In the beginning was the Word,

Jesus said to him,

For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world—

We live in a world that would answer the question, “What is Truth?” in a number of different ways. Which is interesting in itself, given that the definition of truth is actually pretty simple. Truth ultimately comes down to, that which is. Perspectives and opinions on truth are actually in a completely different category of things. There are obviously a whole lot of opinions on everything. But we are talking about objective truth not subjective perspective or opinion and it is very important to keep those categories separate for this kind of conversation. Statements are true or false based on how accurately they reflect that which is.

This article will also assume that you accept that God is God, and that Jesus is God incarnate, since this newsletter is about walking the way of Jesus. I will not be offering a defense of God’s existence it will be a foundational assumption in this article.

Let’s get real

So when we speak of the truth we are talking about all that actually is. The sum total of actual reality. In fact The Truth when used in this sense is functionally just a synonym for all of objective reality.

Let’s look at some of the passages I have highlighted above. The first passage taken from the beginning of John’s gospel may seem like an odd choice, since it does not even mention the word “truth”. But again, since truth is “that which is”, this passage actually has a lot to offer us in understanding truth.

Let’s step back a bit. When Moses asked God for His name, God simply responded, “I am who I am, Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’”. God just simply is. God is reality. God is the truth. So when John begins his gospel with “In the beginning was the Word” he is making a deep connection between that “Word” and God. He goes on to say that “the Word was with God and the Word was God”. “He was in the beginning with God and without Him was not anything made that was made”. And finally, in verse 14 of this passage John connects the last dot, “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth”.

So when Jesus says, “I am the way, the truth, and the life” this is not metaphor, this is literal fact. The Word was, the Word is, and the Word will always be. Jesus is the Word. So Jesus is The Truth. All that we know of reality came through Him. He is the foundation of reality itself, he is therefore quite literally - the truth.

Well that might be your truth…

Now we have to address this common thought. That being - since each person has their own unique perspective on truth, then either there is no such thing as truth, or truth can not be actually known by anyone.

Let’s consider these two positions one by one.

There really is no such thing as actual objective truth.

In other words there is no truth that is not a matter of interpretation, therefore objective truth is essentially non-existent. This idea rests on the observation that reality, can only be perceived by an individual observer’s senses and therefore is not by definition objectively true it is only true from a particular perspective. This objection is brought into play by a variety of people ranging from armchair quantum physicists to armchair philosophers on the internet and assumes there is no ultimate perspective - like God for example.

Let’s think about this. Is it really true that our inability to clearly or accurately grasp or fully agree on “that which is” makes “that which is” disappear. That seems absurd on the face of it. What is, is; whether we perceive it correctly, incorrectly, or even if we fail to perceive it at all. It’s like declaring that math does not exist because our calculator is broken.

You see, God’s calculator works just fine. God is primary - creation is secondary and fully dependent on God. Without God there is ultimately no anything. Since his existence is objectively real, therefore we know there is an objective reality and therefore there is an objective truth - whether we perceive it or not is irrelevant. Whether we as part of creation even exist is irrelevant to the existence of objective truth. So this thought fails badly in the actual world which God has created.

Next objection, there may be an objective truth but we can not know what it is due to our limited and often distorted perspective of reality.

Of the two I think this is at least a better objection because it does not overreach as badly as the first objection does. But this is not a modern thought. This cynicism about the human ability to know truth was solidly in place in Jesus’ time. Pilot dryly responded to Jesus speaking about the truth with a very dismissive, “What is truth?”. To use our math analogy again, this objection says in effect, math exists but we can’t really know the answer because our calculator is broken.

To be honest I think this would be a fair point - if there was no Jesus. If the Word did not exist from the beginning, if the Word did not become flesh and dwell among us our situation would in fact be - totally hopeless. Because the only way that we can know the truth is if the truth reveals itself to us. Our perspective is limited and hopelessly warped by sin. Our calculator is broken by sin and human limitation. But God did not leave us in that state. He revealed the truth to us in Jesus. Jesus is the embodiment (or incarnation) of truth.

Wait! I have a different objection!!

Ok, you may have any number of different objections. I may not know what they are - but it really does not matter.

“How dare you dismiss my objections! Why don’t they matter?”

Because any argument against the existence of objective truth is an excellent reason not to believe the argument. Arguments against truth are inherently self-defeating. Why should anyone believe anything if there is no objective truth. Life becomes an incoherent mess at that point that will ultimately end with might making right. Sort of like the world we see on the news and on the internet everyday.

So Whose Truth do I believe??

God’s truth… His name is Jesus.

God is I am. God is “that which is”. God defines reality. God anchors reality. Reality is truth.

Jesus is the Word, and the Word is with God and the Word is God.

Jesus is “that which is”. Jesus is truth. To know Jesus is to know the truth.

And finally, to get back to our inability to know the truth, you can know the ocean without seeing all of it. Children can know their parents without knowing every last detail about their parents. We can know the truth without knowing everything. Because, we can know Jesus in this relational though incomplete sense, we can trust Him with the things we don’t know, because he is trustworthy. As the embodiment of truth and our Savior he will cover that which we don’t or can’t know with his loving grace.

All that is required to know the truth is enough humility to realize our need of it, and courage enough to embrace it. The truth is bigger than our perceptions of it. The truth is bigger than our opinions. The truth is bigger than the creation it describes. God is. God is the the creator. Jesus is the Word. Jesus is the Truth. We can know Him. We can trust Him, because he gave everything to save humanity from its hopeless state, motivated by nothing but his love for all of us.

To know him, is to trust him.

To know him, is to know the truth.

Have a great week!