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I dream of a better world -
where a chicken can cross the road
without his motives being questioned.
I think we all dream of a better world don’t we? When we look at…and we don’t have to go to the news channels or social media…we probably know enough rough stuff going on in our lives and in the lives of those close to us to know and want a “Better World.” And sometimes, maybe most of the time, having a better world starts with each of us doesn’t it? Individually. God changing our heart first.
Now we’re a church family. And today we’re going to introduce series of messages - teachings that will help us remember and know what we believe to be true.
Now…beliefs need to go somewhere…they have to do something. If they don’t go somewhere or change something in or around us they are just “thoughts.”
So I think we could say we need to make sure our beliefs, since they go somewhere, should be grounded in God’s truth.
As a church family, we’ll do, speak, serve, minister, according to our beliefs..those things we hold as true.
Short illustration that many of you have seen me use before…everyone stand up. Ok…no in the middle of this illustration we’re going to do something we do occasionally. Greet some people around you…say your name…repeat the person you greeted with their name…no mistakes this way…and those of you who often forget names like I do, this will help all of us.
Now…on the way out, make sure to say something to the people you’ve just met…use their name…have a good day, rest of the weekend etc.
Ok…now sit down.
Most of you when you stood and when you sat down, you operated by a belief. You all know about gravity right? You operated by what you believe to be true about gravity. You didn’t think about standing up…or holding on to something fearing you might float to the ceiling if you let go. And when you sat down, you did so at a certain speed that was comfortable…you knew you’d be moving toward the pew and were ready..as always…to land. You didn’t second guess whether or not you wouldn’t. You operated within the truth of gravity.
Pontius Pilate - Governor or Judea - at the time of Jesus. Many of you will remember that he was the one who finalized Christ’s crucifixion.
Just before that though, Pilate is asking Jesus questions…questions as to why he is or is not guilty and worthy of death.
John 18:37–38 (CSB)
37 “You are a king then?” Pilate asked. “You say that I’m a king,” Jesus replied. “I was born for this, and I have come into the world for this:
to testify to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.”
38 “What is truth?” said Pilate.
Let’s sit back for a moment and question something. Now, this message is going to set up a bunch of messages this summer…I’m not really sure how many quite yet. But we’re going to begin, as a church family, to go through our foundational beliefs.
In our constitution and by-laws, we have a statement of belief. What we believe to be true as a church family. What we believe to be true about God and the world He has created.
It is basically us, making a statement, about what we think is truth.
TRUTH - Now in today’s culture, and its kinda always been this way but right now TRUTH seems to be a very touchy subject. It’s OK to make a statement of truth, what you believe to be true, but if it counters someone else’s truth…then you might want to watch out.
In some circles, anything short of everything being OK, is wrong. Which really can’t make sense logically…but that’s where many people have gotten to in their lives…in their beliefs.
Over the last 3 weeks we looked at where our real battle is…and the Armor that God gives us. The armor that is completely from Him…given to help us navigate life, to protect us, and to help us help others see truth as well.
Truth, Righteousness, The Gospel of Peace, Faith, Salvation, and God’s Word.
So we now wade a little deeper in these things called beliefs. With our armor on.
The question is, can we know truth?
We live in a world of competing worldviews don’t we. You’ve often heard me say that we are in a war of messages. Messages that try to lead towards something, a belief, or away from a belief.
Now today, there is a very loud message saying that you can’t know truth. You can’t know it…because there’s no absolute truth. Most things or all things are relative. Or…in a more personal statement…in the mind and heart of many people (maybe you and I sometimes)…what I want to be true is.
Now, if that statement is true...
Can humanity live like that?
Well, let’s look for a second at the idea of a worldview. A worldview is pretty simple.
SLIDE
A worldview is “the sum total of our beliefs about the world.” (Chuck Colson). We all have a worldview, it consists of certain parts, and leads to real-life actions.
Here’s a more technical answer.
SLIDE
Worldview - The framework from which we view reality and make sense of life and the world.
