We Shall Know the Truth

Jesus Christ is a man, a God-man.  He is personal (Jn 1:14).  He is God (Jn 1:1).  Even further, Christ Himself is the personal embodiment of truth - yes, Jesus is Truth (Jn 14:6).  While volumes could and have been written on these propositions,  the purpose of this post is quite narrow; not to write a volume, but an essay - less than 501 words.

Truth, the grand Reality, stands independently of its creation.  It is objective, which means it does not depend on another for its true meaning.  To be more personal, we proclaim that Jesus Christ stands independent of His creation.  He is objective, and does not depend on His creation for His true meaning.

Just because His creation does not determine His meaning, does not exclude His creation from responsibilities concerning Him.  Man was created in the image of God (Gen 1:27).  As such, man is God's representative on earth.  Because of his covenantal relationship to God, he is morally obligated to be God's faithful representative on earth (Exodus 20:16).

Simply put, God is Truth and it is man's obligation to faithfully represent Him.  Man must tell the truth.

While I can begin the above sentence with the word "simply," we all know it is not that simple.  Man fell from his "very good" estate (Gen 3).  And because of this tragic event, he is totally depraved, being unable to rightly fullfil his obligation to faithfully represent God.  This is death.  It is enslavement to misrepresenting the truth.

Perhaps one of the greatest depicted effects of the fall is found in John 18 when Pilate looks Truth in the face and asks, "What is Truth?"  Here we learn that truth exists even when people reject it.  We also learn that people turn and create all types of falsehoods and call them truth.  As McDurmon rightly says, "These activities represent fallen man's desperate attempts to impute his own truth instead of God's."

It is important to understand that after the fall Truth did not change.  God is immutable. The change happened in man and his ability to know and represent the Truth.  After the fall, man was bound to breaking, at least, the 9th commandment.

But God did not leave man in his misery.  The "Image of the invisible God" came to redeem fallen man.  In Christ, truth is revealed to us (Col 2).  Therefore, we can know the truth and be freed from our enslavement to lies (Jn 8:32).  Contrary to popular belief, a Christian can know the Truth; not because he/she has superior intellectual powers, but because God does.  As the Truth is written, "we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us" (2 Cor 4:7).

Doctrine is not a bad word when understood in this revelatory light.  A confession to know the truth must be accompanied with a confession that we are but jars of clay.

This is what Harris calls Humble Orthodoxy.