God's Attributes Series: When We Call God a Liar

Who Us?

Such a shocking title. Who would ever call God a liar? Surely that could never be the case. Well, I hate to break it to you but we do. When do we do it? When we doubt, when we disobey, when we worry, when we forget the vision and promise of provision, we are calling God a liar. We can go on and on. What is a lie?  The definition of a lie, according to dictionary.com is, "a false statement made with deliberate intent to deceive; an intentional untruth; a falsehood." Sounds pretty bad doesn't it? Yet, people do it all the time, even categorizing them into colors and sizes. Some people claim to only tell "little white lies." Yet, you would not expect God to be One Who would lie, but we do, at times, "call" Him a liar.  But not to worry, you are not the first and you certainly will not be the last to experience this. Thankfully, God is kind, gracious, and faithful even when we are not. The purpose of this blog post is to explain how we tend to call God a liar along with encouragement to stop.


When did all of this start?

So when did this all start? This started In the beginning of the beginning, in the Garden of Eden. Do you remember how God made the man and woman and placed them in the most beautiful Garden where they had no needs or wants that He had not provided for? The only stipulation was they could not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Everything else was for their use and all they were asked to do in return was to tend the garden and have dominion over everything on earth. In other words, they were charged with ruling over the earthly dominion. That was not a bad deal at all.

Of course, you know the story of what happened. That honor turned out not to be enough for Adam and Eve, our fore parents. The first instance of calling God a liar was when they believed the devil above what God had already told them. They varied from the Truth and in so doing called God a liar. Let's roll the tape, shall we:

Genesis 2:15-17: "Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. ¹⁶ And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; ¹⁷ but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”

 Genesis 3:3-9 - The Temptation and Fall of Man

3 Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Has God indeed said, ‘You shall not eat of every tree of the garden’?”

² And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat the fruit of the trees of the garden; ³ but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.’”
⁴ Then the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. ⁵ For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
⁶ So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate. ⁷ Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings.
⁸ And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.
⁹ Then the Lord God called to Adam and said to him, “Where are you?”

Satan's Beguiling Started With a Cunningly Asked Question

So this is pretty big. It's where it all began to go south. Let's take this in slow motion. First, look at how Satan phrased the question. He asked it negatively as if to say, God did not give you as much as you think He did. Satan was essentially saying to them about God: "He said you cannot eat of every tree. He is holding something back from you." Yet, the truth of the matter is, there was only one tree He told them not to even touch, much less eat from it. And of course, Eve made it worse by proving she had not forgotten God's warning but chose to disbelieve it. She even stated the command positively. "Yes, we may eat of the tress but there is only the one tree in the middle of the garden that we are not even supposed to touch, or we'd die that very day." She was clear on what God had said, but chose to rebel against it anyway.

After Eve's Answer, Devil Shot Back Accusing God

First of all, the minute the serpent spoke in this questioning manner of God, proving by the way that He knew fully well what God had spoken to them, she should have ended the conversation right there. Instead, she kept listening and engaging in conversation. Yet, even if she continued to speak past that point, once the devil's response to her explanation was "You will not surely die...," accusing God of lying to them, she should have ended it.That would have been the prefect time to excuse herself after making the mistake of entering into conversation with the deceiver. But no, not only did she continue this deadly discourse, she noticed the fruit looked quite appetizing, took a bite and offered some to her husband. Notice the "progression," going to the forbidden tree, speaking to an accuser, doubting God, the fruit begins to look good, they acted on their desire. And it all began so well, too.

That Day We Began to Die

Isn't it interesting that the day we sinned was the day we began to die? It went exactly the way God said. Before sin, God's plan was for man to live together with Him in perfect harmony. Otherwise, there would be no need of a warning of death from sin, if death was not a reality before. No, before sin, death was not a reality. Not only did man become corrupted by sin, God then cursed the serpent, the woman, and that ground.  And since through the woman everyone else was birthed, all of mankind was cursed because of that one sinful act. Did you notice how simple and easy it was to sin? It was as casual as eating fruit, yet that fruit had been forbidden. And to think, these people hung out with God on a daily basis. It makes you wonder, which one of us is unable to sin? The answer is one, if we continue to follow the first Adam, the natural man -- our flesh. Everything was cursed after that. And we know the first slaughter happened as a result of man's sin when God had to shed the blood of an animal to obtain the covering for the man and the woman. After that point, sin would always need to require a blood covering for its atonement. But I am getting ahead of myself.

Precautionary Measures

After the man and woman sinned in the Garden, the earth fell under a curse. However, God had already put certain measures in place so that mankind would not be lost for eternity and would have a chance at redemption. He already knew Eve and Adam would sin. So what did He do? He evicted Adam and Eve from the Garden and placed security at the gate and, furthermore, He placed security at the Tree of Life.

Genesis 3:22-24

²² Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us, to know good and evil. And now, lest he put out his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever”— ²³ therefore the Lord God sent him out of the garden of Eden to till the ground from which he was taken. ²⁴ So He drove out the man; and He placed cherubim at the east of the garden of Eden, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life. 

A Foreshadowing of Hope Restored

Isn't God amazingly good? He gave man free will with which he sinned. Then God secured the entrance to the Garden and the Tree of Life to prevent them from eating and living in a sinful state for eternity. Man would have been hopeless forever. But God keep them away from the Tree of Life until He sent Jesus as our new tree of life so that all who chose to could eat of His body and drink of His blood, spiritually and symbolically, and thereby live a sin-free life forever.

Our Part in Accusing God

But Adam and Eve were not the only ones accusing God of lying. We do, too. I mentioned this in my opening sentences. We accuse God of being a liar when we doubt that He will do as He promised, when we disregard, when we disobey, and anything that is inconsistent with trusting that He will do as He has said. Yet, God cannot tell a lie. If He speaks it, it must come to life.

Numbers 23:19

“God is not a man, that He should lie, Nor a son of man, that He should repent. Has He said, and will He not do? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?

Then in Isaiah we learn that God cannot lie because anything He speaks cannot go undone:

Isaiah 55:11-12

¹⁰ “For as the rain comes down, and the snow from heaven,
And do not return there,
But water the earth,
And make it bring forth and bud,
That it may give seed to the sower
And bread to the eater,
¹¹ So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth;
It shall not return to Me void,
But it shall accomplish what I please,
And it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it. 

God simply cannot lie. So let's remain consistent with His Word and His promises to us. Let's do this no matter what life looks like. Let's stay in faith and though it may not have come, wait for it, it will surely come. (Habakkuk 2:2-4).

IMPORTANT NOTE: Please watch for a future post on how God's consistency throughout the Bible, from Genesis to Revelation. Please Keep an eye out for the connection between the Fall in Genesis and eternal life in Revelation. God is a Keeper of His promises, His consistency, love, and faithfulness in keeping His promises never ceases to amaze me. Praise Him!