Four Lies That Ruined the World

Love Worth Finding was pleased to be a sponsor of the “Truth Matters” Apologetics Conference, April 21-24th, 2023. For the Friday Night keynote address, LWF was able to present one of Adrian Rogers’ signature messages “4 Lies That Ruined The World” via video.

God’s Messages

Dear Lord,
Today…….I am asking all my prayer warriors to say a prayer that may help others. So many people are hurting right now. Many are struggling with finances and need jobs. Some are facing foreclosure and don’t even know how they are going to make it from week to week..

Many are lonely. . Many are heartbroken. . Many are facing sickness and health is fading. . Some are dealing with difficult family members. Many have lost HOPE.. Tonight, let us put our prayers and faith together decree and declare breakthrough over our families. Financial miracles WILL take place. Jobs WILL be found. Our Bodies WILL be made whole & sickness WILL flee. Marriages and relationships WILL be restored. Family members WILL find Jesus. Heartbreaks WILL be healed. JOY WILL be restored and HOPE WILL be found. In Jesus Name. Amen!!!!!! Keep God First…….

The title of the message today.
Four lies that ruined the world. These are Satan’s four biggest lies. Satan’s whole system is built on a lie.
Jesus said in John chapter eight and verse 44 to the unsafe Pharisees.
You are of your father, the devil and the lust of your father. You will do.
He is a murderer from the beginning and a boat not in the truth.
And when he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own for he is a liar and the father of it, that is every lie that’s ever been told has been spawned by the daddy, liar, the liar of all liars.
The father of all lies. Who is the devil himself. Satan is a liar.
Jesus said he is a murderer from the beginning and a bono in the truth.
Now listen, his motive is murder. His method is the lie. Never forget that his motive and his method.
There in John chapter eight and verse 44 Satan wants to bring, bring death to life, to joy, to peace, to happiness, to fruitfulness.
He wants to bring physical death. He wants to bring spiritual death.
He wants to bring eternal and he does it through deception.
He is a dirty liar and we’re going to find four of Satan’s biggest lies.
These are foundational lies and they are lies out of which all other lies come.
Now, remember that Satan is the uh he is the master liar and because he’s the master liar, his lies are very good.
Uh Satan knows how to tell lies. His lies are very clever.
Let’s look here in Genesis chapter three verse one.
Now, the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field just underscore that word subtle.
Now, Satan’s lies are not lies that are obvious lies on the surface.
Uh You have to look beneath the surface to see his lies because he’s very clever.
Now, let me tell you something, the best lies sound the most like the truth.
And so there is some truth in most lies.
A clock that doesn’t even run is right twice a day. Isn’t that right?
But now wait a minute, if a clock is only right, twice a day, you look at it and you say that’s wrong, it may be right twice a day but it’s still wrong.
What is more dangerous? A clock? Five hours wrong.
Our clock, five minutes wrong o’clock, five minutes wrong is far more dangerous than o clock.
Five hours wrong. When you look at a clock that’s five hours wrong, you say that’s wrong.
Somebody tell me what time it is a clock five minutes wrong, you miss your airplane.
Now there’s a difference and Satan’s lies are very close to the truth and yet so very far from the truth.
Now again, Satan had rather you think a wrong thing, believe a lie than to do a wrong thing. Why?
Because the thought is the father of the knee, it is more dangerous to believe a wrong thing than to do a wrong thing.
You can do a wrong thing by mistake and the next time do the right thing.
But if you believe a wrong thing, you keep doing the wrong thing over and over again for the Bible says as a man thinketh in his heart.
So is he and so the devil is the he is the original liar. The devil is the master liar.
And the best lies sound the most like the truth and those that are nearest to the truth and still alike are the most dangerous.
Now, Satan being a very clever liar, Satan being the master liar.
Satan wanting to do his work through a lie which is murder will tell a lie about the biggest subject and he’s in, he’s not interested in telling lies about little things.
He wants you to believe lies about the biggest subject. What is the biggest subject? God.
God is the biggest subject. Now, if Satan can get your mind twisted about who God is and what God does and what God is like, then he’s got you because the thought is the father of the deed aws a great leader in the Christian and missionary alliance church said, and I want you to listen to this quote.
No religion can rise higher than its concept of God. That is so true.
No religion can rise higher than its concept of God.
Now, Satan in the very first year of book in the Bible, the very first pages of history is going to tell four big lies and all of them are going to deal with the character of God because Satan does not want you to understand who God is that may surprise you to learn that Satan is an evangelist.
