ECCLESIASTES 1
WHAT IS TRUTH?
Ecclesiastes 1.3-11
S: Truth
C: Revelation
Th: Confusion
Pr: We can know the truth about God, ourselves, and the world.
CV: We will clearly communicate the transforming truth of the Bible.
Type: Inductive
PA: How is the change to be observed?
• Find the truth and act on it.
• Know the truth about God, ourselves, and the world.
• Rejoice that eternity has been set in our hearts.
• Realize that life does not make sense without God.
• Make this journey with purpose.
Version: ESV
RMBC 02 November 08 AM
INTRODUCTION:
There is a lot of confusion about God.
Those were big questions we saw in the video.
Does God exist?
What does He expect from us?
And those clips show us that there is a lot of confusion in the world.
If there is anyplace we are all feeling confusion today is when it comes to politics.
After all, who is telling the truth?
Is McCain?
Is Obama?
It seems to me, elections have developed into who is a better expert in spinning the truth.
You see…
Today’s truth seems to depend on the spin.
We have been listening to ads on TV over the last few weeks, and whether it is Krysan or Lee, Mesi or Ranzenhofer, or Obama or McCain – we struggle to know what the truth really is and who is telling it.
Each side continually accuses the other of lies.
So we determine who is telling the truth according to the sound bytes.
Who looks better?
Who seems more convincing?
Who has better posture?
Who is more sincere?
Who has more confidence?
And while many of us would argue that none of this would be a basis for the truth, for many in our culture today, this is how truth is determined.
It is all in the spin.
There is an interesting man in the Bible who had a handle on the truth, but still ended up living chaotically.
He had it all.
He had power.
He had fame.
He had prestige.
He had wisdom.
He had money.
He even had women – wives and concubines.
He was, as we used to say on the farm, happier than a bull in the barnyard.
And when it was all said and done, and he comes to the end of his life…
Solomon asked, “Is there anything new?”
As he writes his final memoir about life, called Ecclesiastes, he comes to a conclusion about his life.
It has been meaningless.
It is all old.
There is nothing new.
As he puts it (Ecclesiastes 1:9 [Msg]):
What was will be again,
What happened will happen again.
There’s nothing new on this earth.
Year after year it’s the same old thing.
I feel like he is talking about the America election.
But…
Solomon is looking for meaning in life.
He is looking for what is true about life.
And as he continues on in this writing, he resolves the dilemma he is feeling.
This dilemma, I believe, represents well the dilemmas many face in the postmodern worldview of today.
OUR STUDY:
Let’s take a look at the four major worldviews…
Worldview Shifts (Western)
Ancient World: 2500 BC to AD 500
Historically…the Ancient World includes the times of the pharaohs and the Egyptians, the empires of Assyria, Babylon, Persia and Greece, and of course, the Roman Empire.
Medieval World: AD 500-1500
The Medieval World is the time from Charlemagne, to the Holy Roman Empire, when the popes were effectively the rulers of the western world.
Modern World: AD 1500-2000
The Modern World began with the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the Enlightenment, and continued into the 20th century.
Postmodern World: AD 2000+
We live in a very historic time in our culture.
For the last fifty years, a distinct change has been taking place in the way people think and act.
Actually, its beginnings go back to the 19th century.
Modernism has been characterized by humanism, individualism, and anti-authoritarianism.
And what I want to note here is that postmodernism, as a worldview, is simply an extension of modernism.
It is not a reaction against modernism, but a logical follow-up.
The transition has been taking place for 200 years.
It is just in the last fifty, it is like someone stepped on the gas.
Let’s see what a difference these worldviews have made.
First, in…
Epistemology
Epistemology is the study of knowledge – its nature, origins and limits.
Ancient World: Regional worldview; time period of first historic civilizations; deities were considered regional and territorial.
Knowledge was based on the regions, because travel was limited.
It was local.
It was very religion-based.
And when conflict came, it was my god was smarter than your god.
The shift, though, began with the empires.
