Alright brethren, let's turn
to Ephesians chapter 4. Ephesians 4. Ephesians 4 verse
25. Wherefore, putting away lying,
speak every man truth with his neighbor, for we are members
one of another. Now, speaking to believers, speaking
to the body of Christ, to the church, the Holy Spirit has just
instructed us to put off the old man, which is corrupt according
to the deceitful lusts. And He's commanded us to put
on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and
true holiness. And so now He comes to particulars.
shows us how to put off the old man and to put on the new. One
of those ways, he says, verse 25, wherefore putting away lying. That's one way the believer puts
off the old man. Putting away lying. Lying is
of the old man of flesh. Put away lying. Verse 25, speak
every man truth with his neighbor. That's how the believer puts
on the new man. speak every man's truth with his neighbor. And
then he gives the believer a reason or a motive for doing this. He says in verse 25, For we are
members one of another. Every believer, as well as those
Christ shall call out through the gospel, are members in Christ's
body. Members one of another. Now the
very life of the body of Christ The life of the body of Christ. The edification of each member
in the body of Christ. And the very tie that binds every
member together, brethren, is truth. Truth. Wherefore putting away lying,
speak every man truth with his neighbor, for we are members
one of another. I must not preach this as a precept
only. You know, imagine if someone
was here who'd never heard the gospel preached or somebody gets
a recording of this who'd never heard the gospel preached and
I had just preached this in precept only. They would think salvation
is by man's works when it's not. Salvation is all of God's work.
I want to preach this like Paul does a little later in the letter
when he gives the exhortation to submission. He preaches Christ
and Him crucified as He preached that exhortation. And that's
what I want to do here today. First of all, verse 25 says,
putting away lying. Now look over at John chapter
8. Putting away lying. Where does lying come from? You
ever thought of that? Why do men lie? Where does that
come from? The father of lies is the devil. John 8 verse 44. Christ is speaking to some men,
and He said, Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your
father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning,
and a bold not in the truth, because there is no truth in
him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh
of his own, for he is a liar, and he is the father of it. Christ
said the devil was a murderer from the beginning and abode
not in the truth. It was Christ that the devil
sought to murder. He was the one the devil sought
to murder from the beginning, from eternity. And it was because
the devil abode not in the truth, he would not have God the Son
come and take human flesh and then the God-man be exalted over
him who was a created angel. That was just, he was like those
Pharisees we saw today. He would not have another have
honor above him as a man, as a man. And for that reason, Christ
said there's no truth in him. He abode not in the truth, so
there's no truth in him. He fell into darkness from the
state God had originally created him. Now Christ said, when he
speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own, for he's a liar and
the father of it. It's natural for the devil to
speak a lie. Lies are of his own, of his own
nature, of his own will, of his own wisdom, of his own devising,
because he is a liar. That's his being. He is a liar. That's all he is, a liar. No
truth in him. He's just a liar. And he's the
father of lies. Now the way the devil sought
to murder Christ in this earth when he was cast out was by murdering
Adam and Eve through whom Christ was to come into the earth. He's
trying to prevent this all along. And so he enters into the garden
and the first word the devil spoke to a man was a lie. The first lie ever spoken in
this earth was spoken in the garden and he said to Eve, Thou
shalt not surely die. He said, when you eat that tree,
even though God said you'll die, you won't surely die. You will
not die. That's what he told her. That
was the first lie ever told in the earth. And it led to the
murder of all mankind. All men died when Adam sinned. In Adam, all died. By one man's
disobedience, many were made sinners. Therefore, man comes
from the womb, and he comes from the womb with a nature, listen
to me carefully, with a nature exactly like the father of lives. We come forth with a nature just
like the devils. Ephesians 2, remember what it
said? We walked according to the prince
of the power of the air. That's the devil. We walked according
to the prince of the power of the air. Doing what? in the lusts
of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the
mind. Christ said, the lusts of your
father you will do. And that's what we did. While
we were under his power, that's what we did. The description
Christ gave of the devil is a description of your old man of flesh and
of mind, and of every man. The old man within us is a murderer
of Christ from the very beginning. We come forth from the womb enmity
against God, hating God, wanting to murder God. The first and
chief lust of our old man, the number one lust of our old man
of flesh, of every man who is not regenerated, converted, believes
on Christ, that old man, that old man that you have with you,
you know what the first chief lust of that old man is? To lie. To lie against God. Chiefly to
lie against God. And our old man, we wouldn't
abide in the truth. We would not abide in the truth.