What Satan wants is not casualties. He wants converts over to his own ideas.
And so Satan comes as an evangelist to Eve to evangelize her for the devil’s religion.
Eve was his first convert and rather than four spiritual laws, they are four spiritual flaws, four lives that He wants Eve to believe and Eve takes the bait and these lies are not just what God, what Satan has done years ago.
These are the four lines that you meet today and tomorrow, they are very fresh.
They’re very up to date. Now, Satan really uh he may be double faced, but he’s not double minded.
He wants to do the same thing today that he has done all ways.
So are you ready for these four big lies? Alright, lie. Number one, God is not good.
That’s the first lie. Now, notice again in chapter three and verse one.
Now the serpent, that’s the devil was more subtle than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made.
And he said unto the woman hath God said, ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden.
Now, what’s he trying to do?
He’s trying to get Eve to think negatively about God, get the idea that God is withholding goodness from her.
Therefore, God himself is not good that God is severe. God is cruel.
Here’s the beautiful garden of Eden and God made it.
And then God said, you can’t touch it, you can’t eat of it.
Of course, God had not said uh that uh they could not eat of the fruit of every tree of the garden.
That was a lie. What had God said? Look in Genesis two verse 16.
You in the Bible just turn backward one chapter.
And the Lord God commanded the man saying of every tree of the garden, thou may freely eat.
Do you see it of every tree thou may free me eat?
Now, what did Satan say? Now, the serpent was more subtle than the beast of the field.
And he said unto the woman hath God said, you shall not eat of every tree of the garden.
God said, help yourself. Satan said, God says, you can’t have it.
Now, what, what, what is uh what is Satan trying to do.
He’s trying to get Eve to think negatively about God that God is cruel. God is harsh.
God is unloving. He wants to deny you Eve of any ultimate joy.
Anything that brings pleasure is a no, no, any time God sees anybody having a good time that uh God moves in to break up the game.
The truth of the matter is that God had said a resounding. Yes. Yes.
To their joy and to their pleasure.
When God created Eden in all of his luxury, all of his beauty, all of his bounty.
God said to Adam and Eve their Children that is for you, help yourself.
Now, there are a lot of people today who have the idea that God is some sort of a uh a, a cruel God, a vengeful deity sitting up there on his big throne, curling down laws to make a squirm like a worm in hot ashes trying to keep them.
That God is a cosmic kill joy that God is trying to keep things from us.
That is not true. God loves us.
Let me give you some verses I’ve given you these before, but jot them down.
Psalm 37 verse four, delight thyself in the Lord and He shall give the the desires of thine heart in that great.
What your heart yearns for you’ll find in Him. Psalm 84 verse 11.
The Lord, thy God is a son and a shield. The Lord will give grace and glory.
Now, listen to this. No good thing. Will he withhold from them that walk uprightly? No good thing.
If it’ll make you healthy happy, holy wholesome God says, help yourself every time.
He says, thou shalt not. He say, don’t hurt yourself every time.
He says, thou shalt He’s saying, help yourself to happiness. God loves you.
Listen to this one first Timothy chapter six verse 17, charge them that are rich in this world, that they be not high minded.
No trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God who giveth us.
Now listen to this phrase, who giveth us richly, all things to enjoy isn’t that great?
Now, if the devil can get you thinking negatively about God, he’s already got you.
That’s the very first thing he did when he crawled his slimy corroding, pass it into history to get Eve to think negatively about God.
Lie. Number one, God is not good. All right, I want you to say it out loud. God is good.
Don’t you ever let the devil tell you anything else? God is good all the time.
All right. Line. Number two, lie. Number two, first lie. God is not good. Lie.
Number two, God is not truthful. God is not truthful.
Now, notice he said in verse one half, God said, now that’s a doubt.
The doubt leads to a denial.
Now notice in verses uh two through four and the woman said unto the serpent, we may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden.
She knew better but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden.
God has said, ye shall not eat of it. Neither shall you touch it lest you die.
And the serpent said unto the woman, ye shall not surely die. Verse one doubt.
Now, in verse four, denial, you’ll not die. You don’t have to worry about God. Now see what she’s trying.
What Satan did. First of all was to get Eve to think negatively about God.
Then the next step is easy to think to get Eve to think skeptically about God.
Line number one, God is not good. Line number two, God is not truthful.
Now, what Satan had done in verse one is to put a question mark after the word of God.