God (Theology)
Knowledge (Epistemology)
Origin (Cosmology)
Humanity (Anthropology)
Morality (Ethics)
Salvation (Soteriology)
Meaning (Teleology)
Destiny (Eschatology) Eternity
Truth. ‘How’ we view truth about anything and everything means something huge.
Our beliefs help us with our values.
Our values help us act and behave…or misbehave.
Truth - What do we know.
The most intelligently astute years for children are at ages 4 and 17. At four they know all the questions. At 17 they know all the answers. :)
I believe chocolate is good. I value chocolate…enough that I’ll hand a store clerk money to buy chocolate. It has value to me. Therefore I will buy and eat it.
Belief, Value, Action
How we live…what we do day to day, reflects what we believe to be true.
Let’s go with something simple:
SLIDE
1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
Very simple. There was nothing, then God, who was already in existence, created everything.
Belief - God is real, He’s the creator...
Value - If God is who He says He is…then we value Him and everything about Him
Action - We act in ways that please Him, that honor Him, that Glorify Him and we give up ways of life that would go against those things.
God is Real, We hold Him in the highest place of Value (above everything else), our beliefs and values lead to actions that reflect those beliefs and values…we do things that would honor Him and lift Him up before others.
Simple right?
Nowadays common belief questions God, denies His existence, or just defies Him. I truly believe that there people who just don’t know about God…who don’t know much about Him…haven’t had opportunity or that draw to come closer. I believe if they truly found Christianity to be true…they’d accept it. There are some who are blinded so much so that they just don’t see it, deny it. There are some who defy it…meaning they think there’s more to life than simple evolution and random existence…but they don’t want there to be a loving God.
…meaning, if God is real, then that would necessitate their values and actions to change…and they don’t want to change.
When we read the Bible, Jesus and others talk about reality…or the truth…a ton. There are so many times when Jesus might say, truly I tell you, Here is the truth, …and on and on. He’s helping people see truth. Now why would He do that? Because there are lies around, misconceptions, wrong perceptions, twists of truth…all from - or originating from…the father of lies…Satan.
Either something is true or its not. There were great philosophers who tackled this idea…concerning truth.
Here’s a simple exercise for this....2 plus 2 is four…2 and 2 can’t also be 5.
God either exists or He doesn’t. He con’t both exist and not- exist.
I say all of that to just say…The truth is out there. (cue the x-files music)
The truth is out there
We all need to remember something…and this goes all the way back to the beginning. And, please know, I battle this all the time. In the garden, in the beginning…all Satan needed to do was twist truth a little. For some reason Adam allowed the serpent into the garden, and then Eve was asked, “Did God really say...” The truth was, yes, God said… The twist was, well if God maybe didn’t say that exactly, then you can rely on your own thinking. Look how good the fruit looks! Don’t you really want to take a bite?
And Eve…right there we see the Battle Paul discussed…the battle that is not against flesh and blood. Here Satan sets it up…believe what is true about God…or make up your own “truth.”
You believe whatever you want to be true.
Here’s where the heart changed for humanity. Instead of serving God, humans began to serve themselves. Instead of being selfless, we (me included) became selfish, instead of resting peacefully in our place as children of God, we put ourselves in God’s place.
And now we have hearts that need recreated.
We have decisions like this everyday don’t we? What do we believe true? What or who do we value? And then…how do we talk, behave, think, decide, how do we feel? All of those things.
Paul wrote this in his letter to the Philippian church family
Philippians 4:8 (ESV)
8 Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.
What’s Paul trying to say…keep your mind focused on truth. Goodness. Love. Excellence. And what…or who…is the reference point for all of these things? God.
As Christians, part of our commitment is to say: I’m going to fight myself, my own worst enemy, me, and in the power of the Holy Spirit, in Christ’s power, I will try to live out things in the proper order.
I’m going to embrace God’s way, instead of my way. Instead of defining truth the way I want it to be, which is an illusion, I’m going to study God’s word and embrace what is actually the truth. Instead of being selfish I’m going to try to be loving and caring for others. Instead of trying to play god and force things to go my way, I’m going to let go, and let God run the universe. He is after all, much better at it than us.
