Ephesians 4:25

25 Therefore, laying aside falsehood, speak truth each one of you with his neighbor, for we are members of one another.

Pray

The Application (Eph. 4:25)

·        Paul was not content to explain the principle and then leave it

·        He always applied it to the areas of life that need to feel its power

·        Paul named the sin  

·        Paul told us to avoid lying and he explained why

I.       Lying (v. 25)

A.   Types of lies

1.     A lie is a statement that is contrary to fact, spoken with the intent to deceive

2.     If I tell you it is noon

a)    Then discover that my watch is wrong

b)    I did not tell a lie

c)     But if I gave you the wrong time so you would be late to a meeting

d)    And I would benefit from it, that would be a lie

3.     There is the lie of speech

a)    Sometimes deliberate and sometimes almost unconscious

b)    We have a duty to our kids

(1)  We as parents need to call our kids to honesty, constantly

c)     We do not know where deviation from truth will end….. if we do not consistently check it  

d)    Deception is a natural tendency, original sin

e)     Deviation from a story you know to be different is where it starts, there is a fine line between hyperbole and lying,

(1)  The line would be changing the facts of the story

(2)  It is more from carelessness about truth than from intentional lying, that there is so much falsehood in the world

(3)  Truth demands a deliberate effort

B.   There is also the lie of silence, and maybe it is even common

1.     Andre Maurois, calls it “the menace of things unsaid.”

2.     It may be that we by our silence give approval to some course of action which we know is wrong

3.     It may be… that we withhold a warning or rebuke when we know quite well we should have given it    

a)    The motivation

(1)  We are all members of the same body

(2)  One member or part of the body can not injure or deceive another, without injuring himself, as all have a mutual and common interest

(3)  We can live in safely only because the senses and the nerves pass true messages to the brain

(a)    If they took to passing false messages, if, for instance, they told the brain that something was cool and touchable when in fact it was hot and burning, life would very soon come to an end

(i)      Sin is indeed a false message acting like a true one

(b)   A body can function healthily only when each part of it passes true messages to the brain

(c)    If then we are all bound into one body, that body can function properly only when we speak the truth

b)    There is another sin the world is very guilty of, hopefully we as Christians do not fall into the same trap

(a)    Saying that a profitable lie is better than a hurtful truth

(i)      I do not want to hurt their feelings,

(ii)    I do not want to loose them as a friend

(b)   Truth can hurt,

Proverbs 27:6

Faithful are the wounds of a friend,But deceitful are the kisses of an enemy.

Zechariah 13:6

"And one will say to him, 'What are these wounds between your arms?' Then he will say, 'Those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends.' 

(c)    The apostle exhorts us to cease from lying, & from every thing that is contrary to truth                         

II.    Satan is a liar

John 8:44

44  “You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies.     

1.     The devil wants us to believe that God is a liar

2.     And to doubt God’s Goodness to us

Genesis 3:1

1  Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Indeed, has God said, ‘You shall not eat from any tree of the garden’?”    

3.     Whenever we speak truth, the Spirit of God works

4.     Whenever we tell a lie, Satan goes to work, even a part of the truth

a)    We like to believe that we help people by lying to them, in any of these ways, but such is not the case

b)    We may not see the sad consequences immediately, but ultimately they will come

1 John 2:21

21  I have not written to you because you do not know the truth, but because you do know it, and because no lie is of the truth.   

5.     One day the whole world will believe

a)    “The Lie”

2 Thes. 2:9-11

9 that is, the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders,

10 and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of  the truth so as to be saved.

11 For this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false,

6.     Hell is prepared for people who make a practice of lying

Revelation 22:15

15  Outside are the dogs and the sorcerers and the immoral persons and the murderers and the idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices lying.    

III.  This does not mean that anybody who ever told a lie will go to hell

1.     Rather that those whose lives are controlled by lies—they love lies and they make lies—are lost forever.

IV.The Christian’s life is controlled by truth

1.     Note the reason Paul gave for telling the truth:

a)    We belong to each other in Christ

b)    He urged us to build the body in love Eph. 4:16

c)     He urged us to build the body in truth

Ephesians 4:15

15  but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ,    

2.     The first sin that was judged in the early church was the sin of lying Acts 5:1-11   

B.   Truth is conforming one’s words to reality

C.   The reason for this exhortation is that believers are all members of one another in Christ’s body, the church

1.     This is why it hurts all of us when someone in the body lies… 

Ephesians 4:4

4  There is one body and one Spirit, just as also you were called in one hope of your calling;

Ephesians 4:16

16  from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.

2.     Putting away—Greek, “having put away” once for all.

3.     Nothing new here

Zechariah 8:16

16    ‘These are the things which you should do: speak the truth to one another; judge with truth and judgment for peace in your gates.

17    ‘Also let none of you devise evil in your heart against another, and do not love perjury; for all these are what I hate,’ declares the Lord.”          

D.   It should be the character of God’s people that we are children who

1.     We.. Will not lie, …..who dare not lie, …..who hate and abhor lying

a)    We are a people who have and show grace toward one another

b)    Make a make conscience toward speaking the truth

c)     And would not tell a deliberate lie for the greatest gain and benefit to ourselves

Ephesians 4:17-19

17  So this I say, and affirm together with the Lord, that you walk no longer just as the Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their mind,

18  being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart;

19  and they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness.    

Ephesians 4:22-24

22  that, in reference to your former manner of life, you lay aside the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit,

23  and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind,

24  and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.

E.   4:25 “lay aside”

1.     This is an AORIST MIDDLE PARTICIPLE used as an IMPERATIVE.

a)    It continues the metaphor of clothing (cf. v. 24)

(1)  The believer needs to make an initial decision

(2)  Followed by repeated (i.e. daily, even hourly) decisions to live a holy life

2.     “Falsehood” This refers to either

a)    Lying

b)    “The lie” of unbelief as it was used in

1 John 2:22

22  Who is the liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son.   

c)     The message of the false teachers.

1 Corinthians 12:12-30

12  For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ.

13  For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.

14  For the body is not one member, but many.

15  If the foot says, “Because I am not a hand, I am not a part of the body,” it is not for this reason any the less a part of the body.

16  And if the ear says, “Because I am not an eye, I am not a part of the body,” it is not for this reason any the less a part of the body.

17  If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole were hearing, where would the sense of smell be?

18  But now God has placed the members, each one of them, in the body, just as He desired.

19  If they were all one member, where would the body be?

20  But now there are many members, but one body.

21  And the eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you”; or again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.”

22  On the contrary, it is much truer that the members of the body which seem to be weaker are necessary;

23  and those members of the body which we deem less honorable, on these we bestow more abundant honor, and our less presentable members become much more presentable,

24  whereas our more presentable members have no need of it. But God has so composed the body, giving more abundant honor to that member which lacked,

25  so that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another.

26  And if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it.

27  Now you are Christ’s body, and individually members of it.

28  And God has appointed in the church, first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, various kinds of tongues.

29 All are not apostles, are they? All are not prophets, are they? All are not teachers, are they? All are not workers of miracles, are they?

30 All do not have gifts of healings, do they? All do not speak with tongues, do they? All do not interpret, do they?    

F.    Doctrine and duty are twin blessings in the Bible, both the Christian’s wealth and his walk in Christ

1.     God in his Word never teaches the truth abstractly, but always makes concrete application

a)    Putting away lying

b)    IT contains the negative and the positive aspects

c)     It is not enough simply to abstain from lying; one must also tell the truth

d)    We are members

(1)  Members not only of Christ but of each other

Rom 12:5

5 so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another.