I want to say clearly and plainly that anyone who causes skepticism concerning the authority, the accuracy and the acceptability, the impeccability, the infallibility, the authenticity of the word of God is doing the work of the devil.
That’s the work of the devil. I don’t care what seminar he’s in.
I don’t care what degrees he has.
If he puts, he puts a doubt, a question mark or a denial after the word of God.
He is of the devil, the devil, the devil is out to destroy the truthfulness of God.
Now, we today in today’s society, uh we have substituted many things for God’s word and all of them are based on the devil’s lines.
Let me mention some of these, uh first of all, relativism, what is relativism?
Relativism is the idea that there’s no fixed truth.
A professor in the university stood up and said, students, I want to tell you, there is nothing that you can say is absolutely true.
There’s nothing that you can be absolutely sure of a student, lift his hand and said, Professor, are you sure of that?
He said absolutely relativism. Everything is relative.
That was that, that roots back to a philosopher whose name was Hegel H E G E L.
And he, he is, he, he had sort of a, a dialectic.
Uh what Hagel said was over here is a thesis, a belief.
And over here is an antithesis or an anti thesis that says, I argue with that.
And these two get in a big argument and then they come together to a synthesis thesis, antithesis synthesis.
And so maybe the thesis over here is capitalism, the antithesis is communism and then the synthesis is socialism.
And then that synthesis in minds of many becomes the new uh thesis. Now this is true.
And then over here you get another antithesis and then after a while you get another synthesis, you see what is happening.
Everything is relative, there’s nothing fixed, there’s no anchor, there’s no standard Plato and his Republic talked about some sailors who having lost a chart and encompass, put a light on the bow of the ship and steered by that.
That’s what we’re doing in today’s society. Number one relativism. Number two, subjectivism. What is subjectivism?
Well, I feel this or I feel that let me tell you about my experience.
There used to be a time when preachers would stand in the pulpit and say, the Bible says, then they start saying the church says, and now they just say, well, it seems to me or I feel as they kind of scratch the head subjectivism.
Another substitute for the word of God is rationalism. Rationalism.
That is we bring logic, we bring our computers.
Uh we worship at the shrine of our intellect and rather than saying, thus, say the word of God, we say, thus, say the mind of man, we try to put God on our scales, put God in our test tube, put God in our cyclotrons, put God in our computers, but God will not fit there.
What you say, pastor, I think we ought to be reasonable. Sure you ought to be.
But friend where reason cannot wade faith must swim.
What we believe is not contrary to reason. Listen, it is not contrary to reason.
It is beyond a reason, beyond reason.
God is not an unreasonable God but can a man by reason find out God absolutely not.
And so we try relativism and subjectivism and rationalism.
And if that doesn’t work, what most Americans like is pragmatism. What is pragmatism?
Pragmatism doesn’t even bother to ask. Is it, is it true? We just ask, does it work?
We’re very pragmatic about it? But the most dangerous of all?
And this is the, is the thing that’s happening in the society we live in is something called post modernism, post modernism.
Now, modernism, what would, would argue with conservativism about what is right or what is wrong?
The postmodernist doesn’t even bother to, to argue the postmodernist doesn’t even believe there is anything called truth.
And so the postmodernist or he might believe that truth is everywhere but no one truth is over against another truth.
So somebody might say, look, you’re into Buddha, I’m into Jesus. What is true for you is fine.
That’s your truth. What is true for me is fine. That’s my truth.
And this is called post modernism. And it’s a big word for a lot of silliness and foolishness.
The devil doesn’t want you to believe that God is the God of truth.
Now, if you have Children and you’re raising those Children, your Children have been infected by these other forms substitutes for the truth of God and the big daddy liar is behind it all.
And you’re gonna have difficulty raising your Children unless you get them to believe that the Bible is the inherent inspired and fallible word of God.
And when you talk to them and say you should not commit fornication, you should not commit adultery.
You don’t say it because it’s bad for you or because you say because God says so you don’t tell a lie.
Why? Because God says so it’s wrong to steal because God says so you worship only one God because the Bible teaches that the devil does not want a society to have a fixed standard of truth.
God is good. Say amen. God is truth. Say amen.
Now, if you don’t believe that the devil’s got you going his way.
He wants you to think negatively about God, then he wants you to think skeptically about God lie.
Number three, lie. Number three, God is not righteous. God is not righteous. Look, if you will.
