Skip to main content

My Weather



These days it has become popular to attach a possessive adjective to the word truth. One says, You’ve just got to live your truth, while another says, That may be right for you to believe, but this is my truth.

 

Your truth? My truth? What ever happened to the truth? How I miss the indefinite article rather than the possessive adjective! 

 

In his wonderful book The Thrill of Orthodoxy, Trevin Wax compared this way of thinking to the weather. “You may love the plentiful sunshine of a cloudless morning in late spring, or the gentle fall of snowflakes on a winter night. You may have your preferences, but you don't say my weather and your weather, because you're not in control. It's something that's there, something that happens, to which you must adapt.”

 

If we want sunshine and are dealt rain, we fool ourselves if we simply declare, “Well, my weather is sunshine!” That person would not be taken seriously. No one would be asked to play along, pretending it is sunny when it is raining. In America, you are considered a bigot if you carry an umbrella after I declared it to be sunny. That is delusional, and we do not affirm delusions. 

 

Unless of course, we are talking about something as important as truth. Then we are all asked to affirm delusions, as long as a person proclaims something to be their truth. 

 

Truth, like the weather, is out of our control. We can love it or hate it, but we can not change it. Truth may or may not be politically correct; it may or may not poll well; it might get you cancelled, but it is what it is. 

 

If you tell me you identify as a cat, I’m affirming your delusion if I bring you a litter box. Your truth might be that you are a cat, but the truth is that you are a human. And only one of those is real. 

 

The source of truth is not found within us; indeed, the Bible says in Jeremiah 17:9, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” Following your heart—or your truth—can lead you to a spoiled life, and ultimately to hell. 

 

In John 10:17 Jesus prayed for His disciples, and He said these words: “Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.” If you are looking for real truth, look to God’s Word, the unchanging source of lifegiving truth. It will never lead us astray. It will never lead us into delusion. It will lead us to fulfill our calling, to be in a real relationship with our Creator.

 

That is the truth. 

Labels

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

To Save a Life

(Like my blog about the peace symbol, this blog was written as a default response to all the parents, students, and other people who are asking my opinion of To Save a Life.) By now you have probably heard of the movie To Save a Life, which opened nation-wide in theaters on January 22nd. The movie deals with so many issues that teens face today, like suicide, cutting, drinking, drugs, premarital sex, teen pregnancy, and abortion. At first glance this movie looks like an awesome resource that we should recommend for our teens, parents, youth pastors, and youth workers. But a closer look at the movie reveals a few disturbing things. For starters, according to pluggedin.com, there are 2 uses of the “A” word, 5 uses of hell (used as a curse word), and once the “D” word is used. There are other crude terms used to describe a girl, and crude terms for referring to sexual activity. There is also a bedroom scene that shows a girl removing a boy’s shirt, then afterwards the girl putting he...
38 comments
Read more

All Things To All Men

One of our favorite verses to use in our evangelism methods is where Paul said that he “becomes all things to all men” so that he might “by all means save some (I Corinthians 9:22).” This is certainly a good idea if we keep it in its proper context and application. For example, I remember a time in high school where I knew a kid that loved skateboarding. Being the chicken that I am, I was never a skateboarder. All he would talk about was skating, and I knew none of his lingo. But to help develop a relationship with him (he was new to our church and didn’t know many people), I brushed up on my skating lingo so I could ask if he had done any sick ollies lately (impressed?). This would be like Paul saying “to the skateboarder, I became a skateboarder.” This is effective and necessary. But then there are the people that use this verse to justify doing sinful things in the name of evangelism. The first one that comes to mind is about drinking. Some people will go into the bars to evan...
23 comments
Read more

Evangelism

“Preach the gospel at all times, and when necessary, use words.” St. Francis of Assisi is given credit for this famous quote (although that exact phrasing does not appear in any of his writings), and a lot of people would think that this is a great philosophy. His actual quote was that everyone should “preach by their deeds.” Preaching with our deeds is not just a strategy, it is a necessity. We are commanded all through the Scriptures to let our light shine and be a peculiar people. People should be able to look at our lives and see that we are Christians. They should see the love of Christ readily on display, and thus feel compelled to live their lives in the same way. The sermon that we should preach with our lives is a sermon of love, joy, peace, patience, self-control, forgiveness, conviction, etc. But this idea that has emerged that says we should ONLY preach with our deeds is a heresy straight from the devil himself. Think about it: who is the one that does not want you t...
18 comments
Read more