Musings on the Truth
John 8:44 You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it.
John 14:6 Jesus said to him, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.
Using the Instructions
Have you ever bought a piece of furniture or a grill or a portable metal shed that came in pieces with instructions as to how to put it together? Have you ever looked at the instructions and decided that they were too complicated to understand so you just went off on your own and started putting things together? After all, what man needs a set of directions? However, after a few frustrating hours did you ever come to the conclusion that a little time spent studying the instructions would have saved a lot of time in taking your unfinished project apart and putting it together again according to the instructions? I unfortunately have had that experience! I am afraid that scenario is going to describe the way a lot of people have approached their relationship with God. Unfortunately, there is going to be no place to start over when once the truth has been experienced after death.
Why do I believe that the Bible tells the Truth?
I believe the Bible based on inductive reasoning. If God tells me the truth about one thing, I assume He tells me the truth about other things. When a man deliberately lies to me about one thing, I assume that he will lie to me about other things. Now that may not be true but most of us operate using inductive reasoning all of our lives. Deductive reasoning is associated with the scientific method. Inductive reasoning is the basis for most of our decisions in life. We trust our doctors because we have had good experiences with them. We trust our banks because so far we have not lost any money that we committed to them. We do business with people that have a habit of paying their bills.
What has God told me that I know to be true?
First of all, He has told me that there is evil in this world. We have all seen that evil in the destruction of the twin towers in New York City. We have seen that evil in random school shootings. We have seen that evil in political leaders that kill their own countrymen. I do not need to list the events in this life that have absolutely no explanation apart from the fact that men have allowed themselves to be deceived by a murderer called the devil. He doesn’t care what lie a person believes, He only cares that we do not believe the truth.
Second of all, God has told me that He through the Lord and the agency of the Holy Spirit created all that is in this world. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that most of the technology that we use today was created. It didn’t just happen. It doesn’t take any genius to believe that cars didn’t just "happen" to come into existence. It doesn’t take any genius to use inductive reasoning to be convinced that we are created beings and that we didn’t just happen to come into existence.
Third, I could give other reasons as to why I believe God but they wouldn’t mean much to anybody but me. I have seen the protection of guardian angels in my life. I have experienced the leading of the Holy Spirit in my work for the Lord.
Fourth, the Bible has internal proof that it is the very word of God. When we used to take aptitude tests in school, there were questions that were called validity checks. They basically asked the same things in different ways to see if a person was trying to answer honestly or if they were just randomly filling in the multiple choice options on their answer sheet. The Lord has validity checks in the Bible. One of them has to do with the prophecies of the Old Testament about the Lord Jesus that were fulfilled when the Lord came. I have a list of 44 of these that I have been explaining on my radio programs. Admittedly, there is overlap in some of them but all of the prophecies were given over 400 years before the Lord came and many of them were written down 1500 years before the Lord came dealing with historical events that occurred at least 4000 years before the Lord came. The prophecies were not written by one man but by many. The fulfillments were not recorded by just one man but by many. There are other validity checks having to do with the nation of Israel. One can hardly study these validity checks and come away saying that God does not know the end from the beginning. One has to come to the conclusion that we are created beings, accountable to a God who loves us but who will judge us vehemently and in wrath if we reject Him and His love.
What is Truth?
This question was asked by Pilate before he allowed the Lord to be executed. I know that that Romans 5:6-8 is the truth: “For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
John 3:16-18 is bedrock truth. It says, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.”
My prayer is that everyone who reads this will believe what God has said so that when that final breath is taken you will not only know the truth but you will enjoy the blessings associated with trusting that Truth.
Bruce Collins
Meditation for the week of March 11, 2018