The first lie ever told on Planet Earth happened a long, long time ago! The story can be found in Genesis 3 and it led to what is often referred to as The Fall of Humankind.
And, that initial lie severed the most intimate relationship between God and His greatest creation. The Father of Lies, as he is often referred, set this whole deception into motion in the Garden of Eden.
Taking the form of a serpent, Satan confronted the woman about eating fruit from any tree in the garden.
Eve was quite aware that she was not to even touch the tree in the middle of the garden and doing so would lead to death, as written in Genesis 3:4-5:
“Surely you will not die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
That first lie enticed Adam and Eve to succumb to the temptation of eating from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.
Yes, I know some of you may have great difficulty trusting a Bible story written so long, long ago by Moses many centuries after the actual event occurred, which was passed down from generation through generation.
All cultures have ancestral stories they’ve passionately passed along because those accounts were truly considered beneficial to future generations.
Why would the accounts of God’s people be any different? There’s no more pivotal, significant and foundational story than the first encounter of humankind with the often-called Deceiver in the Garden of Eden.
What I find quite interesting is the devastating impact prevarication (deviating from the truth) has on all aspects of life. What we need to address is just what causes such selfish behavior in humankind.
Well, God’s Word tells us that once sin entered Adam and Eve it was inherited to all future generations. Even the Great Flood could not wipe it off the face of the earth.
Noah, his wife, their three sons and their wives all carried their sin nature into all future generations. We are all born with the same sin nature.
There’s not one of you reading this who has not been caught in the act of lying. If not by others, God is quite aware of all your actions!
I can’t recall the occasions, but I know that lying was part of my mode of operation as a very young child and as I matured, I became more accomplished in my ability to skirt the truth.
Those occasions may well have been infrequent, but I’m ashamed to admit their existence at all. I suggest you take a look in the mirror as well.
For you followers of Christ reading this, you know that we have departed our old ways and must cease from those actions that do not please God. He’s forgiven us of all our sins (past, present and future), but we must strive to be more like our Lord Jesus moving forward.
We need to grow up and not follow our childish actions. Listen to Paul’s instruction to believers in 1 Corinthians 13:11-12:
“When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man. I put childish ways behind me. Now we see but a poor reflection in a mirror; Then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.”
Spiritual maturity is a wonderful reality. Unfortunately, we live in a world that sadly follows the beat of a different drummer.
There’s a continual spiritual battle going on for the lives of the many who have yet to accept Jesus as Savior and Lord.
That battle will continue until He returns, but in the meantime we must combat the ever present lies with His beautiful Truth found throughout His Word!