It seems to me lately that when I am talking to church folks I hear lots of lies about things that are not even important to say, let alone lie about. I am thinking have they (us) lied so much that we are a lie. Really, no truth can come from them (us)?
Psalms 24:3-5 “Who may ascend into the hill of the LORD? And who may stand in His holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart, Who has not lifted up his soul to falsehood. And has not sworn deceitfully. He shall receive a blessing from the LORD And righteousness from the God of his salvation.…”
Pulpit Commentary says on this…”Verse 4. – He that hath clean hands. He whose hands are free from acts of sin (comp. Psalm 15:2-5), and not only so, but he who hath also a pure heart, since the heart is the source of all evil (Matthew 15:19, 20), and wrongful words and wicked acts are the necessary results of the heart being impure.”
Look and think on these and others passages as you research lies and liars from the Bible; Psalm 101:7 “I will not allow deceivers to serve in my house, and liars will not stay in my presence.”
Revelation 21:26-27 The New Jerusalem “…and they will bring the glory and the honor of the nations into it; and nothing unclean, and no one who practices abomination and lying, shall ever come into it, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.”
I want to be part of The New Jerusalem, don’t you? Hopefully, we will do as much about dieting our lies as our calories. Let’s help one another to be truthful! We have a warning to do this from; Hebrews 3:13 (NLT) “You must warn each other every day, while it is still “today,” so that none of you will be deceived by sin and hardened against God.”
Let’s make 2015 our best as we enter into “The Throne Room of God” while it is open season.
thedailylily.com 
In service this morning the minister gave a distinct teaching and exhortation on Transformation and how to help bring it about in oneself. The KEY was “check up on yourself”. ”Try me O Lord, and regard my ways. See if there be any WICKED way in me..[.that is, twisted] ways. A soul may start out to serve the Lord but if we don’t keep watch what comes out of our mouths; our thoughts, opinions, viewpoints even doctrine start to get out of focus and then out of whack and soon they’ve become “twisted”….which means wicked, evil, Sinful!!
As Ananias & Sapphira in Acts 5:3.who had started out to do a good work. They had sold some property and desire to give a donation to the Church. Such fine motivation. Here’s where it started to get twisted. As long as the money was still in possession they could do with it whatever they wished. But after pledging a certain amount they LIED to the Apostles and more importantly to the Holy Spirit that the amount they contributed was the gross amount they had received for the property. They really didn’t have to say anything. They could have just given their contribution to the Lord. HOWEVER….They were building themselves up….but not in the Holy Ghost but in their own eyes and trying to show themselves greater, by lying
Sara said above….”some things are not worth saying, much less lying about”. That was a truly enlightening statement. Just as the amount of money Ananias had pledged was sufficient and acceptable as a gift. They had no reason to lie about it and pretend they had given the full amount,[which they hadn’t] except for their pride & deception!!
It is scary…as I looked up the Scriptures, as Sara suggested, on what the Bible says on Lying and Liars. Yikes!! We’re not talking about misunderstanding, mis-communication, unintentional error…but the subtle, intentional, consistent twisting, exaggeration, over-embellishment of situations and circumstances…not for literary color & style as in a novel [fiction]…. but to control a situation, escape a reprimand or correction or to flaunt some sort of achievement above and beyond what has really been accomplished. Or to make people think you know something!!!
Ananias and Sapphira lost their lives over this lie. God is serious. He says He will blot our names out of the Book of Life,and they can enter therein never.
Hear what the Spirit is saying to the Church…the Body of Christ. The prophets are crying out to the beloved to prepare for the coming of the Lord.
Sara, I love this revelation that the door of the Throne Room is open season to those who cry out ”Oh God, Create in me a a heart that’s pure and hands that are clean, My Lord. Renew a right and steadfast spirit in me that I may be a vessel unto You.
I was thinking today that to exaggerate truth is to exasperate the spirit!
“And grieve (vex not or exasperate) not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.”—Ephesians 4:30.
In one of my BBN Bible Institute courses the pastor was talking about times in the Bible when people were warned not to do things over and over who were Christians. Finally God said I have had enough, that’s it. Your coming home. He said that the Lord may not give you over to the second death which is Hell, but you have just lost the opportunity to do anything further of value for the Lord and lost your reward.
How sorrow of heart this is? Oh Lord may we not do that! Clean us up and may we in reverential fear straighten up and say no to the things we have been warned about.
Oh my Rena! That teaching of taking out before time will give you much food for thought if you allow it. Makes me think of war!
“I am thinking have they (us) lied so much that we are a lie.” What you said here, Sara, must surely be possible. It made me think of a scripture from your recent blog, “Illumination” where you said, “While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light.” John 12:35-36
If this says that we can become the light if we believe in the light, then if we don’t believe, we must become darkness and sons of darkness.