You know why? There's no truth in the old man. There is no truth in a depraved
nature. When it came to God, when it
came to our condition, when it came to how God saves sinners,
we lied, we listened to lies, we believed lies, we spread lies,
we approved of lies. You know why? Because we were
a liar. That's all. That's all we were
and our old man was a liar. No truth in us. Period. Just
a liar. That's all. And when we spoke
a lie, we spoke of our own. We spoke of our own nature. Of
our own will. Of our own wisdom. Of our own
works. Of our own way. Of our own devising. Of our own thoughts. And we approved
of what we spoke of. We spoke of our own. We broke
the law of God constantly. Now listen to me. We broke the
law of God constantly. Because, here's what the law
says, Exodus 20, 16. Thou shalt not bear false witness
against your neighbor. You shall not bear false witness
against your neighbor. Now, we spoke plenty of lies
against the fellow that lived next door to us. There's no doubt
about that. But, first and foremost, we bore
false witness against God and against Christ. That's who we
bore false witness against. We told lies about Him. We spoke literal of God and big
of I. That's what we did. Isaiah 59-3. Look there with me. Isaiah 59-3. This is a description, brethren,
of us right here by nature. Behold, Isaiah 59-3. Let me start at verse 1. Behold,
the Lord's hand is not shortened that it cannot save, neither
is his ear heavy that it cannot hear. But your iniquities have
separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his
face from you that he will not hear. For your hands are defiled
with blood, and your fingers with iniquity. Your lips have
spoken lies. Your tongue has muttered perverseness. None calleth for justice, nor
any pleadeth for truth. They trust in vanity, and they
speak lies, they conceive mischief, and bring forth iniquity. Brethren,
let me ask you a question. I read that, none calleth for
justice. And I read that and I thought,
when you were dead in your sins, did you ever think about the
justice of God? Did that ever even cross your
mind? All I ever heard preached was
God is love and all these things. All I ever heard was morality. All I ever heard was just these
syrupy sweet things. I never heard a word about God's
justice. And I never even thought about
God's justice. Did it ever occur to you that
God would be just to condemn you to hell and do it in truth? I never thought that. I never
called for justice. I never spoke of the truth of
God, of His justice on the cross. In truth, I never spoke of that.
And no believer did, no sinner did. You know what we did? We
trusted in vanity. We trusted in lies. We muttered
perverseness. What did we speak? We spoke lies
and iniquity about Christ's death on the cross. We spoke lies and
iniquity. We thought it in our heart and
we spoke them. When we said Christ died for
all men, we spoke iniquity. Listen to me. We spoke iniquity
when we said Christ died for all men. Did He die for all men? So then He died for men that
were suffering under the just condemnation of God in hell at
that moment. Did He? If He died for all He
did, that's iniquity. For him to be bearing justice
on the cross for a man that's bearing his own justice in hell,
that's iniquity. That's not just. That's the perverseness
we spoke. For any man that Christ died
for to say that he shall suffer the justice of God, that he shall
perish, which is what you've got to say if you say he died
for everybody, that's iniquity. We spoke lies against God when
we said to somebody, God loves you. What if that was an Esau we were
talking to whom God said, Esau I hate? We'd lie to him, didn't
we? We bore false witness saying
God wants to save you. God doesn't want to do anything.
He doesn't want to do anything. When we spoke that we were speaking
a lie. You know what we were doing by that message? Exalting
man to make man think you have the power to let God or prohibit
God. We were bringing God down and bringing man up. And that's
a lie. That's a lie. All the inhabitants
of the earth are reputed as nothing and He doeth. He doeth according
to His will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of
the earth. And none can question Him or say unto Him, What doest
Thou? He does as He will. That's God. And furthermore,
we lied all the time. Look at Jeremiah 9. We lied all
the time. This is God's Word about you.
You know, the sad thing is, men will do like the Pharisees did
in the first hour, because they want that honor of saying, no,
I've always told the truth. They won't hear this message.
