TRAMPLING TRUTH

From My Perspective - - -

The present reality of our day is whether truth is tantamount or truth is trampled. The Bucks County Courier-Times in Pennsylvania published the following opinion in November 2013 by James F. Burns: “If you like your current government, you can keep it. If you like your current Congressmen — your political doctors — you can keep them, too. Call me old-fashioned, but somewhere between political promises from Washington and Miley Cyrus twerking America, I sense a moral degeneracy in which truth and good taste are being trampled by greed and garishness. Call me old-fashioned, but when guest speakers at Ivy League schools are shouted down and driven off the stage in the name of social justice and free speech, I see deeply irresponsible students and absentee university leaders…” Is this a correct assessment of the day and time in which we are living? Hopefully, you will respond with an emphatic agreement.

In Psychology Today (November 2013), Lisa Firestone, Ph.D. discusses: Why We Lie and How to Stop. She begins with the following: There’s a scene in the movie “Something’s Gotta Give” that simply and succinctly captures one reality about the truth. After catching the man she loves on a date with another woman, Diane Keaton is chased out of the restaurant by a guilty and distraught Jack Nicholson. When he finally stops her, he pleads, “I have never lied to you, I have always told you some version of the truth.” She replies, “The truth doesn't have versions, okay?” And that’s the truth. The truth may have many sides to it. It may be complicated or hard to understand, but it exists… in one version. Yet, most of us have trouble with the truth. We may not be outright liars, but we certainly shade the truth to make it fit more comfortably into our lives—to keep it from disrupting anything from our careers to our relationships to our afternoons.” She then highlights areas in which all tend to be less than honest by means of (1) omission, (2) exaggeration, (3) covert communication, (4) self-protection, (5) controlled responses, (6) covert communications, and (7) deliberate deception.

The lack of integrity/honesty should not come as a surprise. The first temptation of human beings in The Garden of Eden was based upon a lie. In a general way, Jesus spoke precisely to this issue when dealing with the Scribes and Pharisees in John 8:44-45, “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. But because I tell the truth, you do not believe Me.”  The prophet speaks of a day that seems to foresee the present in Isaiah 59:14, “Justice is turned back, and righteousness stands far away; for truth has stumbled in the public squares, and uprightness cannot enter.”

The core of Jesus’ ministry was the necessity for Truth. To that end, He declared in John 8:31-32, “Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him: If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” He reiterated this premise to the disciples in John 14:6 where He stated: I am The Way, The Truth, and The Life…” This is clarified with the focus on Truth as Jesus approached His Crucifixion, John 18:35-38. The exchange between Pilate and Jesus included: “What have you done? 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. 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. 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.” 

Pilate lacked the courage to stand for truth and with The Truth. One can only wonder how often “we” shrink back from representing the Truth and allowing for improper behavior and communication. Could it be that “we” are so starved for acceptance that “we” compromise our foundational principles to maintain a “friendship”? Prayerfully and Honestly, consider these things with me.