Let's Talk about .... BIBLE TRUTH

LET'S TALK ABOUT....  BIBLE  TRUTH

From  the  "Bible Advocate" - a publication of the Church of God, Seventh Day, 

Denver, Co. USA

'Jesus on truth'

To the truth, 0 church of God, to the

truth, Lest we die. by Calvin Burreih     

Truth is a favorite word in CoG7 and in the BA. It's been like that most of our magazine's one hundred fifty years. No problem. Jesus and John loved that word, too.

Not all the truth about God, people, sin, and salvation is as plain as we'd like. Some of it is plainer. The simple gospel about Jesus, recorded by John, is among the plainest of Bible truths.

In the Gospel According to John, the words true and truth occur fifty times — far more than in any other New Testament book. John, in fact, uses those words more than twice as often as Matthew, Mark, and Luke combined!

The Bible word truth carries rich meaning and implications, calling for Christians to understand it better than we do. Truth be told, we often obscure the truth about truth by often using that word to mean something Jesus and John never meant by it.

And what is truth? This classic query is a philosopher's dream and a scoffer's "gotcha." Pilate turned the question toward Jesus, after our Lord said, "For this cause I was born, and for this cause I have come into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth" (John 18:37, 38a).

Jesus answered Pilate, not in the next verse but in the fifty uses of true and truth in John's Gospel. 

Here, we'll look at five of those uses and five texts in which Christ matches truth with another great Bible word. Each of these pairings provides a revealing glimpse, a delightful taste, a helpful feel for what He meant by this superb and imposing word, truth.

Truth and grace (John 1:14, 17)

In this perfectly balanced duo, truth is the super-structure of the skyscraper of life. It is the cold, hard stainless steel, rivets and welds necessary for building — but insufficient for residing and abiding.

Grace is the warm, soft, and comfy purple velvet needed to soften and complete a life of steel. Truth makes it sturdy, strong, and stable; grace makes it lovable and livable.

In the church, truth rightly says, "This is right. This is what the Bible truly teaches." And grace rightly adds, "No one is saved by true doctrine, lest any church should boast."

In Jesus Christ, eternal truth is always present — and it is always paired with eternal grace. Either without the other is incomplete.

Truth and spirit (John 4:23, 24)

For those who would be true worshippers, Jesus writes a short prescription here, one that is not easy to decipher.

The common explanation of "worship in spirit and truth" uses a head-and-heart model, like this: Worship in truth means "in agreement with Bible teachings," and worship in spirit means "with gusto and much feeling." This appears to match Christ's great command to love God with all our minds and all our hearts.

On the other hand, the truth component required by Jesus in worship may mean nothing more than that our devotion to God is to be lived out in the reality of life. Worship is best seen in the daily truth of our walk and work!

Likewise, the spirit element of worship may be understood as a reference to the Holy Spirit, announced in John 14-16 as the "Spirit of truth." From this vantage, true worship exhibits the fruits of the Spirit (love, joy, peace — as stressed in those three chapters), along with spiritual gifts and talents.

From this perspective, the truth and the Spirit become the energizing, inspiring pair that join the human to the divine. We may distinguish between, but not separate, them. More elusive than the first pair, this second word pair nevertheless adds to our comprehension of truth.

Truth and freedom (John 8:31,32)

Jesus' familiar words here link our third pair as cause and effect — the first leading to the other. Truth, he says, always marches toward authentic freedom.

In the same way that untruth. (the Devil's lies) leads to bondage (in sin), so does God's truth lead inevitably — if not immediately — to life-freedom. Better it is to follow truth and be forever free from sin's guilt and increasingly free of its practice than to take the path more traveled.

In the Bible, the truth that sets us free is no mere set of statements with which we agree. Rather, it is the full complement of eternal principles once embodied in Hebrew law-wisdom-prophets, now known more perfectly through one Way, one Person, one Life. Read on.

Truth and Jesus (John 14:6)

The essential nature of God's truth — could it be described as abstract and philosophical? Or academic and propositional? Or absolute and spiritual? All of the above, we may suppose; and above all, it is more than their sum.

In John 14:6 Jesus says the truth is personal and relational: "I am the way, the truth, and the life." All the truth that can be known about God, this text suggests, has now been personified in the divine-human Christ. In this way, Jesus himself becomes the only true link and route to God's heaven because "No one comes to the Father except through Me."

To know Christ is to know the Father — the fountain of all truth.

Truth and God's Word (John 17:17)

If the fourth pair leads us to think of truth as subjective reality with Jesus as the subject, this final pair provides an objective balance: "Your word [written] is truth." Both the living Word (Christ) and the written Word (Scripture) share the quality of being true. Truth is their stock-in-trade. Bible truth without the person and work of Jesus easily becomes dry dogma. The attraction of Christ without its anchor and verbal description in God's Word written easily deteriorates into sentimentality. In the balance of the living and written Word, as in the first pair of grace and truth, is great wisdom and safety.

Truth project

May God deliver us from labeling our own views of Scripture as "the truth" with little respect to the profound biblical scope and force of this wonderful word. May this introduction from John's Gospel inspire each of us to our own "truth project" — a lifelong search for the best and most valuable answers to the question "What is truth?" 

..........

THE  FEAST  OF  TABERNACLES  IS  TRUTH.  IT  IS  FROM  GOD.  HE  GAVE  IT.  IT  IS  TO  PICTURE  THE  AGE  TO  COME.  A  TIME  OF  PEACE,  JOY,  A  FRUITFUL  HARVEST  OF  FRUIT  THAT  IS  PLEASANT,  DELICIOUS,  COLORFUL,  AND  STIMULATING.  I'M  A  GREAT  FRUIT  LOVER.  JUST  STANDING  IN  A  PLACE  [LIKE  A  SUPER  MARKET]  AMID  ALL  THE  WONDERFUL  FRUITS  AND  VEGETABLES,  THE  COLORS,  AND THE  SIGHT .... WOW,  WHAT  A  FEAST!