In the current culture we see the battle going on right now. And remember, this isn’t a battle of flesh and blood. This is the battle that Satan brought…while he twists truth…encouraging people to make their own truth. In the recent past we had the differing views of what marriage is or isn’t. Then biological identity. And now, in terms of identity, there’s a battle for what is correct or right within the realm of sexual attraction. Can we simply decide what is right in all of these things or do we rely on God’s word? What would Satan do? I think that he would cause confusion that leads to people wanting to do things their own way…any way that might help them feel good for a moment in time. This isn’t easy. Truth matters.
There’s the battle over the definition of human life. And this isn’t just a battle over abortion …this is a battle over the entire meaning of life…from conception…to the pursuit of identity…the pursuit of meaning and purpose…all the way to the end of life as well. We ask questions as to what is a “quality of life” definition. In some areas of our world decisions are made on who receives care based on a “norm” of what quality means. And life from beginning to end is decided on a scale of defined quality.
What would happen if we took God at His word. He created humanity. Set them up to be in families…who can produce more imagers of God…to cover the earth as families who love Him and exist in His peace. Everyone would be valued. Which would mean that our actions would reflect the love and value we have for each other. That’s not quite what we see…and
…and this is hard to say…but this isn’t quite how we operate personally is it? This is tough
Truth Matters
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
2 This one was in the beginning with God.
3 All things came into being through him, and apart from him not one thing came into being that has come into being.
4 In him was life, and the life was the light of humanity.
5 And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.
That’s huge if it is true. Jesus created everything. Our life comes from Him. Our life reflects His light. There is darkness, but the darkness cannot overcome the light.
In our world today there’s the idea that there is no God or higher being. Our existence rests in mathematical probabilities....chance…and our existence as we know it today is a material existence. We appear, as evolution moves along…and then we disappear. This would be called materialism. Another term used today is scientism.
Now, just as 2 plus 2 has an answer....
How this all began has an answer too. It can’t be both “In the beginning God created” and “we’re all just soft robots”…just material.
One has to be true.
God is who He said He is or there is no God.
What we have to do here is this. We need to read and study God’s word. Make decisions as to what matches up with the reality we see around us. My personal assessment is this...
When I look around at simply biology, science, relationships, the order of the universe, the uniquness of everything in creation as well as the foundations of life, at our sense and ideas about morality…that there seems to be an idea of right and wrong in the world…I lean heavily towards the existence of God. It makes sense that this is where truth is.
But that doesn’t mean that I stop searching and leaning in and reading His word.
Paul wrote to the church in Corinth to keep learning and leaning in. 2 Corinthians 10:5 says
3 For although we live in the flesh, we do not wage war according to the flesh,
4 since the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but are powerful through God for the demolition of strongholds. We demolish arguments
5 and every proud thing that is raised up against the knowledge of God, and we take every thought captive to obey Christ.
And that is pretty telling isn’t it.
Does truth matter? Paul says yes…absolutely. Paul says that we will demolish…take down…arguments…ideas…we’ll call out lies and twists of truth so that people know truth.
Jesus said this… John 14:6
6 Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
15 “If you love me, you will keep my commands.
16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever.
17 He is the Spirit of truth. The world is unable to receive him because it doesn’t see him or know him. But you do know him, because he remains with you and will be in you.
32 You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
Truth Matters. Truth releases us from the tied up chained to bondage of sin and it’s results. Truth sets us from from what has caged us in since sin appeared. Now…freedom doesn’t mean do whatever the heck you want. Freedom means free from sin and it’s curse. Free to be who God created us to be.
So what do we do. We study what we believe in order to know how to value all of creation, our fellow humans as well. And then we act according to our values…our value in God and His love for others. That’s why we need armor because this battle of truth isn’t against flesh and blood.
Remember, the person you think you’re battling is also caught in this war…Satan wants their heart too. They’re not the focus. The lies of Satan are. The battle is for our heart and theirs.
Satan will twist truth to pull you away from God
God will work through His spirit, in your heart, to pull you away and help you realize and see truth …and set you free. Amen!?
A number of you were together this past week in a quick daily Bible challenge.