And I John 1:5,6 says “that God is Light and in him is no darkness at all. So if we say we are his friends but go on living in spiritual darkness and sin, we are lying And if we do this day in and out we would just stay in a state of lying or being a lie.
Debi, read Daniel 12:3 on light!
Thank you, Sara, I read Daniel 12:3. It looks like believing in the light and becoming the light has qualifications. One is to live wisely. Another is to turn others to righteousness. As I read your blog again I see that one way to turn others to righteousness is “Let’s help one another to be truthful!”
Both qualifications would mean “hands are free from acts of sin” and no “wrongful words and wicked acts”. I am seeing that any of these things disqualifies and snuffs out the light.
Thinking on Daniel 12:3 and being reminded by Debi’s comment of the qualifications of being a star with light I thought of the late Rueben P. Job, author’s prayer.”EVER-LOVING GOD, who came into the world clothed in our garment of flesh and who willingly gave yourself to the cross, clothe us in your own Spirit, that persons will recognize you in us and receive your greatest gift of love. In the name of Jesus, your greatest gift. Amen.”
They lie so much they become the LIE. “you are what you believe.” By your words you shall be justified and by your words you shall be condemned.’
Our Sunday School lesson for next week is on Lying. One passage in the lesson says…’Lying is a way to gain UNFAIR advantage over something or someone..”
Do you suppose that those of us who claim that God is our Father don’t ”see” that the lie is NOT true? Maybe as written above….they are not walking in enough LIGHT to SEE that the Lie is NOT True.
Whoa God is speaking pretty loudly, isn’t He on this subject? Rena also said one of her lessons was scaling the same subject.
Yes, I would agree that He is.
Back to thinking on Daniel 12:3.. the bright light of the wise and righteous. I was reading in Proverbs13 that a righteous man hates lying; and that a wise man will keep company with the wise.
Sara, you wrote above “Makes me think of war!”…I was reading about Truth and in Psalm 91:4 it said that God’s truth is our shield and armour. So it seems from this that if we are not truthful and on’t want to be a part of God’s truth because He is Truth, then we ourselves discard His protection in battle and are open to be taken down and or out.
Hebrews 3:13 (NLT) “You must warn each other every day, while it is still “today,” so that none of you will be deceived by sin and hardened against God.”
NLT footnotes for verses 12-14 says: “Our hearts turn away from the living God when we stubbornly refuse to believe Him. If we persist in our unbelief, God will eventually leave us alone in our sin. But God can give us new hearts, new desires, and new spirits (Ezekiel 36: 22-27). To prevent having an unbelieving heart, stay in fellowship with other believers, talk daily about your mutual faith, be aware of the deceitfulness of sin (it attracts but also destroys), and encourage each other with love and concern.”
I’d like to encourage all today with a verse from God’s Word. It was my devotional verse this morning. Psalm 86: 5 says: “O Lord, you are so good, so ready to forgive, so full of unfailing love for all who ask for your help.”
Tammy, that is so profound. The grace of God is astounding and when we intentionally turn from our sin and ask forgiveness He is FAITHFUL to forgive us and cleanse us from it. But our INTENTIONS must be pure.
I can vow to examine how true or pure is everything that comes out of my MOUTH by examining how true and how pure is the INTENTION or MOTIVE that comes out of my HEART. When I catch a lapse in being straightforward, I must confess immediately and apologize to the Lord & to anyone involved and ask forgiveness.
And not believing what Jesus says in His Word is also a lie. We must believe and KNOW that what He says does not return void but accomplishes ALL that He has sent it to do. When we doubt that or think that ”sometimes He does….and sometimes He doesn’t” that is unbelief. We need to look into our hearts when we THINK that He doesn’t perform His Word. That’s where the hindrance is. That’s where the lie is hidden there-in.
Bishop Ruben P Job writes, “As Christians we share the good news that God can be heard, understood, and obeyed. We have scriptures, nature, history, and the stories of our lives that speak God’s truth. Further we have the capacity to “hear” God’s voice deep within our own souls.”
I personally find so often that Christians seem to forget to tell the stories of their lives. I am a story person. I love stories that are true! Not made up stories (lies) for the sole purpose to deceive. I get so tired of hearing and watching people twist truth. Hide the obvious and lick their lips with glee when in the darkness of their minds they think someone fell for their storyline. May we pray they fall in the hands of God for correction before punishment becomes their or our story!
A story of truth from the deep wells of one’s soul is like fresh water given to a dehydrated body!
I just read Isaiah chapter 59. It seems the footnotes for verse 21 goes right along with what Bishop Ruben P Job wrote, “As Christians we share the good news that God can be heard, understood, and obeyed. We have scriptures, nature, history, and the stories of our lives that speak God’s truth. Further we have the capacity to “hear” God’s voice deep within our own souls.”
