Church of Christ Studies

Believing A Lie

A company of people like this, gathering together from time to time, can but serve as quite an inspiration and an encouragement to any one who attempts to address public assemblies. I want you to know, ladies and gentlemen, that I appreciate your presence and hope all things may be pleasant and helpful.

 

I have promised to speak to you to-night on the subject, "Believing a Lie."

 

In speaking of certain characters, Paul said (2 These. 2: 10-12) : "And with all deceit of unrighteousness for them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this cause God sendeth them a working of error, that they should believe a He: that they all might be judged who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness."

 

There is a very, very popular idea extant that if a man believes a thing to be right, honestly follows out his convictions and his sincere purposes along that line, such a platform will ultimately land him safely home in glory. The principle here involved is not accepted by anybody on any other item except in matters of religion.

 

To use some illustrations which I have heard, let me suggest that there might be a bank in the city of Nashville on the verge of destruction and ready to be closed. I do not know that, and, believing it to be a sound financial institution, I gather up the last dollar I have and deposit it with the cashier. Now, I want to ask, does the fact that I believe that bank to be sound guarantee me against the loss of the money I put therein? Such a question carries its own answer.

 

If some designing man were to seek and finally gain the hand and heart of a young woman, I want to ask you, does the fact that she loves him, believes in him, and has confidence in him secure her against the misery, the woe, and the wretchedness that is certain to come from one of that designing nature and character? Again, to ask such is but to answer.

 

In all the affairs of life the belief of a proposition does not guarantee the safety thereof. That does not work in our State government. it does not apply in the realm of science or of warfare. Many a battle has been lost because the commanders believed a lie. Many a ship has gone down to the bottom of the mighty ocean because of the fact that those who had it in charge believed a lie. I recall just now the great Titanic on her wonderful maiden trip, characterized by the very elite passengers of the land, and in the midst of revelry and joyful festivities they believed that the mighty ship was unsinkable; and, notwithstanding the fact that the news was flashed by wireless suggesting that icebergs were coming from the North, they turned a deaf ear, passed it by, and continued in the belief of a lie. The result was that more than twelve hundred went to the bottom of the sea.

 

I signed a man's note once for a sum of money at the bank. I verily thought that when it became due the man would pay it. I believed a lie.

 

Ladies and gentlemen, Paul did not subscribe to the doctrine that the belief of a thing is a guarantee thereof; and so it is said in our text that because certain ones received not the love of the truth (he did not say because they did not receive the truth, but because they did not receive the love of the truth), God will send them a strong delusion, that they should believe a lie, that all those might be damned who believe not the truth, but have pleasure in unrighteousness.

 

There is something or other connected with the belief of a lie. Paul, what is it? Not salvation, but damnation. In this splendid, goodly land of ours every man and every woman has access to the truth of God, but the very fact that a person has the truth is not a guarantee of his eternal salvation. it is not enough simply to have the truth, but a man must have the love of it in his heart, or else God will send him a strong delusion. I do not think that by any direct communication God would send that delusion; but he would allow the man who does not love truth to be worked upon by error until he becomes satisfied, lulled to sleep, and his conscience eased. Then, drifting upon the bosom of time, prompted by opinion and personal preference, the man rests in the belief of a lie, which, if not arrested and if not in some manner changed, will result in his damnation.

 

In the Bible there is a fine story told expressly to demonstrate the principle herein involved. The record of it is found in 1 Kings 13; and now I want you to follow and to study with me as best we can the story related and then see if the application be legitimate and worthy of our most serious concern.

 

After Jeroboam had established himself as king of the ten tribes, he decided that if the people continued to go to Jerusalem for to worship, by and by they would renounce their faith in him and their allegiance to the government he sought to maintain and would seek to go back under the rule of David's descendant; and so he said: "Let us build us two calves of gold. Let us set one of them up at Dan, and the other at Bethel." And then he went to the people and said: "it is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. I am too much interested in your taking such a long journey when it is wholly unnecessary. it is much more convenient otherwise. Look upon your gods, O Israel, that brought thee out of the land of Egypt."