Now in Genesis three verse four, and the serpent said unto the woman, ye shall not surely die.
That is God is not really going to punish sin. There is no God of judgment.
You don’t have to worry about facing a judgment.
Now, I won’t tell you friend, God is good, but God is also righteous.
God is loving. Yes, God is loving, but God is righteous.
And if you preach the love of God to the exclusion of the holiness and the righteousness of God, you only preach half of the truth.
And when you take half of the truth and try to make half of the truth, all of the truth that half of the truth becomes an untruth.
Now, Satan is moving them along now since you don’t believe that, that there is the God of the Bible who’s good and loving.
And since you don’t believe that the God of the Bible is uh is, is truthful.
Uh or the Bible, the word is true. Uh And then you don’t have to worry anymore about judgment.
Now, when God gave the 10 commandments, God was not giving advice, he was giving law and law without penalty is only advice.
Now, there are a lot of people today who take these things of pragmatism, rationalism, subjectivism, and they do away with the idea of, of eternal punishment.
I would be unfair to you as a preacher.
If I did not tell you, there is an eternal hell.
If you die without Jesus Christ, you’re going to die and go to hell.
You said, oh, Pastor, not on Sunday morning. You wouldn’t say yes, yes.
There is a fiery burning hell H E L L for those who reject Jesus Christ as their personal savior.
Lord, you say, well, that’s un-american.
It may be, I have an idea that if the Supreme Court of the United States of America could vote on it.
They would outlaw hell as cruel and unusual punishment that God has no right.
God has no authority to do that, but God is a righteous God and God will not let one half of one sin go unpunished.
New Ageism comes out of the idea that you will not surely die.
You know what the new age is.
It’s just a blend of Eastern religions that’s come into America today. Satan knows that man fears death.
That’s the reason we have the some believe in reincarnation.
You’d be surprised how many people in evangelical churches say they believe in reincarnation as you just keep going around and around and you get as many chances as you need and the new age has no personal God who is going to judge you.
See these people believe that that men and animals, we’re all interrelated and, and we’re all transmigrating.
And if your car is good, you keep moving up high and if your car is bad, you move down.
And finally, one day, if your car is good enough, you reach nirvana, but they reject the idea of a righteous God, a God of judgment.
Their little, their little imaginary God says that God is too good to punish sin, friend, God is too good not to punish sin.
God is righteous, say righteous God is righteous.
The devil would have you to have the idea that you can sin with impunity. Praying God is good.
God is truthful. God is righteous, but these truths are being taken away from our society.
These are big lies on which the other lies are built lie number four. God is not gracious.
God is not gracious. Look if you will now in verses four and five and the serpent said in the woman, ye shall not surely die for God does know that in the day that you eat thereof, then your eyes will be open and ye shall be as Gods knowing good and evil.
Now, what he was saying in effect is since God is not good, since God is not truthful and since God is not righteous, you know, you need not to fear Him, you need to be your own God.
Uh You need to experiment a little bit.
You need to work your way up until you are like God.
Now eve, you can never be capable of being all that you ought to be until you become autonomous.
You don’t need to depend upon God. This idea of God is cramping your style Eve.
You need to be liberated. God came to set every woman free and every man free, every boy and girl free because He is a God of grace.
But notice I said the best lie sounds so much like the truth. Thank Him.
He said, God does know that in the day that you eat, then your eyes will be open and you will be as God.
That’s what Satan wanted to do to begin with. He wanted to be as God.
But you see the Bible teaches we’d be like God, not as God small in different uh Satan says you be your own God, your own little autonomous God, you have your own way.
Well, what does God’s grace want us to be? God’s grace wants us to be like Him.
God created us in his image so he could have fellowship with us as talked about in revelation chapter 22 verse four, and they shall see His face and his name shall be in their foreheads.
What does that mean? His name in our foreheads? That means God likeness. What is God prepared for us?
First Corinthians chapter two verse nine, as it is written, I have not seen nor you heard nor has it entered into the heart of man, the things which God has prepared for them that love him.
But what Satan was saying, oh, you don’t have to believe in God is a God of graciousness and God has a great eternal destiny for you.
What God has a monopoly on this thing of being God?
And God doesn’t want you to get in on it. God is hitting you off at the pass.
You can never ever be fulfilled until you do your own thing eve.
What you need to do is experiment, try it. You might like it. How do you know it’s wrong?
Because he said so because he said so how do you know after all experience is the best teacher friend when it comes to sin, experience is not the best teacher is the worst, worst teacher.
