What does lying look like?

One of the distinguishing characteristics of the way Christians talk should be their consistent commitment to speaking truth.Unfortunately, lying is such a part of our culture and such a part of our past, that we often lie without even realizing it.This means, even as Christians, we need to work at putting off falsehood. But how? Especially, when it so widespread? First we must identify it. What does it mean to lie? How do we speak falsehoods? Rather than specifically identifying the different kinds of lies we are tempted to speak, I thought it might be helpful to instead to point out two more general characteristics of the kind of lying speech that we must work at putting off.First, falsehood, is the kind of speech that doesn’t flow out of faith in God but instead trust in yourself.Lying is a form of self-salvation. Can I say that again because really we could spend all day long identifying specific examples of lying but, this pretty much sums most of it up?We need to put away all the kinds of talking that doesn’t flow out of faith in God but instead is a form of self-salvation. Because where does lying come from, what is it really, it is when we don’t believe God is for us and we don’t believe that God can protect us and provide for us and so we use our words to try to do for ourselves what God has promised to do for us through Jesus Christ.This is one of the big differences between lying and simply making a mistake in what you said, lying is connected to manipulation, you are trying to manipulate the situation because you don’t trust God to take care of you. We use our words to promote ourselves, we use our words to gain advantage for ourselves, our words aren’t motivated by faith in God but by trust in self.And second, falsehood, it is the kind of speech that is not based on the truth of the gospel and God’s Word but instead on the errors and lies of the world. One of the most common and dangerous kinds of deceptive speech in our world today occurs when we talk about things that God has talked about in the Bible and we either change or distort what God says or we present human ideas and opinions instead. It is what Satan did in the Garden of Eden ultimately. God gave certain counsel and Satan gave the opposite counsel, and he’s been doing the same thing ever since. Whenever you sit down with your friend and you talk about marriage and you give counsel that twists the Scripture or that is from the world and not true to what God says in His Word, you are speaking falsehood, and really that is falsehood of the most dangerous kind. We have to be putting that kind of falsehood off. Lies go with the old self and truth with the new self.