As they began to get bigger, knowledge increased.
The final was the Roman Empire, which had reached into Asia, Europe and Africa.
It was a very opportune time for the next cultural shift.
Medieval World: Judeo-Christian, God-centered worldview.
When the Roman Empire fell, the Christian church became the center of activity and knowledge.
The power vacuum was essentially filled by the Roman Catholic Church.
Whatever the church said was true, was true, even if they were wrong.
Then with the Enlightenment, the transition to the modern world was made…
Modern World: Man-centered trust in reason to discover truth.
Reason becomes the answer during the modern world.
All answers can be discovered given enough time.
Even truths about God can be discovered and known.
Truth is considered objective – that there is only one truth – to be discovered and known.
But now we come to the transitions of today…
Postmodern World: Self-determined pluralistic view of culture and religion; conflicting truths and beliefs are accepted.
Truth is no longer objective.
It is subjective.
And it does not matter if they conflict.
Let’s increase our understanding of these worldviews with the topic of…
Understanding & Belief
Ancient World: Power and faith were in the kings, empires and local deities.
People believed what people and beings in power said.
They were the ones in control.
The same is true in the…
Medieval World: Power and faith were in the church.
The Roman Catholic Church assumed the power, so what they said is what was believed – about God and the world.
They were considered the final authority, even in science and history.
But then the change came…
Modern World: Power and faith were in human reasoning, science, and logic.
The Roman Catholic church was discredited as free thinkers kept proving the church wrong.
New ideas exploded – in areas of science, math, history and literature – not that these were dormant during the medieval world – but there was an explosion of knowledge and understanding during these times.
Even the understanding of God expanded, for there was a belief that God could be discovered.
Now we are in transition, as reason no longer is in command…
Postmodern World: Power and faith is in personal experience.
For the postmodern worldview, there is no independent reality.
This is important to note.
It is different from the worldview that we are accustomed.
Though many of us might not like it, it is what is!
You see, modernism viewed the world with a confident gaze, eyes to the horizon, believing that knowledge of the universe and self was possible and that a single story — an overall narrative that makes sense of everything in life — could explain everything.
But the postmodernist views that kind of world with a shrug and a smirk.
Their thinking is…
We know better today.
We know that our understanding is conditioned by our perspective.
We are trapped in our own experience.
There is no one version of truth or of universals of the human condition.
The postmodernist rejects the imperialism of any single point of view being the correct perspective.
Postmodern View of Truth
So having heard all this, let’s go back to the original question -- what is truth?
How does the postmodern worldview regard truth?
First…
Truth is a construction.
According to the postmodernist, we can never know some absolute, objective, once-and-for-all truth.
What’s true for one person may not be true for someone else.
Truth happens because individuals and cultures construct truths that work for them.
Since truth is not discovered but constructed, there are many ways of putting together a plausible explanation about anything.
Constructing a model that accounts for the evidence is the best that we can do, and one model is just as valid as another.
ILL Understanding
Ravi Zacharias recalls when he was lecturing at a university about how culture seeks to bring coherence to a group of given people, a student stormed up to the microphone and bellowed, "Who told you culture is a search for coherence? Where do you get that idea from? This idea of coherence is a Western idea."
Rather surprised, he replied by reminding her that all he had done was present a sociologist’s definition. "Ah! Words! Just words!" she shouted back.
"Let me ask you this then," he pleaded with her. "Do you want my answer to be coherent?" At that moment, laughter rippled through the auditorium. She herself was stymied for a few moments. "But that’s language, isn’t it?" she retorted.
So he asked her if language had anything to do with reality. "Don’t words refer to something?" he asked her. "If you are seeking an intelligible answer from me, mustn’t there be correspondence between my words and reality? How then can this basic requirement be met in our culture?"
Of course, the student was only reflecting the spirit of postmodern thought — no truth, no meaning, no certainty.
We now hear that language is detached from reality and truth detached from meaning.
