"How Could I Fall For That?"
I had a great story that I was just about tell you that someone else told me. But I won't. Why not? The story sounded good. I was moved by it. It had a great point. But after trying to verify the facts of a public event, I found that the real story was a lot different than what others said about the same event. It didn't check out. The person may have been just passing on a narrative that someone else told him. However, I'm not going to repeat something that I'm not sure is accurate.
Have you ever been stung by repeating an "amazing" fact only to find that it was a hoax, scam, rumor, greatly embellished or just an outright lie? Have you ever asked yourself, "How could I fall for that?"
There are entire websites such as snopes.com that are dedicated to exposing widely held "urban legends" or widely believed but completely untrue stories. Some of these stories are widely repeated and replicated by sending on to entire address lists. You may have gotten some from your friends and have come across them on social media, but, alas, you discover that they are fiction. The information may damage reputations or hurt someone's livelihood.
God places great importance on telling the truth. Spreading false information is one of the 10 cardinal sins. It's equivalent to theft, murder and adultery. The effects of lies have deceived the human race by destroying belief in the true God. This has been orchestrated from the beginning by a powerful supernatural being—called in the Bible the Devil—who is identified as the "father of lies" in John 8:44.
Harmful lies about the existence of God, who He is and His existence have separated humanity from our Creator. Using every means possible, Satan has been spreading hoaxes about the truth of who God is from the time of the first human beings created. He lied about God to Adam and Eve and told them that they would not die if they disobeyed God. Adam and Eve believed that lie. Look around at the world today. You can see what resulted from that lie.
Mankind has been lied to by civil and religious leaders. As these lies mount up they produce confusing stories that have collectively divided and immobilized nations. People have had a deceiving veil cast over their lives by lies, lies, and more lies.
Thankfully, God has preserved His Word, which represents authoritative and inspired truth for us today. Many people sacrificed their lives to make this available. The Bible has withstood millennia of scrutiny and is considered by many to be the most accurately preserved book in the world. It's a book that exposes hoaxes and scams intended to steal people's minds and hearts. Simply put, the Bible is truth (John 17:17).
As we read in the book of Hebrews, "The word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. (Hebrews 4:12). We need this "sword of the spirit" to protect our minds and lives.
To that end, I would like to offer you our study aid Is the Bible True? It's a great place to start and compare all that you know with a source that exposes scams and hoaxes that have weakened all of us. It also reveals truth about who we are and where we are going. It shows that the Bible is a book of power for transforming your life, bringing you to a positive repentance and conviction. It reveals to us what Jesus taught about the coming Kingdom of God.
You can download your copy of Is the Bible True? immediately at www.ucg.org/booklet/bible-true/, or you can request a physical copy.
Either way, don't fall for lies, however alluring or well meaning. I invite you to find the truth for yourself today!
P.S. Do you have a similar experience to what I recently had? Please feel free to share it with me at victor_kubik@ucg.org. Let's all be about discovering and applying biblical truth.