They won't hear the truth, because they want the honor of saying,
I've always told the truth. So they'll believe a lie instead,
just like the Pharisees who would not believe on Christ the Sabbath,
because they want the honor of keeping the Sabbath day. But
here's what God says about us. Jeremiah 9, and He says there
in verse 3, They bend their tongues like their bow for lies. This
is a depraved man right here. This is all that the man of flesh
is right here. They bend their tongues like
their bow for lies, but they are not valiant for the truth
upon the earth, for they proceed from evil to evil. and they know
not me, saith the Lord. Take ye heed every one of his
neighbor, and trust ye not in any brother, for every brother
will utterly supplant, and every neighbor will walk with slanders.
They will deceive every one his neighbor, and will not speak
the truth. They have taught their tongue
to speak lies, and they weary themselves to commit iniquity.
That's you and me by nature. That's all we are. That's all
we are. Now, had God left us in that
state, we would have died and perished in condemnation and
we would have died justly. The Scripture says, the fearful
and the unbelieving and the abominable and murderers and whoremongers
and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars. shall have their place
in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone, which is
the second death." We'll die the first death, then that will
be the second death for all lives. It says, "...without are dogs,
and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters,
and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie." The reason we did not
perish in our lives is this right here, but God. God who is rich in mercy for
His great love wherewith He loved us even when we were dead in
sins. He quickened us together with
Christ. By grace are you saved. That's
the only reason. Now, wherefore, brethren, put
off the old man. Put away lying. Look at Ephesians
4 verse 27. Back at our text, Ephesians 4,
look at verse 27. Put off the old man, put away
lying, verse 27 says, neither give place to the devil. That's
what lying is, it's giving place to the devil. Now listen, understand
what this putting away and this putting on is. Try to understand
this. It's a state. It's a character
of the inner man created by God. This is not common virtues. We're not just... Don't tell
a lie. We're not talking about virtues.
Be truthful. Don't lie. That's not what we're
talking about here. It says, this is the state created in
the inward man. By God's grace, in the new man,
God has brought us to entirely, thoroughly abandon and renounce,
not in speech only, but in the inner man. every false way. He's made us hate every false
way in the new man and love the truth of God in the new man.
This is something that the old man is incapable of, brethren. The old man loves lies and hates
the truth. The new man loves the truth and
hates lies. So, what he's saying to us is,
this is the fact. This is what we are in our new
man. Now he says then, so then, now,
you put off that old man. See what I'm saying? Put off
that old man. Your old man's going to want to lie. That's
what he is. He's a liar. Put off the old
man. Scripture says, Lie not one to
another, seeing that you've put off the old man with his deeds.
You see that? You have put him off. God put
him off when he created you anew in the Spirit. And you've put
him off through faith. Now he says, now put him off. Now put him off. Don't give in
to him anymore. So brethren, put away all falsehood
in your thoughts. Put away all lying in your speech
and in your actions. Put away all false doctrine,
all false preachers, everything that is false. Put it away. Put
it away. That's what he's saying. Put
it away. Now secondly, Our text says, speak the truth. Speak
the truth. Ephesians 4.25, Wherefore, putting
away lying, speak, every man, truth with his neighbor. God
is truth. God is truth. As lying is of
the devil, truth is of God. God is truth. The Lord passed
by Moses when he showed him his glory. And God proclaimed, The
Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering and
abundant in goodness and truth. And truth. God is God who cannot
lie. He's not going to deceive. He
cannot deceive and He will not deceive. There's no reason for
God to lie, brethren. He has the power to do what He
said He'll do. What He promises, He can bring
to pass. He has no reason to lie. There's
nothing in Him that's... You know, you'll do something
that is a lie and then you have to lie to cover the lie and keep
lying and lying and lying. There's no lie in him. No lie
in God. The Scripture says God's not
a man that he should lie, neither the son of man that he should
repent. Hath he said and shall he not do it? Hath he spoken,
shall he not make it good? Whatever God says, God's going
to do it. That's right. And furthermore,
the second person in the Trinity is not only the Son of God, he's
not only the Word of God, he said, I am the truth. I am the
truth. Look at Ephesians 4.21. You've
heard Christ, you who believe. Ephesians 4.21 says you've heard
Christ, you've been taught by Christ as the truth is in Jesus. He's made flesh and He dwelt
among us. Full of what? Grace and truth. He's the truth. And then God
the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth. He guides us into all
truth. So brethren, Our triune God in
Christ Jesus is truth. He's truth. And therefore a lie
being contrary to the truth is contrary to our God who is truth. And so, he says, it's the utmost
abomination to him. I think lying is the chief sin,
brethren. Because it's contrary to the
preeminence of our God. He's true. He's true. Lying lips
are abomination to the Lord, but they that deal truly are
His delight. Wherefore, putting away lying,
speak every man truth with his neighbor. And not only is our
God truth, not only is our God truth, He redeemed us in truth.
