What Is Truth?

Title: What is Truth?

Central idea: contrast Jesus truth with truth in American culture today

Specific purpose: define the culture in which we must live Christ

Scripture: John 8:31b-32

Jesus said, John 8:31b-32, “If you hold to my teaching, you are truly my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." This is an often-quoted scripture; so, what did Jesus mean by the word "truth”?

The New Testament authors wrote in Greek. Therefore, to understand completely what Jesus was saying, we need to understand what the Greek word translators translated into the English as “truth” means. You see, words do not necessarily translate as directly as we would wish. For example, the word “love” in English has many different meanings. I love hotdogs. I also love my children. I love these beautiful Blue Rindge Mountains. Now loving a hotdog is different than loving my children and different than loving where I live. Well, the Greeks have four words that we translate into the English word love. Each of these Greek words has a different meaning. The Greeks had different words for loving hotdogs than they had for loving my children.

Our Biblical translators translated the Greek word a-lee-the-i-a into the English word “truth”. Looking at aleetheia’s translation, we see that Jesus was saying that you would know that he could be trusted and relied upon. You would know that his truth is not only intellectual; it is moral. Jesus truth has to do with our relationship with God and with people.

Through history, people have sought to know truth. The ancient Greeks sought truth. Their best and brightest became our early philosophers; indeed, in Greek, philosopher means “lover of truth”. We still study the works of ancient philosophers like Socrates, Aristotle and Plato for in them we find truth. Our Founding Fathers relied on the Word of God for truth. Because of that, our Nation grew in freedom. We knew the truth, and the truth did set people free.

Today, the philosophers in our culture question whether truth exists or not. They ask is there “absolute truth” or is it just something we make up. Others modern philosophers want to know if anyone can know truth with any kind of certainty. They asked is truth even important? This uncertainly about what is truth has made a mess of things. It is why we face so many uncertainties, so many disagreements in our culture today because we no longer agree on what is truth.

Because of this uncertainty, truth often takes a backseat to emotions. People live according to their feelings rather than Biblical truth. Many base their decisions, moral and otherwise, on how they “feel”. Passions have become more important than one’s ability to think things through, more important than truth. Relativism is the name given to this view. Relativism means that ethical truths depend on the biases of the individuals and groups holding them and not on absolutes as found in our Bible. Relativism says that what is moral depends on the society in which you happen to be living.

A powerful example of relativism occurred in Germany in the 1930's and the first half of the 1940's. The great unfairness of the Germans having to pay war reparations to the Allies for the damage done in WWI plus the pain of the Great Depression, the German people were literally starving. The Nazi Party promised better. Early on, Nazi Brown Shirt attack dissenters. Then they burned books. Before the end of 1933, there were work camps for the undesirables. In March of 1934, the Nazi's had enough power to take control of the government. Quickly, the Nazi's outlawed all other political parties. From then on, whatever the Nazi's decided was moral and was made law. To disagree could be fatal. By mid-1942, the genocide of Jews, undesirables and Gypsies was a consuming Nazi goal.

Relativism has invaded our American culture. It is so rampant that in a recent Barna poll, 57% of Americans believe that right and wrong are personal choices. This relativistic approach has led to many errors. The sad result is that we have lost the ability to have and discuss honest differences of opinions for what we hold as true differs so drastically. This relativistic approach is why we hear from many politicians and some in the media remind us of what Plato said, “Imposters and fools speak as loudly as saints and scholars.” Political "spin" has replaced truth. When politicians often spin the facts into lies, they cause others to reach false conclusions. This is an attack on people's ability to make sound decisions. This is dangerous for the debating what is true is the vital process of making good decisions in a democratic society.

Look at the well thought out wisdom of our Declaration of Independence: "When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."