 

In the course of time Jeroboam, assuming the place of a priest, planned to burn incense upon the new altar thus erected at Bethel. In the meantime God appeared unto a young man, a prophet that dwelt in Judah, and ordered him to go down to Bethel and cry against that altar, and told him what to say: "O altar, altar, thus saith the Lord; Behold, a child shall be born unto the house of David, Josiah by name; and upon thee shall he offer the priests of the high places that burn incense upon thee, and men's bones shall be burnt upon thee. And he gave a sign the same day, saying, This is the sign which the Lord hath spoken; Behold, the altar shall be rent, and the ashes that are upon it shall be poured out." Now, that is the command of God thus far unto the young prophet. "And when you go, young prophet, eat no bread, drink no water, nor come again by the way that you went."

 

The young man understood perfectly well what God declared. He never even raised the question as to whether or not the declaration was clear; but, understanding thoroughly just what God wanted him to do, he made ready, responded to duty's call, and went down to Bethel. As Jeroboam's people were gathered round about to witness the burning of the incense, this young man broke through the crowd close up to the altar and thus proclaimed the prophetic declaration as announced by God. Upon hearing this, Jeroboam's anger was kindled, his wrath was great, and he said to those round about him: "Lay hold on that young man, that we may kill him." But as he stretched out his arm to carry into effect that kind of an order, the God of heaven interfered and wrested the same, made his arm stiff, so that he could not draw it back again to his body. Jeroboam was not unacquainted with Jehovah, and understood quite well that God's hand was in it all; and immediately the king changed his tune and said to the young prophet that stood by: "Entreat the Lord thy God for me, and ask his favor upon me, that my hand may be restored." And the young prophet, glad to accept the suggestion, took the matter unto the Lord in prayer, and Jeroboam's arm was made like it was at the beginning. Then what? Instead now of the king's despising and having murder in his heart, all the wrath was changed to admiration; and so he said: "Young man, I want you to come home with me and refresh yourself, and I will give you a reward." A wonderful, wonderful temptation, such a strange trend of affairs, such an unexpected reply from what the young man had right and reason to look for! Instead now of the king's wanting to curse and to kill, he takes the side of the young man and says: "Sir, I want you to come unto my house, into the royal palace. I want you to have a royal dinner and be my guest, and I will give you out of the overflowing treasures a splendid reward." I want to ask you: Had you been in that young man's position, how would you have treated an invitation of that sort? Were you ever invited by a king to come and dine with him? If so, did you have a disposition to turn it down? Were you ever asked to come into the home of royalty and there be laden with riches galore and with rewards supreme? Immediately the young man spurned the invitation and said to the king: "If thou wilt give me half thine house, I will not go in with thee, neither will I eat bread nor drink water in this place." Well, why? "For it was commanded me by God not to do that."

 

I submit to you, my friends, that there never has been pictured to mortal man a finer type of humanity thus far — a young man who is not afraid of the wrath of the king, a young man so mindful and so respectful of God's commandment that he is not moved by flattery, a young character so reverent for the word of Jehovah that even the glittering shekels of gold and of silver have no attraction for him. And so he said to Jeroboam: "I could not go, not if you were to give me half of thy house." Well, why not? Was there any reason especially for not doing it? From a human point of view, absolutely none. Well might he have accepted the doctrine of expediency and reasoned after this fashion: "Perhaps if I go home with old Jeroboam, I may have a splendid influence over him and may cause him to return to the fold of God. Therefore, I will feast in the royal palace myself; I will have my name to go abroad that I was a special guest; I will receive the rich reward, and, at the same time, I will gain a soul for God." But had he done that, as you well know, he would have been in violation of the will of the Lord.