Footnotes for verse 21(NLT): “When the Holy Spirit dwells within His people, they change. Their former desires no longer entice them; now their chief aim is to please God. We who are Christians today are the heirs of this prophecy, we are able to respond to God’s will and distinguish between good and evil because the Holy Spirit dwells within us. (John 14:26; Philippians 2:13; Hebrews 5:14).”
Now that is good news, wouldn’t you say?
Matthew 7:16 explains the way to ID change or not? “You can identify them by their fruit, that is, by the way they act. Can you pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles?”
Upon thinking about your comment above saying: We who are Christians today are the heirs of this prophecy, we are able to respond to God’s will and distinguish between good and evil because the Holy Spirit dwells within us. Our BSF leader quoted just yesterday from John Piper about what is evil (sinful). No fruit with these:
1. The Glory of God not honored.
2. The Holiness of God not reverenced.
3. The greatness of God not admired.
4. The power of God not praised.
5. The truth of God not thought.
6. The beauty of God not treasured.
7. The wrath of God not feared.
8. The wisdom of God not esteemed.
9 The faithfulness of God not trusted.
10. The justice of God not respected.
11. The presence of God not respected.
12. The Grace of God not cherished.
13. The commandments of God not obeyed.
14. The person of God not loved.
Using the Holman’s says a sinner is a person who has missed God’s mark for life, rebelling against Him.
May the Lord Jesus abiding in us cause a change in us and may our hearts, souls, mind, and spirit turn all the nots (knots and twist of the mind) into a fruit bearing tree for the Lord.
John Piper sure shot in arror thought the heart of the matter with those words Rena posted. Gee, what about number 5.. Whoa!
” When the Holy Spirit dwells within His people, they change. …”
The ‘change’ Tammy’s footnotes speak of looks like a true barometer for measuring the atmospheric conditions inside a person and whether or not the Holy Spirit is operating the controls or not.
This is interesting…what do you think? “The Devil was walking down the street with a friend, and they saw a man pick something up, look at it carefully and put it in his pocket. The friend said to the Devil, “What’s that?” The Devil said, “He has found a bit of the truth.” The friend said, “Isn’t that bad for your business?” The Devil said, “No, I am going arrange to have him organize it.”–John C. Lilly
It that like the saying.’ God has made the Bible so simple and clear that it takes a cadre of philosophers and theologians to confuse it for mankind.”
The Devil said, “He has found a bit of the truth.” ……..“No, I am going arrange to have him organize it.”
“This is interesting…what do you think?”
satan, hard at work to twist truth
I think “The Twist” is his clever arrow. Sure shows like a star rocket when mouths open.
I might have one disagreement with your statement, Tammy. I’m not sure how hard Satan has to work to twist the truth in minds! Wonder how hard we have to work to untwist a truth flaw that others spouted off and we accepted at face value and find out it is valueless in eternal matters. But, very valuable to our vanity.
“I might have one disagreement with your statement, Tammy. I’m not sure how hard Satan has to work to twist the truth in minds! ” Good point, Sara.
I was thinking that the devil having him organize his bit of truth may mean that the man filed it away (organized in a file) but never did anything with the bit of truth he had.
Whoa! Debi, that’s a big victory for the Kingdom of Satan, I would think! James 4:7 might have a line to say about that. “Therefore, anyone who knows what is right but fails to do it is guilty of sin.”
Sara, that Scripture …”who knows to do right but fails to do it is guilty of sin” came to me yesterday morning. Uh-oh… And I thought about all the preaching and Bible teaching in churches and almost daily…revelation and wisdom and exhortation…we ought to be spiritual giants by now, wouldn’t you think?.
Yeap! Too much learning with no understanding might be an issue to think about!
In reading the comments on twisted minds, I began thinking about vines, particularly wild vines like honeysuckle and trumpet vine and one called bindweed. They can get out of control quickly and choke and harm other beautiful, fruitful, useful plants because they twist their way around and around the branches. Maybe Jesus knew that if we tried to be wild vines, there would be harm and destruction. He decided that He is the vine. He told us to stay still and remain in Him under His control and be branches if we hoped to see any fruit.
I don’t see fruit coming from a twisted mind.
Debi your last two sentences speaks to me. You are right about twisted mind having no fruit. Fruit comes when one takes on the character of Jesus Christ who in his character has all the Fruits of the Spirit. JESUS did not have a twisted mind and we won’t either if we follow the steps He gives us daily to change our character. Allowing Him to daily use His tools to change us will eventually give us a new character that exhibits the fruits of the spirit. (Time and Work and Prayer and Faithfulness to Him on our part) to produce in Galatians 5: 22 the fruits: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentlemess and self control.