The Daily Ricky

WHAT IS TRUTH?

So Pilate entered his headquarters again and called Jesus and said to him, "Are you the King of the Jews?" 34 Jesus answered, "Do you say this of your own accord, or did others say it to you about me?" 35 Pilate answered, "Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered you over to me. What have you done?" 36 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." 37 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." 38 Pilate said to him, "What is truth?" – John 18:33-38

We have heard it said, “It is the honest truth.” which usually means, “It is the truth as we know it.” Pilate, like many of us, had heard so many testimonies that run contrary that he had come to question truth. The honest truth is most often a rare find. Hidden motives, a dark side or opt outs are the case rather than the exception. She didn’t lie. She just changed her mind. Oh, didn’t you know that this was predicated upon such and such.

We are not all knowing creatures. We all live by a certain measure of faith. That faith may be in others, natural processes or laws and in the way we have come to know our universe and its routines in our lives. These have become truths for us. We predicate our spiritual beliefs upon that which we know so little about and look for that premise, foundation or experience upon which we move forward with life. Often times we get hard nosed and frustrated. If something looms as an apparent contradicting we look for why it appears so. The reason for this is that we have come to accept that our premise as rock solid honest universal truth. You either believe in this way or you believe that all truth is relative, good during a certain space or time but much like a floating rock.

Pilate was a man caught in midst of battling forces over truth and his place as an official of Rome . It was not an easy place to be. He saw hypocrisy and he had a sense of the right direction, but then there was Rome . He wanted to appease, or find a place of reason but it was not to be so with this crowd. He allowed evil to prevail.

Often we can allow people to work out their differences and come to some point of toleration and peace yet when a great light shines where is darkness to hide? It cries out, “Crucify the Light, we don’t want that truth because it threatens everything!”

Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me (John 14:6).” In the way this it is stated there is no middle ground. Here is a premise we either accept or reject. If Jesus is who He claimed to be then there is nothing more important than getting to know Him. It is from this point we move forward into life and look backward into time for those things that testify of Him. Then we build our faith upon what we see revealed and the changes He is making in our life experience.

He bears witness of the truth about what I am and the truth about who He is and what He has come to make of me. We listen to Him and He speaks to us. Are you after this truth that is not relative but an honest truth?

Grace and Peace and Joy to you all be multiplied,


Bill