 

Now, there is another side presented. Down at Bethel there was an old prophet of the Lord—a man who knew quite well that Jeroboam, in the offering at Bethel on his new altar, was doing the wrong thing; but this old prophet of God, while his heart was against the act, lacked the courage of his convictions. Propriety and expediency suggested that he had better keep quiet and to hold his tongue against the doings of the king. And so this old prophet at Bethel did not attend Jeroboam's inaugural offering of incense.

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But the old man had some boys, and one of them was down at Jeroboam's meeting. Let me say to you, fathers and mothers, that you and I may be too religious to go to certain places, we may be too good to be defiled by contact and association with things that are unscriptural and ungodly; but bear it in mind that, unless we are exceedingly particular, our boys will be there and our girls not far away.

 

So when this young lad, the son of the prophet, had witnessed all that transpired, he went back home to tell his father of the things that had come to pass down at Bethel— how that a young man stood there and cried against the altar, how they beheld that the altar was rent and the ashes thereof poured out. The old prophet was exceedingly anxious to meet the man who had the courage to speak the truth and to condemn the wrong, even if he himself had been lacking and cowardly in the affair; and so he said to his son: "Saddle the ass. Let me go out after that young man, that I may fetch him back home with me." The boys saddled the ass, the old prophet rode thereon, and hastened down the road toward which the young prophet had gone. He soon found the young man dismounted and sitting under the spreading branches of a mighty oak. When this old man approached him sitting under the oak, he said: "Young man, I want you to come back to my house. I want you to share my hospitality and enjoy my feast. Come and eat with me and refresh yourself." The young prophet told him just what he did Jeroboam. "Why," he said, "I can't do that." "Why can't you? Why not?" "Simply because God told me not to. That is sufficient; that is enough. God said for me to eat no bread, drink no water, nor return the way that I came. I cannot do it." The old prophet was so anxious and so determined to carry his point that he framed up a lie—not a story, not a falsehood. it does not take that many letters to spell it. The Bible says that he told him a lie. Well, here is what it was. "Young man, I also am a prophet of the Lord, as thou art. We belong in the same class. And an angel of God hath appeared unto me, and told me to come down and fetch you back, and refresh you by giving you something to eat and water to drink." Friends, the man that had been able to withstand the invitation of the king, the man who had had strength of character and resolution enough to resist the temptation of flattery, the man who had been so unselfish as to overcome the desire and greed for gold, fell upon the plausibility of a lie. Mark you, he wasn't a bad man, but a brave character and a true soul, and hitherto a loyal one; and when he could not be trapped by fear of the king's wrath nor by the flattery of being invited as a guest at the palace, when he could not be bought with money, he yet failed and was overcome by the plausibility of a He that was told.

 

So the record says that the old prophet carried him back, during which time the wife of the old gentleman was seeing to it that a bounteous feast was being prepared. And as thus they sat around the table richly laden, even in the midst of their enjoyment the word of the Lord came to the old prophet and caused him to say: "Forasmuch as thou hast disobeyed the mouth of the Lord, and hast not kept the commandment which the Lord thy God commanded thee, but camest back, and hast eaten bread and drunk water in the place, of the which the Lord did say to thee, Eat no bread, and drink no water; thy carcass shall not come unto the sepulcher of thy fathers." That solemn announcement was well understood by the old prophet, who was conscious all the while that he had lied to the young man and was the cause of his wreck and of his ruin. He was then just as anxious to get rid of his guest as he was to have him in the first place; so once more he said to his boys: "Saddle the ass; let the young prophet ride thereon and hasten away."

 

As the young prophet, conscious now of being deceived by the He, starts on his way home, a lion meets him face to face. I have tried to feel as he must have felt when the lion comes and gets hold of him with his terrible claws, when he sees the glare in the eye of that ferocious beast and is dragged from the ass. As the lion pulls the man to him and his life is being crushed out, I wonder what is uppermost in the mind of the young prophet. Is it the fact that he sees the lion's glare or feels the terrible paws? Is the​ predominant idea with him now that his life work is ended and he must die? I think there is a weightier matter than all that. Friends, it was not the fact that he was dying, but it was the terrible idea that he was passing out in open disobedience to the voice of God.

