The truth has no other agenda than to shine forth and light the way. The truth reveals darkness. The truth uncovers deception. The truth fights an ongoing and unceasing war against falsehood, lies, treachery, and betrayal.

         The truth exposes the hidden kingdom of the devil. 

         The whole world (Kosmos) lies in the power of the evil one. [1 John 5:19]  

         The majority of the people on this planet have always been under a thick cloud of deception. The people who want to rule over and enslave humanity must deceive them. They must lie and cheat. They must hoodwink, trick, and fool.

         If they don’t, they’re out of business. The truth is the one thing they are most afraid of, because it is the one thing that will reveal them for what they are. These evil, secretive people have always, whether they know it or not, taken their cue from the devil himself.

         “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. But because I speak the truth, you do not believe Me.” [John 8:44-45]   

         The devil is the one who invented lying. He has always used lying as his principle tool for gaining power. Every single person who has joined his side or obeyed his suggestions has been deceived by his lies. These then end up using the devil’s very methods to deceive others.

         He shades the truth. He is always involved in a cover up. He uses ultra-brilliant slight-of-hand tactics to make people believe something false in order to keep them from knowing reality, to control them, and to make them subjects of his illicit kingdom. He establishes sin as the status-quo.

         Why in the world do so many people adamantly insist on engaging in behavior that will take them to hell? They are obviously deceived and have no clue regarding their eventual destination. Nobody in their right mind would want to lose their soul. If someone knew they were going to hell, wouldn’t they want to do something about it?

         Liars are in league with the devil. There are no exceptions. There are no “little white lies” that are innocent or good. Such lies are as harmful as all other lies. A lie is a lie. Liars learn their craft from the devil. It might be through an intermediary, of course, or through someone who has learned to lie and teaches others to do so.

         Some people teach lies they know are lies. The majority teach lies they believe are not lies. They think they are teaching truth. They have been deceived. They have been lied to unknowingly. They are enchanted by a spell and are completely unaware of it. This is the nature of deception. Some people are excellent liars. They have the ability to lie in such a way that the majority will always believe them.

         The majority, it appears, actually appreciate being lied to. They would much rather live in a fantasy world than face the truth. As long as the people they put their faith in keep telling them the kind of untruths that make them feel better about themselves and that the status-quo is correct, they rally around it. It gives them security. But it is a false security.

         Beware the ones you put your faith in. There is only One who will tell you the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. He is not on television.

         Yet, it apparently doesn’t matter. Most people would much rather have a false sense of security than face the truth, which removes a false foundation. Facing the truth means facing reality. But facing reality is scary. It’s upsetting. It involves dealing with personal sin.

         It means facing God.

         Most people don’t want anything to do with facing God. That’s why the majority of people will go to hell. It is not only because they are deceived, it is because they are willingly deceived. God has sent truth-tellers into the world from the very beginning in an effort to counterattack the lies of the devil and set people free.

         “If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” [John 8:31-32]

         It follows, then, that whoever does not continue in God’s Word and are not disciples of the Lord Jesus will not know the truth and will not be free.

         Truth-tellers are always misunderstood, lied about, gossiped about, smeared, cheated, libeled, slandered, and betrayed. This happens to all truth-tellers. Some have greater protection than others and are able to stay alive long enough to make an impact. Some actually have good success. But other truth-tellers are killed off early.

         Abel was a truth-teller and was killed at a relatively young age by his own brother. Cain was a liar and took his orders from the devil. The devil knew the Messiah would arrive through the righteous generational line of Abel. Cain killed his only chance at salvation! This was a perfect type of what happened when the Messiah came to His people.

         The ancient Hebrew prophets were truth-tellers. They were pretty much all killed by the lying jerks in power, one despicable Hebrew king after another, often after manipulating the majority of the people to do their bidding. In other words, the majority of the Hebrew people were actually in favor of killing the prophets. And the more prophets they killed, the more their country went down the drain.

         “Woe to you! For you build the tombs of the prophets, and it was your fathers who killed them. So you are witnesses and approve the deeds of your fathers; because it was they who killed them, and you build their tombs. For this reason also the wisdom of God said, ‘I will send to them prophets and apostles, and some of them they will kill and some they will persecute, so that the blood of all the prophets, shed since the foundation of the world, may be charged against this generation, from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who was killed between the altar and the house of God; yes, I tell you, it shall be charged against this generation.’” [Luke 11:47-51] [1]

         The greatest truth-teller of all time is the Lord Jesus Himself. His own people crucified their Messiah after deceiving the Roman government about Him. Imagine that. Those evil people were such world-class lying manipulators they deceived even Rome! Pontius Pilate found no fault in the Lord according to Roman law. But Pilate relented because they threatened to lie to the Roman emperor about his loyalty. Pilate knew they would have been successful. He thus saved his own skin and condemned an innocent Man to death having no idea who He really was.

         © 2012 by RJ Dawson. All Rights Reserved. [Part 1 of 3]

[1] Unless otherwise noted all Scriptures are taken from the New American Standard Bible, © 1960, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.