What we are left with is a way of thinking basically shaped by our bodies and by our tendencies and desires, which is how life has become defined by our untamed passions.
Hence, incoherence is now normal.
This brings us back to the politics of the day.
By this way of thinking, spin is literally everything.
Since truth is not an absolute, it can be continually revised, without even worrying about contradictions.
It is why a politician can say one thing to one group and another thing to a different group and it hardly gets challenged.
It is the truth you have constructed for the moment.
This brings us to…
Truth is a matter of interpretation.
Truth-claims, because they are constructions of language, are subject to endless reinterpretation and are incapable of any definite, fixed meanings.
If you live in academia, you know that postmodernists love to "deconstruct" texts, that is, making them mean the opposite of what they say.
I do agree with some of the postmodernist’s view about language.
Perspectives do count.
Knowledge is partial.
Communication is difficult.
Interpretation is involved.
We all understand through our own personal grids.
But postmodernists need to understand that in their quest to find the meaning behind what is written that they are just as likely to manipulate language as those they accuse of doing so.
They, too, can push language to mean anything they want.
Third…
Truth is an exercise of power.
Since truth is constructed, the postmodernist views truth to be the constructs of the dominant groups.
In other words, it is the creation of the powerful.
This is why the postmodernist is willing to accept historical constructions by women, homosexuals, and racial minorities that cannot be supported by evidence, but which advance the political agenda of those on the margin.
This way, under their interpretation, they become liberating alternative truths.
Case in point…
ILL Truth (S)
Back in 1987, when Tawana Brawley accused three white men of raping her, it became a national case full of racial tension. Men like Al Sharpton were continually in the headlines perpetuating their view of the circumstances.
When it turned out that New York teenager Tawana Brawley had lied about being sexually assaulted by white men, the magazine The Nation claimed that “it doesn’t matter whether the crime occurred or not” because it symbolizes “what actually happens to too many black women.”
Finally…
Truth is compartmentalized.
According to the postmodernist, values such as consistency, unity, and personal integrity are "fundamentalist" and thus wrong.
Instead of having a single core identity, human beings are free to have many identities, compartmentalizing them so they do not impinge on each other.
Religion, sexual desires, job demands, family role, and political beliefs are all part of one’s makeup, but none of these compartments need have any bearing on any of the others.
In other words, truth is what we want it to be in any given situation.
It is our choice.
ILL Truth (S)
Many have considered Bill Clinton the first postmodern president. It seemed that he was always reinventing himself to adapt to the moment. He was an expert at manipulating words to his favor.
George Stephanopoulos, now an ABC news analyst was the Director of Communications for Bill Clinton’s White House.
When reporters hounded him about Clintonian lies, Stephanopoulos accused them of “an excess of literalism.”
Stephanopoulos, to his credit, did tire of the Clinton lies and left the White House.
CHALLENGE:
Finding the truth, and acting on it, is an old problem.
I do not apologize that I work from a worldview that believes Christianity, when lived correctly, has the answers to life.
It is my experience that truth is found in the words of Scripture.
Given the opportunity to be received on its own merits, God’s Word transforms us.
The Bible is a book that offers answers to the very questions that human beings cannot escape…
Who am I?
Where did I come from?
Why am I here?
Where am I going?
The Bible compels our attention because it addresses issues of real life in the structure of a story and a historical setting.
We are not the only ones to look for an understanding of truth in difficult circumstances.
Pontus Pilate was faced with this when Jesus was brought before him.
Here is how the text reads (John 18:33-38)…
33 So Pilate entered his headquarters again and called Jesus and said to him, "Are you the King of the Jews?" 34 Jesus answered, "Do you say this of your own accord, or did others say it to you about me?" 35 Pilate answered, "Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered you over to me. What have you done?" 36 Jesus answered, "My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world." 37 Then Pilate said to him, "So you are a king?" Jesus answered, "You say that I am a king. 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." 38 Pilate said to him, "What is truth?"
After he had said this, he went back outside to the Jews and told them, "I find no guilt in him.”