 

Some men came along where this wonderfully strange scene was enacted, and went into the city where the old prophet lived and told the sad story. They said that there was a man lying in the road, a lion standing by, which had not devoured the body, and also an ass gazing upon the seen" " wonderful testimony to passers-by that every transgression and disobedience receives a just recompense of reward. When the news thus came to the old prophet, he said: "it is the man of God, who was disobedient unto the word of the Lord." He bade his sons: "Saddle me the ass." The old prophet went and found the carcass cast in the way, and the ass and the lion standing by. So he "took up the carcass of the man of God, and laid it upon the ass, and brought it back: and the old prophet came to the city, to mourn and to bury him. And he laid his carcass in his own grave; and they mourned over him, saying, Alas, my brother !" After the burial, he said: "Sons, when I am dead, I want you to bury me beside this young prophet. Let my bones He side by side with his." That was the best atonement he could make, and yet it was wholly inadequate and not to be compared with the wrong and the wreck that he had wrought by causing the young man to believe a He.

 

You doubtless say and reason now, just as I am disposed to do, that the old prophet was guilty of the greater sin. Sometimes we reason about it after that fashion. Let me ask you: Why didn't God kill the old man, who told the He, rather than the young prophet, who believed the He? I think the answer lies here. There are other passages in the Bible that have to deal with the teller of the He. There are plenty of other scriptures and examples that deal out the punishment and portray the destiny of those who misrepresent and who are guilty of lying. But the special reason for this story's being written is to impress upon you and me the danger of believing a lie, and I don't doubt but that in due time that old gentleman received his share of condemnation for having told the He.

 

I want to ask this just now: Is every He that a man believes detrimental? Does damnation follow the belief of all lies? If so, my friends, we are upon exceedingly dangerous ground, for deception and delusion are abroad on every hand. I am frank to say to you, because I firmly believe it, that there are lies which a man may believe and not be condemned. I can think just here if that old prophet had told this young man sitting under the oak almost anything else, it might not have resulted in the young man's death. Suppose the old gentleman had come to him while he was sitting under the oak and said: "Sir, a cyclone is coming, the storm is raging. This tree will be uprooted. Flee for your life, and stop not until you reach your home at last." 0, the young man might have been scared wonderfully; he might have run until he was almost out of breath; but the chances are that he would not have met a lion in the way; and while that would have been a lie, it was not of that type the belief of which brought damnation unto the soul.

 

To make the matter short and without extending the lesson to-night, let me suggest to you this, which I think is in harmony with God's word and teaching in general: Any kind of a lie on earth which would cause me to sin or to fall short of doing God's will or to go beyond that which God demands is the type of a lie that will condemn the soul and rob it of a blissful crown.

 

There are certain things religiously that I can believe, which may be a lie and yet not subject me to condemnation. There are many problems and questions about matters pertaining to Christian duty and things in general about which there are conflicting beliefs. Some think the Holy Spirit in person dwells in the heart of a Christian; others think that the Spirit is in the Christian only through his teaching and his word. One or the other of these theories is a lie, but I think that the belief of either of these theories would not damn a man. Why not? Because neither would cause him to sin; neither would hinder his obedience to the will of God. There is but one thing, my friends, that will keep you and me outside of heaven's splendid mansions, and that one thing is sin. Whatever might cause me to commit sin, either in thought or in deed, if not forgiven, will result in my condemnation rather than my salvation.

