His perfect knowledge provides a firm footing from which we can discover truth. When standing trial before the Roman governor Pilate, Jesus said to Pilate, “For this reason I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. And knowing the truth brings wholeness, healing, freedom, life, and joy. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.". Truth is revealed in the Bible as the character of Christ, His teachings and His promises. What does it matter whether we can or can’t know what’s really “out there”? No one comes to the Father except through me.”10 The Apostle John, reflecting on the whole of Jesus’ life, wrote, “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. The Bible Claims to Be God's Word For some people, this basically means that in the end, truth doesn’t really matter. It prescribes a specific action as “right”—what should be done—encouraging all people to comply with its dictates, keeping them under its sovereign sway. What Scripture says, God says. He obeyed God perfectly, satisfying God’s righteous requirements.30, Yet Jesus was crucified by people who, like all of us, loved lies rather than the truth.31 But Jesus’ crucifixion wasn’t a tragic accident—it was God pouring out the punishment we deserved onto Jesus. Therefore it is our duty to resist all claims to truth by subverting them, exposing their hidden motives, and subjecting them to radical critique. It’s about the body and the heart of Christ we are representing. None of us can claim a view from nowhere. We don’t make the truth, but God’s truth makes us. If we solve a math problem, we’re uncovering a piece of the fabric of logic that God has woven into creation. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. It tells the story of how God created people to rule the world under his dominion, and so enjoy fellowship with him and cause creation to flourish.27 Yet, the Bible tells us, people rebelled against God, choosing to disobey him. But it doesn’t tell us all things. 32 The lips of the righteous know what is acceptable, but the mouth of the wicked, what is perverse. Truth is disputed territory today, as it always has been. When the Bible says that God is true, it implies that he truly exists, that he is perfectly truthful in all he says and does, and that … Jesus claimed to be the only way, the only truth, the only life and the only path to God (John 14:6). It might surprise you that the question “What is truth?” is itself found in the pages of Scripture. The only universal truth is that it’s always wrong to say someone else’s truth isn’t true. Ibid., Acts 3:14–21, 17:30-31; Hebrews 10:12–13. Within this view, truth is a good thing, even though it’s just a social construct. The twenty-first century West suffers from what you might call “truth fatigue.” We’ve been through a seemingly interminable history of battles over the truth. A Deeper Look at What the Bible Says about Truth. But this is a dangerous practice. And this always gets personal sooner or later. Unlike Pilate, you’ve stayed for an answer. The Bible uses a wealth of terms and images to describe God’s truth. So does Paul. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”38. But we need to pull back the lens a little. King David prayed, “Surely you desire truth in the inner parts; you teach me wisdom in the inmost place.”37 God wants us to be true all the way down. 18 Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures. So how do we know what’s true in addition to the Bible? As Friedrich Nietzsche famously put it: “There are no facts, only interpretations.”5 And if that’s the case, then the only way one interpretation will ultimately defeat another is by holding a gun to its head. As long as you do what makes you happy and leave others to do the same, what does the truth matter? He doesn’t want true statements from false hearts, or “true” deeds from deceitful motives. It says, starting in verse 5, that “One man considers one day more sacred than another; another man considers every day alike. “Truth is tyranny and should be resisted” correctly recognizes that we all have a vested interest in the truth, which is a powerful concept that can be wielded for ill as well as for good. Religious claims (e.g., “Jesus is God”) are meaningless because no experiment can tell us whether they are true or false. Because he is the true God, he has sovereign power over all. All rights reserved. Finally, what of the claim that “Truth is tyranny and should be resisted”? Many of us make promises to ourselves to eat better or exercise more, or to be more consistent in our Bible study, or to be more available to our family and friends. But how is this possible? Did you catch the significance of these monumental revelations? The truth about modesty is that the Bible teaches it to be about much more than the clothes we wear. We can know each other. Jesus tells us that the Father accomplished this by the power of the Holy Spirit: “But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. If we’re being honest, we must all admit that our lives are marred, one way or another, by deceit and falsehood. God’s truth “works” because it teaches us how to be true from the heart. It, too, claims a power as dominant as any religion. Psalm 25:5 - " Lead me in your truth and ..." Psalm 34:13 - " Keep your tongue from evil and ..." Psalm 119:30 - " I have chosen the way of ..." James 5:12 - " But above all, my brothers, do ..." Proverbs 30:5 - " Every word of God proves true; ..." 1 John 2:27 - " But the anointing that you received ..." Try pondering, meditating and believing in your heart scriptures such as 2 Peter 1:3-11, Psalm 16:7-8, Romans 8:5-14 and Galatians 5:16. Looking ahead to Jesus’ coming to earth, the prophet Isaiah said that Jesus would be put to death “though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth.”13. What is truth? How about you? Let's explore these claims further. We’ve all departed from truth in our thoughts and actions. This doesn’t bring dutiful drudgery, but joyful freedom. Philosophical symposiums generally dismiss the Bible’s counsel out-of-hand, and even if you merely mention that Jesus claims to be the Truth in such a gathering, you will feel the room tightening-up. “He is the living God, the eternal King. Anything we can know, he knows already. 30 I have chosen the way of faithfulness; I set your rules before me. In sum, the Bible is true because every word of it is the word of God. We can run to him, cast ourselves on him, and depend wholly on him, because he is true. Jesus is the truth. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. So what, then, does the Bible say about truth? How does the Bible repeatedly refer to death? Much less is it to say these views have nothing to offer. Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. First, there is no such thing. Have you ever thought that truth could be a person? But can we really get by without truth? The Bible says, “Buy the truth and sell it not…” (Proverbs 23:23). We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”11 In Jesus, the truth took on human nature. 26 "But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me. According to the Bible, the Lord is the true God, the one who really lives and reigns. And when they do this, they come to know the truth. Death has been defeated in the life of the believer. Francis Bacon, “Of Truth,” cited in Scruton. God worked through the human authors of Scripture in such a way that they freely wrote precisely what God intended them to. If truth claims are to be debunked, deconstructed, and overthrown, why not this one? We saw above that because God is true, all he says is true. The yogic teaching is listed first, then what the Bible has to say about it. As such, truth is an instrument of violent coercion, even torture. Fill your mind with the Word of God (the Bible) instead of letting your thoughts be overcome with the negativity and lies that plague you from the people around you, the enemy, and yourself. If their truth allows them those actions, on what ground can you declare such practices to be wrong? This means, first, that nothing that contradicts the Bible is true. . Everyone’s got an opinion on truth—even if the opinion is that there is no such thing. As the Apostle Paul put it, we “suppress the truth” by our own sinful desires and deeds.12 Yet Jesus lived a perfectly truthful life. Philosopher Roger Scruton has argued, “All discourse and dialogue depend upon the concept of truth. 8 Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Pulling together many biblical passages and themes such as these, the nineteenth-century Dutch theologian Herman Bavinck wrote: “He, therefore, is the primary, the original truth, the source of all truth, the truth in all truth. When the Bible says that God is true, it implies that he truly exists, that he is perfectly truthful in all he says and does, and that he alone knows all reality perfectly and immediately. So what the Spirit revealed to the Apostles is true. If there are no criteria by which agreement about the truth can be peacefully negotiated, then communication is war—and truth is the heavy artillery.6. When he is angry, the earth trembles; the nations cannot endure his wrath.18, According to the Bible, the Lord is the true God, the one who really lives and reigns. What does the Bible say about absolutes? In order to understand more fully what the Bible means when it says that Jesus is the truth, we need to understand that truth is an attribute of God’s own nature. 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