How To Know If Preachers Are Lying

He who says, “I know Him,” and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.

1 John 2:4

They come in all kinds of forms, shapes and sizes. Liars are everywhere, you’ll find them in the marketplace, in governments and even in our houses of prayer.

Liars speak with careful eloquence that give others the impression that they are trustworthy and reliable. And those deceived by liars, will unfortunately only come to realized that they have been lied to after finding out what they have been told is nothing more than worthless disinformation, that leads them to destruction rather than life.

In man’s church, the common liars are those who speak from the pulpit and who utter sentences purely only with intention to draw other men to themselves and not to God. They will equate serving God as serving them and their church. They teach that by giving to them is the same as giving to God. Or they train others into believing that, by the use of sorcery and positive vibes, is the correct testimony that leads people to Christ. Hence, in short, they teach the plausible; that to serve God is the same as to serve them and their church.

False preachers and liars are also masters of manipulating extrovert minds. Leaders who do things to fortify their own boundaries, conducting sessions to motivate one another, they do these to capitalize on the behavior of men that are scientifically classified as extroverts. Unlike their minority counterpart – the introverts, extroverts are always in need of company or people around them, that they use as their source of fuel to keep their fire burning and to keep them going.

Without company, extroverts will break down and capitulate easily. The evidence is obvious; during the beginning of the pandemic lockdowns two years ago, when churches worldwide were forced to shut down temporarily, a lot of people became upset and uneasy because they woke up one day to find out the scary truth that they have lost their access to the company of people around them.

False preachers and liars use this to their advantage to keep them going back to their churches, subtly feeding them with nothingness but deceiving them in words, that by going to church is essential for them to keep the faith and to ensure their salvation. Indeed, many would believe them because when they are in church surrounded by the company of other men, they feel a lot better than they are alone at home and by this logic, they conclude what they were told concerning church attendance is true.

While meeting one another frequently is not a bad thing but is in fact encouraged in the Bible (Hebrews 10:25), but knowing what sort of company we are getting ourselves into is pivotal to our own beneficial outcome. Choose the wrong party, and you’ll get everything wrong in life. Choose liars, and you’ll be deceived for a very long time until you set things straight.

Having said this, it must also be emphasized that not all man-made churches are bad altogether. There are a few good apples among many rotten ones, and from Revelation Chapters 2 and 3, the Scripture gave detailed description, that one out of seven types of man-made churches could possibly exist in our times that illustrates the meaning of a honest and truthful church, and how we are to identify them.

The purpose of this article is not to provide encouragement but to highlight the importance to be alert. There are many institutions, churches, houses of prayer, preachers, prophets etc. that you can find in almost every corner of the world, that are already in the business of encouraging people and you. Go to them, if encouragement is what you sought after.

But you are welcome to stay and read on, if you are interested to find out, how to identify between those who speaks the truth and those who lie, before you go to them for your weekly dose of encouragement. Liars, I know, are already giving me all kinds of ideas to keep writing and to fill up this blog with all sorts of truth. Let this blog be the de-facto reference and source of authentic, searchable information for the public and the church.

Using the Bible as the guide, is the best and the most effective way to weed out unscrupulous liars and to expose the wolves who disguise themselves among the sheep. The Bible contains numerous passages that gave vivid depictions of liars, their behavior and their characteristics. The Bible has never been short of wisdom in this sense, in its ability to uncover the truth of what is standing at the other end of God’s spectrum of righteousness. And by understanding what the Bible cautions us in regard to liars and their lies, it would therefore become easier to figure what is God’s truth and find answers to simple questions such as “why bad things are happening to good people today”.

Liars Are Loveless

but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head —Christ— …

Ephesians 4:15

According to the Bible, people who cannot speak the truth are by nature loveless people. Even when they speak or preach about love, they are lying. The love taught by lying preachers are but abstracts borrowed from human affection, glorifying themselves and the people around them rather than glorifying God, and their version of love is mere feelings passed on to man as the Bible truth. When liars talk about love, they can speak loudly in Bible thumping sessions to emphasize, but they are incapable of defining or clarifying what exactly love is. They tell others to love, but they could never demonstrate how to love. Because lies oppresses the truth, liars are therefore loveless people, for the Bible taught us in the exact contrary, that love ALWAYS rejoices in the truth and not lies (1 Corinthians 13:6).

Liars Are Afraid Of Shame & Disgrace

A righteous man hates lying, but a wicked man is loathsome and comes to shame.