 

There is one lie, ladies and gentlemen, that is the most popular and most prominent and that has to-night more victims than all others of which I can think. That lie is expressed in these terms: that in our pathway along through life there are duties to be performed, there are obligations to be met and problems to be solved; but for all of these there is time enough yet. This idea has brought condemnation to more people than all things else. Thousands of souls have been led into failure to do God's will and submit to his authority on the belief of this lie. Believing this He causes men to be guilty of a sin—not of commission, perhaps, but of omission, in that they fail to respond to duty's demand. On every hand and in the realm of religious discussion we are told that penitent believers ought to be baptized. All people so agree, and so much so that outside of the Quakers there is not a church in America of which you can become a member without some form of baptism; but it is said to be a mere external rite, a mere ordinance; that there is nothing specially obligatory about it; and, therefore, there is plenty of time, and, in reality, it is nonessential. Forgetting that the Savior said the Pharisees and lawyers rejected the counsel of God against themselves, in that they refused to be baptized at the hands of John, many are thereby deceived.

 

Then, again, when I encourage you and others who favor me with their presence to respond to duty's call and obey God, and remind you of what Peter said when a vast multitude cried out and asked, "What shall we do?" there are some people who will discourage obedience by saying: "That is water salvation." Why, friends, who said: "Repent, and be baptized every one of you for the remission of sins ?" Peter. What did he know about it? Guided by the Spirit, he knew all about it. Who says to the contrary? Some uninspired men, who by their utterances seem to advertise how little they know regarding the teachings of God's word. Any declaration that you and I to-night might make, which would cause a man to hesitate in responding to the call that God makes binding upon him, would lead such a one to believe a lie, be guilty of the sin of omission, and be damned at the last great day.

 

And now there comes to us a very practical question: How can we be sure that we are not blindly guided? How can you, my friends, who are engaged in various activities of life, be certain that you are walking in the light? There lives not a man upon the earth but that might be a blind guide, and so it is said: "it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps."

 

I submit to you that there is but one set of men who have ever lived on the face of the earth whom you and I can afford to follow. I refer, of course, to the apostles of Christ. Hence, I bid you listen to no man per se, nor to accept anything from any uninspired man which you cannot turn to the book of God and read for yourself. Otherwise you might honestly be led to the belief of a lie, and thereby lose your own soul. The young prophet made this terrible mistake. God had told him exactly what to do, but instead of heeding it he listened to the old prophet. He ought to have respected and continued in obedience to God's command. He should have said to the old prophet: "You claim to be of like profession with me. You say that an angel has come and told you to bring me back; but I have direct authority and commandment from God, and I will allow neither prophets of earth nor angels in heaven to countermand God's order; and if the Lord wants me to come back, he must tell me himself."

 

Hence, Paul, in commenting on a line parallel with that, says (Gal. 1: 8, 9): "But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before, so say I now again, If any man ["I care not from whence he comes; I care not," says Paul, "regarding the attitude or the bearing that he assumes; if any man"]  preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed."

 

There is but one safe course, therefore, for you and me to pursue, and that is, individually and personally, to go to God's word, there turn and investigate for ourselves. And when God says a thing, let all men be liars, but let God's word be true. Let us accept it, believe it, obey it, rely upon it, trust God for the fulfillment of the promises made therein, for it is right and cannot be wrong. If I yield to the philosophies of men, if I acquiesce in the vain fancied theory drawn by some uninspired man, I am treading on dangerous ground and may forfeit my right to the tree of life transplanted in the paradise of God beyond. I beg of you, my friends, to believe the truth. That alone will make us free. I bid you become and be just what God requires, live as he has directed, and then earnestly, patiently, and lovingly trust him the remnant of your days for the fulfillment of his precious promises.

 

If there are, therefore, any of this company now who believe the truth as revealed in the Bible, who will repent genuinely and thoroughly of all your sins, publicly confess the Christ, be buried in baptism, and rise to walk in newness of life, I beg you to respond to the call to-night.

 

NOTE.—This sermon is based upon one preached by Brother J. W. McGarvey, and is largely a duplicate of the same.