11/05/23 DECEPTION IS DESTRUCTIVE

11/05/23 DECEPTION IS DESTRUCTIVE

God hates lying, false witnessing, gossip, slander, libel, false accusations, blasphemy (speaking against people). God requires accusations against a person to be based on two witnesses, and those accusations must be verifiable. DO NOT ALLOW A DISGRUNTLED PERSON TO PREJUDICE YOU AGAINST ANOTHER PERSON. Make your judgments based on facts, personal knowledge and get both sides of a story before you judge someone. Do not become a participant in another person's personal attacks or vendettas. 

The accuser may be deceived, or he may be angry, or he may be jealous, or he may be hiding something in his own life. Injurious accusations (defamation) can be written or spoken. (One of the names of the devil is, "the accuser.") The devil is not only the accuser, he is "a liar and is the father of lies."

Keep in mind, it is easier to believe a lie than to believe the truth. It is easier to propagate a lie than to correct a lie. Even when a lie has been unmasked, the damage is done and cannot be undone. Don't be part of Satan's work, plan, corruption, destruction.

Sometimes telling the truth about someone is intended to unjustly defame them. Though something is true or has been true about a person, it is not always justifiable to repeat that truth. Some people tell the "truth" about another person as a weapon to harm or destroy the other person.

Don't be caught-up in someone's drama, anger, plotting, meanness, sin. Usually the, "truth" that is told is actually a partial truth, designed to harm or destroy another person.
Life is fragile and transient. Sadly there are beautiful relationships that suffer shipwreck because of someone else's false accusations, misrepresentations, personal attacks.

False accusations and gossip are such old and prevalent sins that God addressed it many times in the Bible, including one of the Ten Commandments is, "Do not bear false witness." Defaming and false accusing others can be an act of deliberate evil or an act of gullibility and ignorance. In either case, lives are ruined and God is disobeyed and dishonored.

False accusations have saddled Christian people with bad reputations for a life-time, and have caused family break-ups, and have undermined and ruined wonderful ministries and have also resulted in legal attacks and imprisonment, as well as eternal suffering for many innocent people.
Don't be part of the gossip crowd. Don't destroy decent people. Don't aid blasphemers. Defaming someone can result in eternal damage for a number of innocent people.

The "innocent people" I refer to are the unsaved people who might have been reached by a believer, but Satan used the false accusations against that believer to harden the heart, blind the eyes and deafen the ears of the unsaved to the witness of the believer who was blasphemed. Satan uses one person's blasphemy to harm as many people as he can.