What is Truth?

Pontius Pilate, in his fascinating conversation with Jesus of Nazareth, asked Jesus if he were a king. Jesus said, "For this purpose i was born and for this purpose I have come into the world--to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice." Pilate said to him, "What is truth?" (John 18:37-38).

This conversation stops me in my tracks. Pilate asked a great question, and interestingly enough, John does not give Jesus' reply. He leaves the question dangling in the air, echoing down the millennia until it reaches us. I can still hear Pilate ask it. He was so close to truth that it was literally staring him in the face.

For several centuries, Christianity has enjoyed a hegemony on truth in the West. Western civilization was shaped by the Bible, Christendom enforced the Bible onto the populace to the point where unbelievers and deviants were persecuted. For good and for ill, the Bible was used and abused to force conformity amongst the Western populace.

That is, until the rise of the Anabaptists and Mennonites and others like them. They rebelled against the "church-state" paradigm. They believed that conversion could not come by the government or the sword, but only by grace through faith in the gospel. Eventually, persecution led many of them to the New World. There, Baptists would eventually be instrumental in insuring the separation of Church and State and the freedom of religion for all people, even freedom to worship the devil.

Believe it or not, that grand and great dream laid down by the early American Republic has had a major impact upon truth. As the early Baptists suspected, if given the chance to freely worship the devil, some people would. And some would be Buddhists, and some would be Hindus, and some would be Moonies, and some would be atheists altogether. Being a Baptist myself, I am altogether delighted that they have the freedom to be as wrong as they please.

For the first couple of centuries, the people of the United States spoke Bible, as did their ancestors in Europe. I do not mean that all the people in the United States were Christian; I would never argue that. However, it is apparent that they all filtered their understanding of life, predominantly, through a Biblically colored lens.

Take Thomas Jefferson as an example. He was, from what I can tell, a Christian heretic par excellence. He famously cut out the miraculous parts of the Bible, leaving in all the laws and the moral code and the ethical teachings of Jesus. It seems that he admired the teachings of Jesus. Such would have been the attitude of many in that day: the default lens for interpreting right from wrong was a Biblical one. One can hardly read a novel or or thinker who wrote from the beginning of the republic until the early 1950's who wasn't profoundly aware of Biblical traditions of right and wrong, and even the moral stories* that the Bible contains.

Now, things are on different. Christianity does not enjoy the hegemony it once did. That's not to say that its influence isn't strong and felt. It surely is. However, there is a much greater competition of ideas out there in the market. Some are compltely foreign to a Biblical worldview. Jefferson did away with the miracles. Post-Modern America has ditched most of the Christian ethic.

This brings me back around to Pilate and his question to Jesus: What is truth? I think for many, Pilate's original question may even assume too much. Instead, the question of the day might be, "Is there such a thing as Truth?"

I believe that there is Truth that is objective, real, and unchanging. I believe that Truth is embodied in the person of Jesus Christ. The challenge for Christians is now, as it has always been, is to take the gospel, the story and teachings of Jesus, and put them into the market place of ideas. The gospel is a narrative without parallel. The beauty of Jesus is without rival. He is a teacher without equal. If Christians would just see that He is the message, we could be a far more winsome and compelling people.

The Audacity to be Correct

I remember, quite vividly, one of the things that used to bother me more than anything else in the world. It struck me, at the time, as either absolute arrogance or brainwash. If you wanted to elicit the rolling of the eyes or an audible scoff, all you had to do was mention that one could know that they were going to heaven. I thought such a knowledge claim was preposterous.

I believed that no one could really know that there is a God at all. Or if there were multiple gods. I was fine with claiming that Jesus was God, or that Budda was the enlightend one, or that Muhammed was Allah's prophet. After all, I figured any of these things could be true. I thought religion was simply a matter of picking the one that seemed to make the most sense. Thus, I was happy in my amiable agnosticism, and I was content to let everyone be happy in the system that they had picked...as long as they did not start telling me that I was absolutely wrong.

I felt that I had arrived at my own system of belief by the only means availible to a human being: reason. I found my system of belief to be as reasonable as anyone else's, and so I took it personally if someone told me I was wrong. I could suffer being told wrong if it could be demonstrated reasonably my error. But I would have none of this, "I just know that I know" stuff. That sounded too much like getting emotionally carried away or simple psychological wishful thinking. As if one were attempting to make something true by repeating it over and over.

In some ways, I am much the same as I was then. I am still stubborn, and I still have little patience for the "I just know that I know" explanation. I believe that a Christian ought to have a better reason for their faith than that. But in other ways, I am vastly changed. I now proclaim that Jesus Christ is the only way to the Father, that one must believe that He died for one's sins and rose from the dead for one's justification, and that Jesus Christ is the true Lord of the Universe. I tell people that He is the absolute and only way to salvation. What changed?