He redeemed us in truth. The Word of the Lord is right,
the Scripture says, in all His works. All His works are done
in truth. Everything God does, He does
in truth. You know, man doesn't do things that way. Man does
things with shady. Everything He does, He does in
truth. All along with the works of His hands, along with those
works that He does in truth, God's law is truth. Scripture
says God's law is true. The works of His hands are verity
and judgment. They're true. And all His commandments
are sure. They stand fast forever and ever. They'll be upheld and magnified
and not once broken forever and ever. And they'll be done in
truth and uprightness. That's what God says of His law,
of all His commandments. Now, we saw that we broke God's
law. Just that one of being a liar.
We broke that one. And we broke all God's law. We
came forth lying lawbreakers. Therefore the law and the justice
of God would swallow us up in death. It must swallow us up
in death. God's true. His law will be upheld
forever. It will be done in justice and
right and truth. That means every soul that sins
has got to die. He's got to die. God's law must
be fulfilled in righteousness. Justice must be carried out in
justice. We had to die for God to remain
just. We had to die for God to remain
just. How then could God's righteous
and holy precepts be fulfilled by us? Think how holy God's law
is. The law of God is a mighty steed,
too many hands high for me to mount and ride to glory no matter
how I try. It's high, it's mighty, it's
broad, the law of God. How am I going to fulfill every
precept of that law and righteousness when I'm a liar by nature? How
can God be true in justice? How can He kill us as the law
demands and yet still have mercy on us? Psalm 57 verse 3 says, He shall
send from heaven and save me from the reproach of him that
would swallow me up. God shall send forth His mercy
and His truth. Whenever God sent forth His Son,
the Lord Jesus Christ, He sent His Son from heaven. And sending
His Son, He sent Him who is mercy and truth. That's who He sent.
And He said, and He's come to swallow up the reproach of him
that would swallow me up. He's come to condemn the condemner. He's come to put death to my
death. How's He going to do that? He's
going to have to be righteous. He's going to have to be holy.
He can't be a liar when He walks this earth. Have you ever sat
and thought about this? I mean, I think about this. Christ
the Lord walked this earth and never thought a lie. He never spoke a lie. He never
did a lie. He never even thought a lie.
Can you comprehend what it would be like to have never told even
one lie? He never told a lie. Because there was truth in Him.
And that's all that was in Him was truth. All that was in Him
was truth. He fulfilled the whole law in
perfect righteousness, in thought, word, and deed. And then He went
to the cross. And how is this justice going
to be satisfied? Now listen, Christ didn't go
to the cross and just die for whoever. He went to the cross
with a particular people on His breastplate. He went to the cross
with the names of each and every one He's dying for. and He took
their sin, and He took the justice of God for them, stood in their
room instead as their substitute, and God poured out wrath on Him,
and God satisfied justice by putting to death His own Son. That's how He can be just. Now
then, everybody for whom Christ died, every single one for whom
Christ died, this is true of them. Mercy and truth are met
together. Righteousness and peace have
kissed each other. Justice and mercy, truth and
mercy, truth and grace, justice and grace, in perfect harmony
with one another. Why? Because by mercy and truth,
iniquities purged. That's right. He was being merciful. You want to see mercy? Look at
Christ going to the cross that He might withhold from you what
you deserve. That's true of every believer.
That's true of everybody for whom He died. He went to the
cross because He's mercy. He went there because He's mercy.
