In recent days we've been told that in order to love others well, we have to be willing to lie. We must, as the new social mores dictate, be willing to affirm whatever truth someone feels is their truth even if it is untrue.
Way back in the early 1990's my husband and I chaperoned a large group of teenagers on a youth trip to Jekyll Island, Georgia, for a TRUTH CONFERENCE. The speaker was concerned that signs were pointing to a disturbing trend-- truth was becoming relative, not absolute.
He explained the peril associated with such a scenario and warned us all to resist the assault against the existence of absolutes, explaining that we must confront this agenda in a world seemingly bent on "having it our way," even if "our way," was categorically dishonest and intellectually false.
It occurred to me this morning as I read passages from John where Jesus was being accused and tried, that attacks against truth are nothing new. In John 18: 37-38 we read the following:
Pilate said, “So you are a king?”
Jesus responded, “You say I am a king. Actually, I was born and came into the world to testify to the truth. All who love the truth recognize that what I say is true.”
“What is truth?” Pilate asked.
So what IS truth? Is it subjective? Is it ethereal? Intangible? Irrelevant?
Jesus said in John 14:6 "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."
His words communicate a clear and unmistakable message. There is no other way. There aren't many paths, many options, many opinions, or many truths. There is one truth about eternity and HE is that truth. HE is that way. HE is LIFE...eternal and precious.
At the end of this week we will observe a day called Good Friday. The only "good" about this day is what it accomplished-- at least if we believe the truth of scripture. Otherwise, it's just a historical day when a man who was found to "have no fault" by Pilate endured suffering of the cruelest and most unthinkable degree.
On Sunday, those of us who believe the truth of John 14:6 will gather in humble awe that He found us worthy of saving. And this "saving" was done because the truth of The Word says that every person's sin has the penalty (wages) of death in a place prepared for those who reject God's truth.
But Jesus Christ came into our world to become the final payment for sin and he died in the place of those who would surrender the pride of our flesh, forsake the way of our own truth, and submit to Him as Lord of our lives.
One of the true things about human nature is that we do not like authority, we want to be our own "gods." We love our own truth and we hate God's truth when it intersects and interferes with our preferences, our priorities, and our privileges. But we can't have it both ways. We either accept His truth or we follow our own way that scripture clearly says will end in death. (Proverbs 14:12)
Maybe by God's providential grace what I've written will convince someone that it's time to acknowledge that there is absolute truth and this truth is personified in Jesus the Christ who came as a ransom for sinners like us.
If you've sown to the winds of moral relativism and rejected the existence of absolute truth, understand this, you are refusing to allow the person who loves you most to rescue and save you from lies that are damning.
Today, He invites you to believe.
Will you?
For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, that WHOEVER believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. John 3: 16
No comments:
Post a Comment