THE  AGE  TO  COME  WILL  BE  LIKE  THAT.  IT  WILL  BE  BEAUTIFULLY  COLORFUL,  EVERYWHERE  SIGHTS  OF  PEACEFUL  COLOR,  AND  PEACE  WILL  BE  LITERAL  INDEED;  NO  MORE  WARS  AND  STRIFE  AND HATRED.  NATIONS  WILL  LEARN  WAR  NO  MORE.  IT  IS  WRITTEN  "THEY  SHALL  NOT  HURT  OR  DESTROY  IN  ALL  MY  HOLY  MOUNTAIN  SAYS  THE  LORD."

THERE  WILL  BE  VARIETY:  GOD  IS  NOT  A  GOD  OF  BLACK  AND WHITE;  HE  LOVES  VARIETY.  WE  HAVE  VARIETY  TODAY  ALL  AROUND US  IN  SO  MANY  WAYS.  IT  WILL  ALSO  BE  SO  IN  THE  AGE  TO  COME,  BUT  VARIETY  AMONG  FULL  LOVE  AND  PEACE.

THE  FEAST  OF  TABERNACLES  WAS  AT  THE  END  OF  THE  FRUIT  HARVEST  IN  THE  HOLY  LAND.  THE  ISRAELITES  SET  UP  THEIR  TENTS  OR  BOOTHS  AMID  THE  WONDERFUL  FRUIT  HARVEST,  AMID  THE  COLOR  AND  VARIETY  OF  FRUITS.

IN  THE  AGE  TO  COME  TRUTH,  GOD'S  TRUTH,  WILL  COVER  THIS  EARTH  AS  THE  WATERS  COVER  THE  SEA  BEDS.  THERE  WILL  BE  NO  MORE  LIES,  DECEPTIONS,  HALF-TRUTHS,  SLANTED  TRUTHS,  TRUTHS MISUSED [YES  THAT  CAN  HAPPEN],  TRUTH  PUFFED  UP  FOR  VAIN  GLORY;  IT  WILL  BE  A  WORLD  OF  PURE  HOLY  TRUTH,  OF  GOLDEN  TRUTH.  THINK  ABOUT  GOLD  FOR  A  MOMENT:  YOU  CAN  HAVE  GOLD BARS  ON  THE  OCEAN  FLOOR  FOR  CENTURIES,  AND  THEY  WILL  REMAIN  PURE,  UNTARNISHED,  WILL  NOT  DECAY,  BUT  WILL  STAY  AS  PURE  AS  PURE  GOLD  CAN  BE.

SO  TRUTH,  IS  AS  PURE  AS  GOLD;  IT  IS  TODAY  IN  GOD'S  WORD  AND  IN  CHRIST,  AND  IT  WILL  BE  TOMORROW,  AS  GOD'S  WORD  THROUGH  CHRIST  WILL  RULE  THIS  EARTH.

TRUTH  IS  WONDERFUL,  AND  IT  WILL  AS  JESUS  SAID,  "SET  YOU  FREE."  

I  PRAY  YOU  WILL  LOVE  TRUTH,  WANT  TRUTH,  SEEK  TRUTH.  AS  JESUS  ALSO  SAID,  "SEEK  AND  YOU  SHALL  FIND."  TRUTH  DOES  NOT JUST  FALL  IN  YOUR  LAP  KINDA  UNEXPECTED  LIKE,  WELL  IT  MAY  COME  TO  YOU,  BUT  YOU  HAVE  TO  WANT  IT,  YOU  HAVE  TO  TAKE  THE  TIME  TO  PROVE  WHAT  IS  GOOD  AND  ACCEPTABLE  TO  GOD.  IT TAKES  SOME  EFFORT  ON  YOUR  PART,  AS  PAUL  ONCE  SAID,  "PROVE  ALL THINGS  AND  HOLD  FAST  TO  THAT  WHICH  IS  GOOD."  I  GUESS  WE  COULD  ADD,  "AND  WHICH  IS  TRUTH."

WE  DO  HAVE  AN  ABSOLUTE  PROMISE  FROM  JESUS,  HE  SAID,  WHEN  THE  SPIRIT  COMES,  YOU  WILL  BE  GUIDED  INTO  ALL  TRUTH;  YES  THE  GOSPEL  OF  JOHN.  BUT  ONCE  MORE  YOU  HAVE  TO  DESIRE  TO  WANT  AND  LOVE  TRUTH,  TO  BE  WILLING  TO  BE  CORRECTED,  TO  ADMIT  WRONGS.  THAT  IS  YOUR  PART  IN  IT  ALL.  THEN  DOING  THAT  YOU  MUST  WALK  IN  TRUTH;  SO  DOING  GOD  WILL  GIVE  YOU  MORE  TRUTH.

YES  THE  AGE  TO  COME  IS  TRUTH,  IT  WILL  ONE  DAY  BE  HERE;  THE  FEAST  OF  TABERNACLES  WILL  BE  A  REALITY  ON  EARTH,  AND  SO  WE  HAVE  THE  WONDERFUL  CHAPTER  OF  ZECHARIAH  14,  ISAIAH 11  AND  SO  MANY  OTHER  PASSAGES  THAT  TELL  US  ABOUT  THE  FULFILLMENT  OF  THIS  FEAST  OF  TABERNACLES.

Keith  Hunt