He's showing mercy. He's withholding from His people
what we deserve. But He's got to be just to do
it. And therefore, He's got to take in His own body everything
we deserve. There's mercy and truth purging
all our iniquity. And He purged all the iniquity
of His people. And the Scripture says, and by the fear of the
Lord, men depart from evil. When God puts His fear in your
heart, you leave the evil of your lying against God. Now let
me ask you something, you that have been taught of God. You
that have been taught that the only way you establish the law
is through faith in Christ. Let me ask you something. Can
you anymore in your inward man speak a lie against Christ and
against what He accomplished on the cross? If you're born
of God, you can't do it. If you're born of God, you cannot,
from your heart, curse Christ the Lord and call His blood a
common thing anymore by saying He died for all men. You cannot
speak evil and iniquity against Him because that inner man is
made of truth. Christ the truth in you. And
you've departed from that evil. And you cannot do it anymore.
In fact, you can't stand to hear those who do it. You hate it. Because believers do not change
the truth of God into a lie and worship and serve the creature
more than the Creator. Believers don't do that. The
inward man does not do that. Here's what the inward man does.
He says, Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto Thy name
give glory. Why? For Your mercy and Your
truth's sake. That's why. We want Him to have
the glory. For my mouth shall speak truth,
and wickedness is an abomination to my lips. That's so of the
new man. He that speaketh truth showeth
forth righteousness, but a false witness deceit. You think of
it. He that speaketh truth showeth
forth righteousness. What did Christ say? He that
doeth truth comes to the light that his deeds may be made manifest
that they are wrought in God. He that speaketh truth shows
forth righteousness. He bears witness. He declares
a true witness of His righteousness, of Christ His righteousness.
But a false witness only bears deceit. That's all he does. Wherefore put away lying. The
way we lie now, brethren, and you tell me this is not so. The
believer is not going to lie on Christ now. We're not going
to lie and speak a false gospel now. We can't do it. But the
way we lie now is by not speaking this gospel as we ought to speak
it. We don't speak it when we ought to speak it, how we ought
to speak it, as often as we ought to speak it. That's how we lie
now. Because we don't want to suffer. And we will. We will
suffer. But he says, speak every man
truth with his neighbor. Declare and bring forth a clear
witness of Christ in your speech to one another and to all who
show an interest in the truth. Now the reason, this is another
thing, not only is our God true, not only did He redeem us in
truth, here's the reason He tells us to speak truth. It's because
the inward man is created by Christ through the truth. Through
the truth. Behold, thou desirest truth in
the inward parts, he said, and in the hidden part thou shalt
make me to know wisdom. This is where God desires truth.
But we were lost sheep. We had to hear the truth. We
had to be brought to faith in Christ in order for His body
to be complete. And so the truth brought the
truth to us and He spoke the truth into our hearts. He said,
look at Jeremiah 33, 6. I want you to see this. Jeremiah 33.6. I was jumping
around when I read this. Jeremiah 33.6. Listen to
this now. I will bring it. He's talking
about his people, his city. I'll bring it health and cure. And I will cure them. This is
Christ, brethren. And will reveal unto them the
abundance of peace and truth. And I will cause the captivity
of Judah and the captivity of Israel. This is his spiritual
people. Try to read this scene. He's
talking about his true spiritual elect people. I'm going to cause
their captivity to return to Him, to return to Him. And I
will build them as at the first. That is, Christ will do the building
just like He did in the beginning. It doesn't mean the building
is going to be built like it was in the beginning, where it was
in the beginning. It means He's going to do the building like
He did at the very beginning. And He says this, And I will
cleanse them from all their iniquity whereby they have sinned against
Me. And I will pardon all their iniquities whereby they have
sinned, whereby they have transgressed against Me. And it shall be to
Me a name of joy, a praise, and an honor before all the nations
of the earth. How is all the nations of the
earth going to hear this and know this as we speak truth with
every man his neighbor? Look now. "...and which shall
hear..." You see that? They're going to hear. "...all
the good that I do unto them." He's saying, they're going to
hear all the good He's done unto you. Why? Because you're going
to go forth and tell them. You're going to go forth and
say, He did this. Like that lame man this morning.
He went and said, Christ Jesus is the one who did this for me.
That's what we're going to do. He says, "...and they shall fear
and tremble for all the goodness and for all the prosperity that
I procure unto it." Not everybody is going to fear and tremble,
but those who are the true members of Christ's body, those who are
His true lost sheep, the Holy Spirit declares that They're
going to tremble because you're going to speak truth to them.
