Truth

The whole world is crying out for truth and yet they cannot find it because they don’t know what truth is; this is just as true of the Church as it is of the world. The Church would generally take the view that the Word of God is truth and so it is in one sense; but truth is more than just the Word. It is the anointed Word, the Word set alive by the Holy Spirit and brought to life in the heart of a believer.

“It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is of no avail. The words (rhema) that I have spoken to you are spirit and life” (John 6:63). Truth then, brings life and if it doesn’t it is not truth. “You have the words (rhema) of eternal life” (John 6:68), Peter said of Jesus. That is what truth is; eternal life. How does the truth bring eternal life? Through obedience; there is no other way. It is written of Jesus; “and being perfected, He became to all those obeying Him the source of eternal salvation” (Hebrews 5:9).

The Word without the Spirit is not truth; it is what is known as “the doctrines of men”. The Word needs the Spirit to become truth; while you can know the Word without the Spirit, you can’t know the truth without the Spirit.

The Word contains in itself a security system that can only be opened by divine revelation, which is a stream of consciousness coming from the throne of God into the heart of man. Whereas the natural man must know in order to believe, the spiritual man must believe in order to know. If you do not believe, you cannot know; that is the mystery of the truth. Even if you believe it does not automatically follow that you will know the truth; the Word must engage the heart, not the mind, before becoming truth. David wrote “Thy Word have I hid in my heart that I may not sin against Thee”: (Psalm 119:11).

God addresses His words of truth to those He has prepared to receive them; He actually conceals their meaning from those who are not His, as for example in the use of parables, or “dark sayings”; “Then the disciples came and said to him, “Why do you speak to them in parables?” And he answered them, “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given” (Matthew 13:10-11). Put another way, for those who believe, proof is unnecessary; for those who do not believe, no proof is possible.

The purpose of truth is to guide the whole life of man, to reveal to him the ways of God in which he should walk. Truth is given to bring life; it must be lived to be truth; if there is no life there is no truth, if there is no faithfulness to truth there is no truth, just human vanity and religious froth and frolic. “I am the way, and the truth, and the life” Jesus said of Himself (John 14:6); truth then, is also a person, Jesus Christ, and thus, truth will always reflect His character and nature and bear His fruit. What Jesus is also saying here is that unless you are on the “narrow way” (Matthew 7:14) you cannot know the truth and without the truth there can be no life.

Truth must bear fruit; the fruit of faithfulness to truth is righteousness and the fruit of righteousness is peace with God; the fruit of truth is obedience and the fruit of obedience is more truth. That is how God’s economy works; “For to the one who has, more will be given, and he will have an abundance, but from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away” (Matthew 13:12).

Truth cannot be what man chooses to make of the Word of God; truth must come from Christ by the Holy Spirit. “He will guide you into all truth” Jesus said of the Spirit (John 16:13); only the Spirit can do that. Truth, being the personification of Jesus, is indivisible and man is not able to self-select that truth which he is willing to follow, although he commonly endeavours to do just that.

Truth is what God is speaking; it is the rhema, of which Jesus said; “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word (rhema) proceeding through the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4). “Proceeding” here is a present participle and gives a continuous sense. “See (imperative) that you do not refuse the One speaking; for if those did not escape refusing the One warning upon earth, how much more us refusing the One warning from heaven” (Hebrews 12:25). The verb refuse here is parateomai and means “begging off” or “making excuses”. This word is used in the parable of the great banquet where those invited “begged off” attending; “But they all alike began to make excuses (beg off). The first said to him, ‘I have bought a field, and I must go out and see it. Please have me excused” (Luke 14:18).

So, the writer to the Hebrews is saying, if we cannot hear God speaking we should not make excuses; after all, He has promised to speak to us and even says that His sheep are those that hear His voice (John 10:27). Hearing God is a gift; “The one having ears to hear, let him hear!” Jesus says. “Let him hear” is a command in the imperative voice. Jesus is releasing His voice to those who will hear. The one thing God’s people need to know is how to hear the voice of God and know the truth, yet it is hardly taught in our Churches.

“The truth will set you free” Jesus said (John 8:32). Free from what? Free from religious bondage which is the condition that the Jews were under at the time. God’s people are still in thrall to religion, giving themselves over to the doctrines of men as opposed to hearing the voice of Christ by the Holy Spirit. Whereas the word of truth is meant to liberate, religion turns the Word into bondage. The Sabbath regulations were a case in point in Jesus’ day. When Jesus healed the paralysed man on the Sabbath, the Jewish leaders did not rejoice over the miraculous work of God; instead, they were critical that their Sabbath laws had been broken. Jesus or course was the Lord of the Sabbath (Mark 2:28) and the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath (Mark 2:27).

“You search the scriptures because you think in them to have eternal life; and it is they that are bearing witness concerning Me” Jesus said (John 5:39). This is an example of religious “truth”. The Jews clung religiously to their scriptures, but when the One of Whom they spoke and to Whom all the prophecies pointed, appeared, they not only rejected Him but crucified Him. Although He was speaking life-giving words, they couldn’t hear Him because He didn’t fit into their religious framework and thus, was, in their eyes, a threat to their religious system and their own livelihood. The Jews claimed that the Father was their God but they did not know Him (John 8:54-55). The same can be said today of the Church; they claim Jesus as Lord but, in very large measure, they do not know Him as Lord and do not hear His voice.

Religion brings comfort, which is peace of mind; it is a false peace and is the peace of the world (John 14:27); it is not the peace of God and it leads to a false righteousness; self righteousness. Religious comfort is based on a false truth; it is based on the Word but is not received of the Spirit; it is the Word selectively applied and cannot bring life. An example can be seen in the life of Saul in 1 Samuel 15:3-23. Saul had been instructed to “utterly destroy“ the Amalekites and all their possessions but, in his own wisdom, he spared Agag the king and kept the finest of the flock of Amalek. Thus, Saul took what he wanted of the word of God and it became not truth, but a lie. God rejected him as king over Israel from that day.

Finally, Jesus is the Word that became flesh (John 1:14); the living Word; the Word of life and the Word of truth.