I confess that I did not figure this out by reason. The Holy Spirit reaveled this to me personally through the gospel of Jesus Christ. My heart was dead, and God the Holy Spirit made me live. I had nothing to do with this. I did not figure it out by human wisdom. I did not figure it out because I was searching for God in my own strength. It was a simple, gracious, sovereign gift that God gave to me unmerited and unlooked for.

Because I remember where I came from and who I am, I try and present the truth in such a manner that I may cause the least offense. That is not to be confused with soft-peddling the gospel or avoiding conflict. I simply mean that I try to speak the truth in love and humility. The gospel is edgy enough without me adding my own hubris to it.

There are a few things that I now know to be true that really aggravate people. Even fellow Christians. I know that Jesus is the only true Lord and that salvation only comes by Him. I know that God has not chosen to save everyone, though He would save all who are willing. I know that God has an elect that He chose before the world began, and that this choosing was based in His own good pleasure and not by the foreseen merit of sinful creatures. I know that God makes a genuine offer of salvation to all who hear the gospel, but that man in his falleness will never bow the knee to Jesus Christ apart from the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit. I know that it is not God's fault when men perish, even if they are not among the elect. Men do not spend eternity in hell because they are 'unelect', they go there because they are guilty of willful sin, and it is willful sin that keeps men from embracing forgiveness in Jesus Christ. God does not actively prevent men from believing.

It may seem like arrogance to some for me to claim such things, but I assure you it isn't. I am open to correction from the Scriptures. If I am guilty of something, it is that I have the audacity to believe in truth and that I have received it by revelation of the Holy Spirit through the Word of God.

Being Spared the Truth

There is a scene from the film "A Few Good Men" in which Tom Cruise's character, Lt. Daniel Kaffee, spars with Jack Nicholson's character Col. Nathan R. Jessup. In that exchange, Lt. Kaffee attempts to elicit a confession from the tough old Colonel. Kaffee pleads that he simply wants the truth, to which the Colonel famously replies, "You can't handle the truth." I'm not certain if Lt. Kaffee could handle the truth or not, but I am certain that God spares us from the full brunt of the truth to keep from overwhelming us with sorrow or to keep us from exceeding pride.

Consider this statement of Jesus, "I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now" (John 16:12). Why would Jesus hold back the truth from His disciples? Why couldn't they handle the truth?

The context of this saying is on the brink of Jesus' arrest and crucifixion. The reality that Jesus is about to 'go away' is sinking in on the disicples, and their hearts are nearly overcome with sorrow (John 16:6). Jesus knew that they were fragile, He knew their grief, and He knew that their faith was not strong enough to handle everything at that moment.

Can you imagine the patience of Jesus? Do you not think that He longed to share with them the glory that was to come? Do you suppose that He was tempted (as we know that He was tempted in every way) to rebuke them for their unbelief and sluggish hearts? Did they not trust Him to do what was right? In my mind, I can see them downcast and grieving as the truth of the loss of their friend and master dawned on them. The Lord saw their grief and thought, "It is enough on them. They can bear no more."

It is gracious of God to bring us along by degrees. Slowly conformed us to the pattern of holiness displayed so wonderfully in the Son of God. He will never lay more on a burdened soul than it can bear, nor will He allow us to see so much of our future glory or our current progress to sabotage our humility.

Consider Paul in this regard. He bears witness that he himself was caught up into paradise and heard things that cannot be told, which man may even speak about (2 Cor. 12:2-3). Because of these exceedingly glorious revelations, Paul was given a thorn in the flesh "to keep me from being too elated by the surpassing greatness of the revelations" (2 Cor. 12:7). Why did Paul receive and thorn in the flesh, and why did God refuse to remove it? Because Paul could not handle the truth.

The Lord handles us so tenderly, neither allowing too much or too little revelation to crush us under the sorrow of sin nor to allow us to become too proud over the progress of the saints. He is like a careful gardener who neither adds too much fertilizer or too little and who gives out water by measure. Too little fertilizer and the plant will lack nutrition, too much and it will wither. Too little water and it will dry up, too much and it will drown. He manages us carefully, each according to his own need.

As we grow in faith and are strengthened by the grace of God, the Lord brings us along into the truth. Jesus said, "When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come" (John 16:13). He will not withhold the greater things from us forever, but He will bring us along as we are able to follow.

We must take care then, those of us who believe ourselves mature, not to outpace God in the lives of others. Be discerning and wise and patient with others, knowing that God has worked patiently in you. Have you ever struggled with the truth of God's revelation? Did God reveal all your sin at once or did He bring you along by degree? If we will be merciful as God is merciful, we will see the fruit that the Lord, the greatest Gardener, entends.