He said, I'm going to do this in truth. Now go over to Ephesians
1. The Holy Spirit tells us that's exactly what Christ has done
for us. Ephesians 1 and look at verse
16. I'm sorry, Ephesians 2 and verse
16. He says, And that he might reconcile
both Jew and Gentile, that's his elect from whatever house
they're in, unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the
enmity thereby, in order that he might do this, having slain
the enmity, he came and he preached peace to you which were far off
and to them that were nigh. Look at verse 19. Now therefore
you're no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens
with the saints and of the household of God. And the next verse says,
and you're built. You're built. He said, I'm going
to build it. You're built up. You built up.
You fitly framed together. Of His own will begot He us with
the Word of truth. He did this with the Word of
truth. The Holy Spirit guided us into all truth. Christ the
truth is formed in our hearts. And now we worship God in spirit
and in truth. And He's put us together in the
body for this purpose. Look at Ephesians 4.15 now. Don't
forget the context. Ephesians 4.15. He put us in
this body for this purpose. But speaking the truth in love,
we may grow up into Him in all things, which is the head, even
Christ. Now this is what Christ said.
He said, Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.
That's what He said. What's our heart? We got a new
man. What do we speak to one another and to those who are
interested? What is it we're going to speak to them? What
are you going to speak out of the abundance of your heart?
We speak the truth that in my flesh dwells no good thing. You
know there's churches where they preach sermons and they don't
even talk about sin. I was telling Melinda yesterday,
you can't even preach anything in this book, anything whatsoever,
and it be gospel, without declaring sin. You can't do it. Amen. So don't preach sin. That
just discourages me to preach sin. It encourages the believer
to hear about our sin. Because we see what God has saved
us from. We speak the truth that my wisdom
is not of me. It's Christ my wisdom. I could
not make myself believe this. I was a dead man. Christ did
this. We speak the truth that our righteousness is not our
own. We've never done anything. Listen to this statement. You
have never done one righteous thing in your life ever. Is that
too broad? That's true. Christ is all my
righteousness. We speak the truth but declaring
our sanctification is not of us. Christ is our sanctification
and He is our sanctifier. and speak the truth by declaring
Christ is our Redeemer and He is our redemption. I want you
to hear this. Listen to this now. Christ said
in John 8, 34, this is what He said. You shall know the truth
and the truth shall make you free. Free means redemption. You'll be redeemed. You shall
know the truth and the truth shall make you free. You'll be
redeemed by knowing the truth. And then another verse later
he said, And if the Son shall make you free, you shall be free
indeed. You get that? You're going to
know the truth. The truth is going to make you
free. That truth is the Son. The Son. He's the Redeemer. He's
my Redeemer. We speak the truth when we glory
only in the Lord. That's the only way. Put away
lies, let no flesh glory in His presence, and speak truth. Glory
only in the Lord. That's speaking truth. And those
who speak the truth of Christ, God says, in their mouth was
found no guile. No hypocrisy, no backbiting. You can't speak truth and have
guile in you. You can't speak truth and speak
lies. That's an impossibility. If you speak the truth, in your
mouth will be no guile. For they are without fault before
the throne of God. Now here's the last thing, and
I'll be very brief. Here's the reason, here's the
motive for putting away lying and speaking truth for the neighbor.
We're members one of another. Now brethren, it's true that
we are in a sense all together members with every man in this
world in the sense that we're in a common society and we're
all in the same family. And our lives are detrimental
to human society. If I lie, brethren, it's not
only going to hurt me, or not only going to hurt my fellow...
If I lie, it's going to hurt me, because it's going to hurt
my fellow man, which is going to hurt society, which is just
hurtful to me. That's so. If everybody just
went about... Everybody does lie, but if it
came to the point where you just absolutely could not trust anything,
because everything's a lie, society would fall apart, completely
fall apart. When's the last time you were
trusted or you trusted Smales with something that's very important
without signing a contract? You know why? Because we've lied
to one another and been lied to so many we don't trust each
other because we're liars. Now that's true of all men but
now brethren in the context Paul has been speaking through this
whole passage about the body of Christ and about us be members
with Christ and members with one another in that body. And
that's what he's speaking up here. He says, speak the truth
because you, those Christ has already called out, as well as
those He shall call out, you're members of Christ, the truth. And you're members of that brother
or sister you're speaking to. So speak the truth. Christ shall
call out His lost sheep And Christ is going to edify those sheep
He's already called out. You see, this is for edification,
for the edifying of itself in love. He's going to call out
His lost members through this truth, and He's going to edify
those He's already called out through this truth. And so being
members of Christ's body, these are members of your body. And
so brethren, if your brethren are edified, you're edified. And when the last member is called
and the body is complete, Christ is coming and we're going home.
