One of my absolute favorite reads
in college was Why We Buy by Paco
Underhill (Underhill, 1999). After spending enumerable
hours studying shoppers and their shopping behaviors, he and his team came up
with a collection of reasons customers buy or don’t buy… the psychology behind
it. Many reasons weren’t necessarily
obvious reasons you would think drives buying behaviors such as price and
product. One of the described no-no’s
for retailers is the “butt brush.” Racks
that are too close, or isles that cause customers to come into close contact,
particularly when their butt gets brushed, while shopping is a sure-fire sale killer.
What if we were to take this kind of look at the lies we buy? What would we find? I found myself unable to fall back asleep
last night as I pondered this very thing… the
lies we buy.
If we’re going to dissect the
nature of lies, we should probably understand the nature of the lie giver- who
he is, what he does, and how he does it:
Who he is: lies are the devil’s native language… he
speaks in lies and will never speak truth to us.
“You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father's desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.”
John 8:44 NIV
What he does: the devil is not a creator like God. Instead the devil counterfeits God’s
creation. And just like designer purses,
you know you’ve bought a knock off when it starts falling apart at the seams,
cracking in weird places, or a zipper gives out on you. The devil is very good at counterfeiting God’s
goodness for us, and though it may look the same, it doesn’t perform the same
when it’s not God’s authentic design.
How he does it: the devil accomplishes it by stealing, killing,
and by causing destruction.
"The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full."
By knowing these things- we know
that the lies we buy are from the devil, that they can imitate what God does want for us, and that it ultimately
will bring loss, death, or destruction.
So what, then, do these lies look
like? So often they are the thoughts we
think and feel that if we think it, it must be true. Why else would we have the thought? Thoughts like: “well, I guess I’ll never be able to get rid
of those thoughts.” The devil wants to
preserve the work he’s started or havoc he wants to wreak in your life, so
often it’ll be thoughts that preserve sin, hide sin, or invite you into sin. Thoughts like
“I’m not any good at this”
“I deserve…”
“I don’t need any help.”
“If I were more ___, then I could
____”
“I’m naturally sarcastic, so I
don’t have to apologize for what I said.”
“He/she’s in the wrong, I don’t
have to be nice.”
“Why should I care?”
I think what’s most deceiving
about lies, is that they don’t sound the way we would expect them to
sound. Just like an open window changes
the temperature of the room, so does a lie change the temperature of our heart. They seem innocent but change how we view and
respond to a situation, others, or ourselves. They change us.
Let’s not grow cold in this
journey: here are some helpful hints for
letting loose of the lies we’ve bought.
1.
File your thoughts. If
you’re like me, filing is not a lot of fun. Mail, legal documents, bills, receipts, and
the like tend to pile up. What actually
happens when I don’t file something right away- I tend to look at it two to three times. Once, when I look at it and determine not to
deal with it, and then again when I’m sorting through the pile, and then a
third time when I finally decide to put it away. Imagine
the damage we cause when we think about a lie that many times! The more we think it, the more we begin to
believe it. Advertisers know that we usually
need to hear a message three times before we actually receive the message… and
so does the father of lies. The more he
can present a lie to us or have us stewing over it, the more likely we are to
buy it. So what do I mean by filing our
thoughts? Determine what the thought
produces and file it accordingly. Does
it produce peace, patience, love, kindness, hope, faithfulness, or
righteousness? Or does it produce division,
jealousy, despair, harm, hopelessness, anger, defiance, hatred, or disrespect? If it falls into any of the latter category,
I give you permission to throw it into file 13:
trash that thought…it’s a lie.
The Bible tells us to take our thoughts captive (2 Corinthians 10:5).
2. Put on the
armor of God.
"10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his
mighty power. 11 Put on the full armor of
God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.
12 For our struggle is
not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities,
against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil
in the heavenly realms. 13 Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that
when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you
have done everything, to stand. 14 Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled
around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place,
15 and with your feet
fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. 16 In addition to all this,
take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming
arrows of the evil one. 17 Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the
Spirit, which is the word of God.
18 And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with
all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep
on praying for all the Lord’s people."
3.
Ask for help. Putting
on the armor of God can feel like an overwhelming task when we feel distant
from God. If this is you: today is a new day! Ask God for help, ask a Christian friend for help. They should be able to help you
find a local church that loves Jesus and preaches from the Bible, and how to get into your Bible. The book of John is a great
place to start if you’re not sure where to start. Have you ever thought about what it would
look like to put your own armor on without help? God loves the church and is His design! They are people that can come alongside us to
encourage us and help us suit up so that we’re able to defend ourselves when
the father of lies comes with his sales pitch.
4.
Speak truth to yourself. It
can be hard to determine where, when, and why a lie sneaks into my thoughts. The best way to target the lie and pitch it is
by combating it with truth. The Bible is
called The Word of Truth for a
reason: it’s filled with truths that
will give those lies a one-way ticket OUT.
If you feel yourself combating a lie over and over again, find a verse
that combats it with truth and post it on your mirror, fridge, and other places
you’ll see it regularly. It may take a little time or a lot of time: give yourself grace if it takes longer than you'd like. It’s time we
start seeking out what God says about us, rather than accepting what the lie says about us.
Father, thank you for your Word
and ALL of the truth you have provided us. I
pray that you would help me identify lies that I’ve bought. Please help me to make right what I’ve made
wrong, and to speak your truth to others and myself. Bring others into my life that I can help
equip and can help equip me with your armor.
Please help me to speak your truth over myself and those around me. I love you.
In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
XO,
Jackie E
What verses of truth are you using to help combat a lie/lies?
What verses of truth are you using to help combat a lie/lies?
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