relationship is based upon lies. Lying destroys confidence, love, trust, hope and security.
All lies come have their origin in the devil, for Jesus said, "Satan is the father of lies." The church is full of lies today, because of a lack of willingness to pay the kind of price which is required of us as disciples of Jesus Christ.
It is always easier to obey what we think God has said for us to do, than to do what God has said in His word. The written word of God does not change. It is rock for us. The hearing from God is not the same thing nor does it carry the same weight as the written word. In our Old Testament reading, God was upset over the prophets who were declaring, "The Lord has said such and such" when God in fact says, "I never said such a thing. They are imagining this in their own minds and their visions are false."
I become cautious at time when people tell me, "God told me to do this", when I see them setting common sense aside. God speaks more though common sense than He does a voice in the night. When people tell me, God has shown me this is the person I’m to marry.
Well is he saved? (Not yet.) Does he have a job? (he’s working on it). Do you have a date planned for the wedding? (we’re going to be engaged for a couple of years.)
Now the written word says, "What does a believer have in common with a non-believer and a Christian should marry a Christian. The written word says, if a man won’t work, neither let him eat. The written word says, it is better to marry than to burn.
Common sense will tell you a believer is just asking for trouble in marrying someone not saved. Common sense will tell you, love will not pay the electric bill. Common sense will tell you, if someone wants you for marriage, they commit themselves fully to you then, not string you out over two years to find out all the reasons they don’t want to be with you. But its easier for us to lie and say "the Lord told me to marry him" than it is to walk away from something we truly want to have.
When God created Adam and Eve, the first man and woman, God placed them in a beautiful garden. They had everything they needed for a wonderful relationship with God and with each other. God told them, "Now listen, there are many trees here with all kinds of delicious fruit on it. Eat as much as you want from them. But now there’s only one tree you can’t eat from. You must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil for when you eat of it you will surely die.
Do you see how good our God is? God’s is not stingy with His blessings. God wants to provide us with some of the best. It is when the father of lies comes strolling into our lives that we run into trouble.
In Genesis chapter 3, we find Satan coming to Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden. He is intent on getting Adam and Eve kicked out of the garden of Eden just like he had been kicked out of heaven. If only Satan had of looked like some ugly monster, this story would have had a different ending to it. But Satan came as smart, intelligent and concerned being. He even sounded like he had a good relationship with God. He said to Eve, "Did God really say, You must not eat from any tree in the garden?"
Now the devil knows that he’s lying. He knew they could eat and had been eating from all those other trees. He deliberately misrepresents the word of God. Even today he comes saying, "Did God really say Christians aren’t supposed to have any fun?" " Did God really say you can never enjoy life as a believer." Satan is planting the seed in Eve’s mind, "Boy, that God, oooh He’s really tough and trying to make it hard on you isn’t He."
Now Eve did not know a thing about Satan, but because he seemed to be offering her some sympathy she wanted to sympathize with him a little bit. She says, "Well, we may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, "You must not eat from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must mot touch it, or your will die."
Now Eve has started to lie, to win a friend. She couldn’t bring herself to tell the truth that God said "eat from any tree except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil." She made it sound as though there may be other trees out there which they may not be able to eat, and God had left it up to them to find the tree in the middle of the garden. She also added how God did go a little far by telling them, "if they so much as touched that tree, they would die."
Saints, why is it that we will betray our Lord so quickly just to gain the acceptance and approval of others. Eve is not the only person lying at this point. Adam is listening to this whole conversation and saying nothing. He could have said, "No, that’s not what God told me. God said, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die." I guess he didn’t want to rock the boat or maybe he wanted to find out what else this guy had to say about God.
Satan first misrepresented the word of God. Then he went a step further. He said to Eve right out "You will surely not die." He went from misrepresentation to out right denial. "God is lying to you just as sure as I am standing here." Satan wanted to provide them with some additional information about God. "Come a little closer. Let me tell you something, "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."
In other words, "God has been playing you. You thought God was interested in taking care of you. Child if only you knew God like I know God. Satan went from misrepresentation of God’s word, to denial of God’s word, and finally to the questioning of God’s motives.
Everything about the commandments of God boil to, do we question God’s motives for the running of our lives. If God is motivated by revenge in the way He deals with us, then we ought to be afraid. But if God is motivated by love, then what do we have to fear.
It takes courage to stop lying and face the consequences which come our way. To stop lying means, we will have to take some responsibility for our actions, we will have to make some changes in the way we do our business, we will have to change how we live at home, and we will have to change what we do at school or at work.
God asks the question in Isa 57:11 "Whom have you so dreaded and feared that you have been false to me, and have neither remembered me nor pondered this in your hearts? Is it not because, I have long been silent that you do not fear me? In other words, what made you so afraid that you chose to tell a lie in my sight, rather than stand for me. Is it because I let you get away with it so long, that you stopped fearing me. My friends, its not that we got away with anything. God’s patience was giving us time to repent.
