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The Bible is clear that lying is missing God’s goal (aka sin) and is displeasing to God. The first sin in this world involved a lie told to Eve. The Ten Commandments given to Moses includes

“You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor” (Exodus 20:16).

In the early church, Ananias and Sapphira lied regarding a donation in order to make themselves look more generous than they really were. Peter’s rebuke is stern:

“Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit?” God’s judgment was sterner: the couple died as a result of their sin of lying.

Colossians 3:9 says,

“Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices.”

Lying is listed in 1 Timothy 1:9-11 as something practiced by the lawless. Furthermore, liars will be among those judged in the end. In contrast, God never lies. He is the source of truth.

“It is impossible for God to lie” (Hebrews 6:18).

Jesus called Himself the way, the truth, and the life, and He expects those who follow Him to be people of truth. The truth is to be expressed in love, offering hope to those seeking redemption from the lies of the world.

Satan is a liar and a murderer. He lied to our first parents and engineered their deaths. Cain was a child of the devil, for he was both a liar and a murderer. He killed his brother Abel and then lied about it. Is it any wonder that these religious leaders lied about Jesus, hired false witnesses, and then had Him killed?

The worst bondage is the kind that the prisoner himself does not recognize. He thinks he is free, yet he is really a slave. The religious elites thought that they were free, but they were actually enslaved in terrible spiritual bondage to sin and Satan. They would not face the truth, and yet it was the truth alone that could set them free.

“You’re from your father the Devil.” At last Jesus identifies their moral father. The religious elites have an evil nature, even though they appear to be very religious.

“And you want to do the desires of your father.” At least in those days most children wanted to please their fathers. The word for the Devil’s desires is often translated “lusts,” desires that trespass the boundaries of legitimacy.

“That one [the Devil] was a murderer from the beginning.” He led Adam and Eve to eat the forbidden fruit, the eating of which caused them to die.

“And he doesn’t stand in the truth, because truth isn’t in him.” God had said, “In the day that you eat from it [the tree of the knowledge of good and evil] you’ll surely die.” The serpent, identified by Jesus as the Devil, said to Eve, “Surely you won’t die”.

Satan is a lying liar who lies!

“Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks out of his own things [we’d probably say, ‘he speaks in character’], because he’s a liar and the father of it [= of lying].” Human missing God’s goal [sinning] is based on the Devil’s lying, so that sinning makes people children of the Devil. We’re all the children of whom we believe.

  • John 8:44 (CSB) — 44 You are of your father the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he tells a lie, he speaks from his own nature, because he is a liar and the father of lies.
  • 1 John 2:22 (CSB) — 22 Who is the liar, if not the one who denies that Jesus is the Messiah? This one is the anti-Messiah: the one who denies the Father and the Son.
  • Revelation 13:14 (CSB) — 14 It deceives those who live on the earth because of the signs that it is permitted to perform in the presence of the beast, telling those who live on the earth to make an image of the beast who was wounded by the sword and yet lived.
  • Revelation 20:7–10 (CSB) — 7 When the thousand years are completed, Satan will be released from his prison 8 and will go out to deceive the nations at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them for battle. Their number is like the sand of the sea. 9 They came up across the breadth of the earth and surrounded the encampment of the saints, the beloved city. Then fire came down from heaven and consumed them. 10 The devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet are, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.

Sources:

Wiersbe, W. W. (1996). The Bible exposition commentary (Vol. 1, pp. 322–323). Wheaton, IL: Victor Books.

Gundry, R. H. (2010). Commentary on the New Testament: Verse-by-Verse Explanations with a Literal Translation (p. 398). Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers.