What is truth?

Abundant Life Episode 36

In this episode Saso and Ben discuss the topic of truth.

Websters 1828

Truth – Conformity to fact or reality; exact accordance with that which is, or has been, or shall be. The truth of history constitutes its whole value. We rely on the truth of the scriptural prophecies.

Key verse

He is the origin of truth

John 1:17

If you follow the news on TV or maybe on Social Media, you are likely constantly wondering whether or not you are consuming truth or lies. In fact it was just a couple years ago that we had a new term coined, fake news which was in effort to call out mainstream news media who are interested in reporting anything but the truth. Then you had so called fact checkers that were checking to see if what people were posting was true or not, but in the end it was admitted that it wasn’t necessarily truth they were seeking but opinion being construed as truth. Needless to say we are in a society where people are extremely confused and starving for truth.

We live in a post modern world where some will say that there is no absolute truth, and ironically they’ve just made an absolute truth statement. Then you have the philosophy of relativism which defines truth as being relative and that everyone can have their own truth. For example you have some that will say that it is all right to believe what you want, as long as you do not try to impose your beliefs on others. But this view itself is a belief about what is right and wrong, and those who hold this view most certainly try to impose it on others.

In a recent study by Barna, they asked different people groups to respond to various statements by whether or not they agree with the statement. Here are 2 different statements that were asked to “practicing christians”.

  1. Whatever is right for your life or works best for you is the only truth you can know. (40% agree)
  2. Every culture must determine what is acceptable morality for its people. (47% agree

There were other people groups that were surveyed like boomers, gen-exers etc, but the fact that practicing Christians would think that truth is relative or that you can get your morality defined by culture is very concerning.

Thankfully we have the truth of the Bible which came from source of truth, God who is truth. God doesn’t just speak truth, His character is the mere definition of truth. Without truth we wouldn’t be able to know God, morality would basically be non-existent and we’d be in a much bigger mess than we are currently. Because we have this truth, we can know God, we can know what sin is, we can know what righteousness is and how to live or lives accordingly.

Redemptive purposes

  • John 14:6
  • John 8:32
  • John 18:37-38
  • 1 John 5:20

The truth about salvation is so critical because it literally determines life or death as your eternal destination.

Sanctification purposes

  • John 17:17
  • 2 Timothy 2:15
  • Ephesians 6:14
  • Psalm 25:5
  • 2 Timothy 3:16-17
  • Psalm 86:11
  • Philippians 4:8 
  • Psalms 43:3
  • John 14:17
  • 1 John 1:6

The Christian walk is not easy by any means, but without truth, we’d be absolutely lost. Interestingly when reading about the armor of God, the belt of truth is the first item of armor applied and it would seem that truth is the foundation for the Christian life. Without the belt of truth the rest of the armor would be irrelevant because we would then be what Paul described in Ephesians.

Ephesians 4:14

The spiritual battle is not fought in the physical, but in the spiritual, in our minds. If you think about the filth we fill our minds with, the lies and deceptions of this world, its so wonder that we struggle with unbelief.

Unbelief was what Adam and Eve experienced in the garden when they chose to believe the lie of Satan over the truth of God and therefore sent the human race into sin.

The apostle Paul talks about judgement for those who chose to suppress the truth and believe the lie.

  • Romans 1:18
  • Romans 1:26

What about you Christian? Are you choosing to believe lies, or suppress the truth. Or are you walking in the truth of God?

John gives a wonderful exhortation to the brethren in 3 John 1.

3 John 1:4

Truth in action

  • 1 John 3:18
  • Proverbs 12:22
  • I Corinthians 13:4-6
  • Ephesians 4:15
  • Exodus 20:16
  • Proverbs 16:13

I would seem, as a society that we’ve succumbed to the philosophy of relativism when it comes to truth. There are times when we tell “white lies”, you know the lies that does’t hurt anyone? But God sees the lie. We sometimes embellish or exaggerate stories, however, it’s either truth or lie, there is no gray area.

Lying in general is difficult because you can’t just tell one lie, and before long, you can’t keep track of your lies until you get caught in the lie or the truth is revealed. The reason for this is because truth is reality and it’s easier to remember reality than to build and maintain a fictitious event.

Truth matters not just in our culture or in our society or in our homes, but it matters to God therefore we must live our life on the principal of truth.

Worship

John 4:23-24

Without a knowledge of God and His character it’s impossible to worship God in truth. We must be informed and have a knowledge of God in order to worship in spirit and in truth. What better way to be informed of this knowledge than to read your bible.

“I should think myself in the way of my duty to raise the affections [emotions] of my hearers as high as possibly I can, provided that they are affected with nothing but truth.” – Jonathan Edwards

Edwards eludes to the fact that truth and only truth can properly influence the emotions in a way that brings honor to God.

The truth is always the truth

  • 1 John 1:8
  • Ephesians 4:25
  • Proverbs 16:13
  • Proverbs 8:7

Resources