Once Eve stopped believing in God’s goodness, the temptation to eat from that tree grew larger and larger and larger. When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.
She did all of this based on a lie. I also want you to notice it didn’t just happen. If Eve had truly believed God had said they could not so much as touch the tree, why was she and Adam next to the tree having this discussion with Satan. Why were they hanging around the one tree they know they should have not been near? Ask your neighbor, "friend how close are you to the tree today?"
Let’s look at the steps of what happened and see how, when we face the same problem, we can avoid it. First. Eve saw the fruit. A great deal of sin comes in at the eye. Let us not look on that which we are in danger of lusting after. Sometimes we need to simply stay away from where the thing or the person is.
Second. Eve reached out and took the fruit. It was her own act and deed. Satan may tempt us , but he cannot force us to do anything we do not want to do. The devil did not make you do it. Third She put it to her mouth and took a bite. When she looked perhaps she did not intend to take and put it to her mouth, but my friends once the flames get going for something, there is no guarantee you can just stop when you get ready Fourth She made it easier for Adam to disobey by handing it over to him. When people do wrong, they always want somebody to join in with them.
The moment the two of them participated in the devil’s lie, their own relationship suffered. For the first time they were embarrassed to be in each other’s presence. They found some leaves and made some clothes to hide their bodies from each other. Remember when I said a lie destroys love, trust, and hope. Now they have to come up with another lie to keep God from knowing what they have done. But you can’t keep anything hidden from God.
God shows up on the scene. He knows Adam and Eve have been trying to hide from Him and He sees the fig leaves outfit they’re wearing. God "Adam, where are you?" If God asked you that question this morning, "where are you", what would you have to respond? Would you be completely honest with God and tell Him where you are spiritually or would you be tempted to lie and pretend everything’s all right or somebody else is to blame for where you are today.
Adam started out with the truth. He said, "I heard you in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid." In other words, "God I really didn’t want you to see me looking like this." So God said, "who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?"
Now Adam was afraid. He didn’t know what God might do. He didn’t know what death was because nothing had ever died in the garden. He knew it must be frightening and since this was his first time experiencing fear, he was imagining the worse.
Now Adam has the option of appealing to God’s mercy for forgiveness or of proving his innocence in this situation. He could have cried out, "Oh God, despite all the goodness which you have blessed me with and your love which you have shown to me, I have consciously disobeyed your word. I chose to believe a lie instead of in what you told me. I ask you that in your great mercy you might forgive me for what I have done." The Bible says a gentle answer turns away rage, but harsh words stir up anger.
For the first time in his existence, "Adam, gets an attitude problem with God. Without any remorse on his part he says, "The woman, the one that you put her-she gave me some fruit from the tree and I ate it." In other words God, the two of you set me up for this. If you had not have given me this woman, and if she had not of taken it off the tree, I would not have eaten it.
Adam is simply lying. He never made attempt to speak up for God, never made any attempt to remind Eve of the risk, and never attempted to stop her. He was just going along with what everybody else was doing. How could he be blamed for what happened? He would rather lie and put the blame at Eve and at God than admit he was wrong in disobeying the word of God. He was full of pride even in the midst of being wrong.
When God looked at Eve and said, "what is this you have done?" Eve could have also humbled herself before God and pleaded for mercy, but she too had and attitude problem. "Well the serpent deceived me and I ate." She knows she didn’t create the serpent and allow him in the garden. That’s one animal God should have never made. Eve was not deceived. She chose to believe the word of the serpent over the word of God, not because she had a great reason to believe Satan, but because she wanted to eat the fruit.
Lies make it easier for us for the moment to get what we want. There is often a gap between telling a lie and suffering the consequences of it. If she had of felt naked immediately after the first bite she took, it is unlikely she would have offered a bite to Adam. She lied and said, "don’t blame me, I’m a victim myself of a powerful figure."
Well God knew Satan had a reputation for lying, so He didn’t even bother asking him for his side of the story. God just stated what his punishment would be. God then went on to tell Eve what hers would be. He then went on and told Adam what Is would be. They were guilty in God’s eyes because they knew what the commandment was and they broke it.
To make matters worse, they lied about breaking it and do not seek God’s forgiveness. God sent them all out of the garden of Eden. I bet once they were on the other side of the garden and had to live with the reality of their decisions, they probably asked God for forgiveness again and again. God forgave them, but He did not remove the consequences.
It was not until Jesus Christ came into the world, that God was able to do undo the sentence of death imposed upon them. For thousands of years God mourned the loss which was caused by a lie. Lies keep us away from each other and they keep us away from God. God showed us just how destructive liars are, by stating they would be cast into the lake of fire. God wants us all to be delivered from lying. We find it in his word in which he commands in Ephesians 4:25 to "Stop lying to each other; tell the truth, for we are parts of each other and when we lie to each other we are hurting ourselves.
God wants us to know, He wants us restored back to Him, no matter where we have been, and where we are today. The way back is not through blaming others, but in seeking God’s mercy. Jesus put it this way, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. (Matt 16:25)
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