Proverbs 13:5

The most obvious characteristic of liars is that they are people who inhibits shame and disgrace but are afraid of being seen with it. By their words and their deeds, liars will usually leave their sentences as vague as possible, to prevent any possible attempt by anyone to investigate what they say. Their words and deeds cannot be examined or inspected because lies are like darkness, and it has no ability to withstand exposure to the Light or truth. Because of this, liars knew if what they say or do becomes exposed, it will then lead to shame and disgrace. Disgrace, or loathsomeness, is also the opposite of grace, the sister component of God’s loving kindness, which is void among liars.

Liars Are Bitter, Jealous & Selfish

But if you have bitter envy and self-seeking in your hearts, do not boast and lie against the truth.

James 3:14

The Bible taught us that out of bitterness, envy and selfish ambitions from the hearts of liars, they boast and speak lies against the truth. Anyone who is capable of lying and especially if they do so from the pulpit; bitterness, jealousy and self-centered attitude are the characters you can look out for in them. They are self-serving, they only prioritize themselves – what they eat, what they drink and what they wear, and they usually have no sense of responsibility as shepherds to care and to feed the sheep. They are jealous when they see others more successful than them, and they become bitter very easily, especially if you stand in opposition to what they do. Like shame and disgrace, liars can often be seen to conceal their bitterness, jealousy and their selfish nature.

Liars Are False Witnesses

You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

Exodus 20:16

Liars themselves speak falsely against others all the time. When confronted with an issue, they quickly maneuver themselves to avoid being questioned, and in doing so, they typically raise or set up false events or statements to divert attention away from them. When they are angrily, they will claim that others are angry at them. If they create tensions, they will say it is not them but others who created the tensions against them. When their church is being questioned for dishonesty, they’ll claim their accusers are angry with all churches in the entire world, in order to drag everyone into their fold to strengthen their defiance against the truth.

In a recent example, by implication, I was blamed by a preacher for not heeding to their wisdom and advice to amicable settlement. But the truth is I was never consulted, I was never given space to explain myself, and I was never even contacted by anyone to come forward to the negotiation table. In fact, I don’t even have any idea what he meant by saying of me refusing their advice, because whatever opinion he claims I rejected, was never even conveyed to me at all.

A liar is only interested to secretly paint others into a corner, without giving others the right to be heard. And they do this by injecting false statements against their target in the presence of other people, to portray that they are not in the wrong, and therefore they are not responsible. They seek to cast the blame on others, and they use the pulpit to repeatedly speak the same lies over and over again, until the people who listen to them believe it is the truth.

Liars Stay In Good Company With Other Liars

An evildoer gives heed to false lips; a liar listens eagerly to a spiteful tongue.

Proverbs 17:4

Do not expect liars to pay attention to words of truth. By their nature, liars are only capable of listening to other mischievous minds, or they only pay heed to what is false or those who lie like them. The minute they sense that you are about to speak the truth, they will do everything in their power to shut you out. Among liars, you will only find the company of other liars in their midst. And when liars shut you off, they can do the extreme, to the extent of even calling you a devil, demon or Satan himself. I’ve also seen from experience, how liars organize group prayer sessions to demonstrate false pleas to God, asking for divine intervention to turn others who oppose their lies and asking God to make others behave in their favor and not against them.

Liars Are Also Thieves

You shall not steal, nor deal falsely, nor lie to one another.

Leviticus 19:11

Because of their corrupt nature, liars are also thieves. Just as they speak no truth from their mouths, neither do their hands bring forth any honest harvest. And in order to compensate for what they lack in life, they resort to stealing from others to feed themselves and their family members. A lying preacher is also one who is usually dishonest with church money entrusted to them to manage.

Liars Openly Rejects God’s Commandments

He who says, “I know Him,” and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.

1 John 2:4

In man’s church, they are the ones teaching the false doctrine of salvation by professing with the lips and mouth. They go against the words of Jesus (Matthew 5:17) by claiming that man is no longer required to obey God’s commandments or even fulfill it. While they lie to people and deceive them with false doctrines, liars also lie and claim that they know who God is and who Jesus is. Thus, claiming they know Christ but not following what Christ expressly told us to do, the lying preacher will also cook up more and more lies to justify their falsehood.

Because of liars, their lies and the corruption of God’s truth they map out for others follow, many shall become deceived and not knowing that by the seeds sown by liars, many believers were never actually born-again or they even know how to.