Uh sin, deceives those who know the least about sin or those who are the deepest into it.
The Bible speaks of the deceitfulness. Of sin. But what Satan is saying to Eve is Eve.
Uh you create your own little God, you will be like God. And again, that’s new ageism.
All the new ages believe that they are God. They, they believe it however, that everything is God.
They would say love is God. Now God is love but love is not God listen very carefully.
God is over all things and God is in all things, but God is not all things and all things are not God.
People today have the idea that they are all a part of, of God in some way.
And that this, this, this new ageism has pervaded and perverted our ways.
Let me, let me illustrate how it goes.
Uh today in our schools in the springtime, we dare not mention Easter in the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
But I tell you what we can mention is Earth day.
We can’t mention Father God, but we can mention mother earth. Why?
Because they believe everything is God.
The birds are God, the trees are God, the sky is God, the air is God.
I’m God, you’re God there, God, we are God. Dirt is God, we are dirt.
Wait a minute if God is dirt and I’m God and God is dirt, it makes me dirt and the animals are gone.
This, this, this new ageism, it doesn’t elevate men.
It, it, it humanism really animals, man. But you see Satan is behind all of this.
Now you say pastor, why, why are you saying all this friend? It’s in the air like a fungus.
Every ism as Dr Lee used to say, ought to be a, they all go back to these four big lies.
They deny a, the goodness of God b the truthfulness of God.
See the righteousness of God and d the graciousness of God. God is gracious, say gracious.
God loves you. God wants you to be like Him.
God wants you to enjoy eternal fellowship with him. Now, let’s come to a conclusion.
How are we going to uh deal with these lies? How are we going to overcome them?
I said, pastor, I’m glad to see you take off your watch and lay it out there, man, went to Baptist church the first time and the choir director stood up and said, what does that mean?
He said the choir is gonna sing. So the ushers came forward and said, what does that mean?
They’re gonna take an offering? Pastor took off his watch. And so what does that mean?
So it doesn’t mean a thing in the world?
How are we gonna come to the conclusion of this thing?
Just leave Genesis? Go to revelation.
May I tell you the two books, the devil hates one is Genesis and the other is Revelation because in Genesis, the devil doom is pronounced in revelation.
It’s carried out. Look, if you will in revelation 12 verses 9-11 and that great dragon was cast out that old serpent.
Now, we’ve already seen him, that old serpent called the devil and Satan, which deceive the whole world.
Those are his four big lies.
He was cast out into the earth and his angels were cast out with him.
And that’s the reason we have such mayhem here on earth.
And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven now has come the salvation and strength and kingdom of our God and the power of his Christ.
Listen to me, friend. Here’s how we’re going to overcome these lies.
For the accuser of our brethren is cast down which accused them before our God day and night and they overcame him.
Here’s verse 11 by the blood of the lamb and by the word of their testimony and they love not their lives unto the death.
Now, how are you going to overcome these lies?
How first of all by Calvary’s conquest by Calvary’s conquest by the blood of the lamb on the cross?
Satan’s back was broken. His lies are exposed.
He’s shown to be what he is, a fake, a fraud and impostor.
And you’re never going to overcome Satan and his lies until you come to Jesus.
Have you been to Calvi? Has the blood of the land?
The shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ become a covering for your sin.
I know again, it’s politically incorrect to talk about the blood. Today. We’re supposed to talk about.
Feel good religion. Bible says without shedding of blood is no remission of sin.
Billy Graham when he first started preaching, had a professor from Cornell University come to him and say, young man, you’re gifted, you’re a great speaker.
You’re very persuasive. But if you want to go places, you’re gonna have to leave out that blood stuff.
Billy said I determined to preach on the blood of Jesus more than ever.
They overcame him by the blood of the lamb. Have you been saved?
Number two, by the word of their testimony? What is the word of our testimony?
Not just standing up saying, I won’t tell you what Jesus has done for me.
This is the word of our testimony. The word of God, bring the word of God against these lies.
Make certain that you say know the Bible, the word of God that pulls the veil of darkness away and exposes Satan’s lies like we’re doing this morning and they love not their lives until the death.
What does that mean? Not only Calvary’s conquest, not only courageous confession, but complete commitment.
They love not their lives until the death.
They said I’m going for God every ounce, every inch, every nerve, every fiber.
Even if I die serving Jesus, I love not my life until the day until a man is no longer afraid to die.
He’s not yet ready to live.