So speak the truth. The way in you and I as believers
will be a blessing is by every one of us speaking the truth
of Christ with our neighbor. Now who's my neighbor? That is
one another who already believe, these brethren who already believe,
and anybody in this world that shows an interest. Don't cast
your pearls before a swine. If a man's not interested, don't
try to make him interested. Somebody sent me an email yesterday
about all the preaching they've been doing in Vegas and on the
strip and on the street corners and all this. And I thought,
man, that is, how shameful. No, but if you, if God's, God'll
make it known to you when He's crossed your path with somebody
that's interested, speak the truth to them. Don't hold back.
Tell them the truth of God. Tell them the truth. You remember,
Melinda said to me when we first started dating, she said something,
and I thought she was pushing back and was denying the truth
like every other girl I dated. And I, so I just closed the book,
said, ah, never mind. And she said, no, tell me what
this book says. I want to know what this book
says. And so I spoke the truth to her. That's what I'm saying
though. You don't know who his people are. You just speak the
truth to them. You'll make it known. Look over
at Zechariah 8. I just want to read something.
You know, in everything that Paul has written in Ephesians,
speaking of being truthful with our neighbor, he's been speaking
of heavenly Jerusalem, being citizens
of heavenly Jerusalem, of being in the body of Christ, and speaking this truth, and
being a blessing by speaking the truth. I think he had been
reading Zechariah 8. I think so, because look here.
Zechariah 8.3 says, Thus saith the Lord, I am returned unto
Zion. and will dwell in the midst of
Jerusalem. This is his church. This is heavenly
Jerusalem. That's what Paul said. Now, you're
no more strangers. You're citizens of the house
of God. You're of this heavenly Jerusalem.
Christ says, I'll return and design. And Jerusalem shall be
called a city of truth. This is his church. And the mountain
of the Lord of hosts, the holy mountain. Thus saith the Lord
of hosts, Behold, I will save my people from the east country
and from the west country, and I will bring them, and they shall
dwell in the midst of Jerusalem. In his church. And they shall
be my people, and I will be their God in truth and in righteousness. Verse 13, and it shall come to
pass as you were a curse among the heathen. That's what you
were. When we were lying and going about, we were a curse
among the heathen. He says, O house of Judah and house of Israel,
he's talking to his elect, and he says, so will I save you and
you shall be a blessing. You're going to be a blessing
to the heathen now. Fear not, but let your hands
be strong. How am I going to be a blessing
to the people? How am I going to be a blessing to God's people
scattered in this world? God said, now, I'm going to save
my people. He said, I'm going to bring them,
and they're going to dwell here, and they're going to be my people,
and I'm going to do this in truth. Now, how are we going to be a
blessing? He said, now, you're going to be a blessing to the
people. How? Look at verse 16. These are the
things that you shall do. Here's how we're going to be
a blessing. Speak ye every man the truth to his neighbor. Speak
the gospel. He is going to call them in truth.
Execute the judgment of truth and peace in your gates. Execute,
walk, do as you preach. Preach truth and walk in truth.
And let none of you imagine evil in your hearts against his neighbor
and love no false oath. Don't love a lie. Don't love
a lie. For all these are the things
that I hate, saith the Lord. That's how God's going to build
this body, finish building this body, and He's going to get the
glory. He said, I'm going to bring them,
I'm going to save them, and I'm going to do it in truth. And
He said, now here's what you're going to do. Here's how you're
going to be a blessing. You that I've already called,
you're going to speak the truth. You're going to go forth and
be my mouthpiece and speak the truth, and I'm going to call
them out in truth. And you're going to walk in truth. And you're
going to put away lies and hate every lie. And that's what he
says there. Wherefore, brethren, putting
away lying, speak ye every man truth with his neighbor, for
we're members one of another. Amen. All right, Brother Eric, if you'll
come.