He had the truth.
He knew it.
There was no guilt in Jesus.
The tragedy is that he did not act on it, but gave in to political expediency.
His truth was that he wanted to stay in power.
Therefore, this man Jesus, dies.
Here is what I have come to realize…
We can know the truth about God, ourselves, and the world.
We can observe the facts.
We can draw the appropriate inferences.
There is truth to be found.
This was the testimony of our children’s song today…
Every time I see the stars sprinkled in the sky,
Every time I climb a tree or catch a firefly,
Every time I hear my Mom sing a lullaby,
Then I know that God is there,
God is always there.
You see…
We can know God.
We can experience Him.
We can be filled with awe as we come to understand the majesty of God and His creation.
It can leave us breathless.
We can also know the truth about ourselves.
Not only that, the testimony of Scripture is that we can find a place in this world.
We can exist with meaning.
For…
Eternity has been set in our hearts (Ecclesiastes 3.11).
He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.
God has put into us a longing or desire to know our significance.
This is why Solomon was struggling in the beginning of his memoir.
He was not satisfied with his endeavors and his achievements.
On their own, they had become worthless to him.
The reason is is that…
Life does not make sense without God.
There is more to life than being born, living and then dying.
We are able to make this journey with purpose.
That is the hope that is truly before us.
That is the truth, if we are willing to believe and live it.
COMMUNION:
Earlier in our service we sang a song of our experience…
All my life I had a longing
For a drink from some clear spring,
That I hoped would quench the burning
Of the thirst I felt within.
Hallelujah! I have found Him
Whom my soul so long has craved!
Jesus satisfies my longings,
Through His blood I now am saved.
Well of water, ever springing,
Bread of life so rich and free,
Untold wealth that never faileth,
My Redeemer is to me.
Hallelujah! I have found Him
Whom my soul so long has craved!
Jesus satisfies my longings,
Through His blood I now am saved.
I hope you know Jesus today.
I hope it has been your experience to be satisfied by Him.
The eternity that is in your heart that Solomon talked about – it is about Jesus.
That is why we gather as a church today.
There is one primary reason.
It is Jesus.
If you know Jesus today, you are invited to share in the elements of the table.
You do not have to be a member of our church, but we do ask that you know Jesus and have a relationship with Him.
We practice “communion” because we are to remember the death of the Lord Jesus.
We take the bread to remind us that it was by the body of our Savior that our salvation came.
He died in our place.
He became our substitute.
We take the cup to remind us that it was by the blood of our Savior that our salvation came.
He died for our sins.
He became our sacrifice.
PRAYER
The apostle Paul writes, "The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me."
Let’s partake together.
PRAYER
Again, the apostle Paul writes, "In the same way, after supper he took the cup saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me."
Let’s partake together.
Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.
Deacon offering
BENEDICTION:
Now…May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal encouragement and good hope, encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good deed and word.
RESOURCES:
Bible Knowledge Commentary: Old Testament. Colorado Springs: Cook Communications Ministries, 2000.
Colson, Charles. "Post-Truth Society." Christianity Today, 11 March 2002, 112.
Jeyachandran, L. T. What Is Truth? RZIM, 2 Oct 2008. Accessed 29 Oct 2008.
Jones, Preston, and Greg Graffin. Is Belief in God Good, Bad or Irrelevant? A Professor and a Punk Rocker Discuss Science, Religion, Naturalism and Christianity. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2006.
Kimball, Dan. The Emerging Church: Vintage Christianity for New Generations. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2003.
Markos, Louis A. "Myth Matters." Christianity Today, 23 April 2001, 32-39.
Veith, Gene Edward. "A Postmodern Scandal." World, 21 Feb 1998, 24.
Wiersbe, Warren. The Bible Exposition Commentary: Old Testament. Colorado Springs: Cook Communications Ministries, 2004.
Zacharias, Ravi. The Absence of Coherence. RZIM, 3 Nov 2005. Accessed 7 Nov 2005.
