Tuesday, October 2, 2012

What Ever Happened to Truth?

"Sanctify them in the truth; Your Word is truth" (John 17:17)

What ever happened to truth?  Now that is a question that has been on my mind a lot lately, beloved, and one that I sincerely believe has been on the minds of many as well!  If ever this world has seen a time when"truth" is under attack - genuine all-out assault - then I believe that this is that time.  Consider by way of example just what has come under unbelievable attack in this very generation.  First of all, the truth of the family as the basis of society is under assault.  In answer to a question from the Pharisees concerning the issue of divorce, Jesus responded:

4 And He answered and said, "Have you not read that He who created them from the beginning made them male and female, 5 and said, 'For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh'? 6 So they are no longer two, but one flesh.  What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate" (Matthew 19:4-6)

One man, one woman, joined together by God in marriage, and one flesh for life.  That is truth, beloved, God's truth.  Yet it is being set aside casually today as if God had never spoken it at all!  Nor is it being dismissed only be certain elements of society from whom we have come to expect such attitudes.  It is being set aside officially and publicly by the highest levels of government.  We have lived to see the day when the truth established by the Creator has been declared by the created to be irrelevant and non-binding anymore.  Is that not, however, what the Apostle Paul warned would happen at the hands of unrighteous men?

25 For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever.  Amen (Romans 1:25)

When confronted in any venue with the words of Scripture, beloved, those who are so nonchalantly dismissive of divine truth respond with the argument that the Bible is archaic, that it is out of date, that it was written by men.  When that happens, we discover yet another front for the current assault, the truth of God Himself as the sole authority for man's living.  The thinking of such people is clearly: "If we can just invalidate the Word of God, we can rid ourselves of God Himself."  The desire in every such heart is for man to become the standard-setter, the central point around which all of life revolves, the end in view as he seeks his own good and his own glory.

But Jesus Christ Himself made the powerful and irrefutable statement in His prayer here that God's Word is truth!  It was God's truth, it is now God's truth, and it will always be God's truth.  It can be ignored, avoided, even disobeyed, but it cannot be destroyed.  It is the one standard by which God judges all of mankind and it will be the same truth that every man will face when finally he stands before his Creator in eternity.

What ever happened to truth?  I am thrilled to assure you, beloved, that nothing at all has happened to truth.  It is still here, it is still operative, it is still effective, it is still all-powerful, it is still transformational, and it is still centered solely upon the person of the Lord Jesus Christ.  Truly, let not your hearts be troubled nor let them be afraid!  Jesus Christ is Lord and the day for the "knee-bowing, tongue-confessing, world-encompassing" acknowledgment of that fact is coming on like a freight train.  Maranatha!

Ron