A Culture of Lies – The Ninth Commandment

A Culture of Lies

Exodus 20:16; Deuteronomy 5:20

“You shall not bear false witness.”

Psalm 12:1, 2

Save, O LORD, for the godly one is gone; for the faithful have vanished from among the children of men. Everyone utters lies to his neighbor; with flattering lips and a double heart they speak.

Lies are the currency of our culture.

The snowball of lies has exploded into a white-out blizzard of deceit, misinformation, distortion, and lies that blinds people to the truth of Christ and the Gospel. Everywhere we turn we are confronted by lies that insist what matters most in life are material comfort, sensual satisfaction, happiness, and getting what we want. The chorus singing this secular oratorio is unceasing – advertizing, politics, education, the marketplace, entertainment, and even a good many churches. The drumbeat, drone, and continuo of materialism and sensuality are so constant in our day that every other voice is compelled either to find a quiet niche out of the public square or pipe its own tune according to the cadences and neumes of the lies of secular culture. In the church we become guilty of false witness when we package the truth of God in the lies of the age, hoping to lure people out of the lies by using the lies to win them to the truth. Every sermon that promises prosperity, every approach to fund-raising that points to material blessings for “seed faith giving,” every capitulation to pop culture and its entertainment-addiction is a compromise with lies, and cannot lead people to the truth. In a culture of lies the Church must stand up against the current, not try to float upon it to safety and health.

Is it possible that your church is compromising with lies in any way? What about you personally?

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“In the Gates” is a devotional series on the Law of God by Rev. T.M. Moore

T. M. Moore is editor of the Worldview Church. He serves as dean of the Centurions Program of the Wilberforce Forum and principal of The Fellowship of Ailbe, a spiritual fellowship in the Celtic Christian tradition. He is the author or editor of twenty books, and has contributed chapters to four others. His essays, reviews, articles, papers, and poetry have appeared in dozens of national and international journals, and on a wide range of websites. His most recent books are The Ailbe Psalter and The Ground for Christian Ethics (Waxed Tablet).

Scripture quotations in this article are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, (c) copyright 2001,2007 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Editor’s note: The use of a translation other than the Authorised Version in an article does not constitute an endorsement in whole or in part by The Christian Observer.