Last time on the Blog, we looked at various lies Satan tries to pass off as truths in our lives. This time, let’s dig deeper into how exactly you can learn to identify the lies in your own life.
First of all, you need to know the truth. The more you are rooted and grounded in the truth, the more easily you will spot Satan’s lies. The more you know someone, the more you know of their life and character. With this knowledge, it is difficult for strangers to deter what you know is true about that person (i.e., you know that your friend is dependable because you’ve worked with them for several years. So, when the new employee tries to tell you your friend isn’t faithful, you have truth to fall back on).. In the same way, the more you know Christ and His character, the less influenced you will be by the lies of the world.
During class, Pastor Shaw demonstrated how to identify half-truths, and if there even is such a thing. He asked the girls for petty examples of lies/truths, to keep it lighthearted. One example was, “She does not have green hair,” and “Her hair is blue.” The statement about the resident NOT having green hair was a truth; but the sneaky comment about her hair being blue wasn’t the truth at all! In this example, someone added something to the truth, and it immediately became false.
Just as in this silly example, when you modify the truth with anything, it becomes anything but the truth. Armed with this principle, you can quickly identify truth and lies concerning the gospel. For example, anything that adds to what the Bible says regarding salvation is a lie. The Bible clearly says that salvation is “by grace” and “not of works” (Ephesians 2:8-9). If you start playing the game “grace plus” you’ve lost the truth and won the lie.
The second in-class example Pastor Shaw used is when something is subtracted from the truth. The example was “she does not have blue hair” and “she does not have hair.” This example shows how easy it is to jump from one lie to another. Since we know from the previous paragraph that “she has blue hair” is a lie, we “jump” to the opposing extreme, “she doesn’t have hair.” It is easy to entertain such extremities in our own lives as well. Let’s return to our Gospel example from above. We are saved by works that we do, right? “NO,” says our conscience, so we jump to the opposite extreme: “we are saved, and we don’t have to do anything!” This is a sneaky lie, did you catch it? Read it again; one word makes or breaks it. The word is “don’t.” It would’ve been perfectly truthful to say we “didn’t” have to do anything to save ourselves (we simply had to accept what was already done for us). However, we are now called to “do” things as saved persons. We are called to love others, called to sanctification, and called to make disciples (See Ephesians 4:17-32, John 13:34-35, and Matthew 28:19).
After reading all this, I hope you feel slightly more equipped to identify the lies in your own life and in the lives of others. If you still feel at a loss, ask God. He gives generous doses of wisdom and does so without backlash! Feel free to comment with questions or prayer requests regarding truth and lies. My prayer for you is the same as that of Christ Jesus in John 17:17, that you be sanctified in the Truth, His Word is truth.
